I think, and I've read, that families are healthiest for the spouses and marriage, and even the kids, when the spousal relationship is the central one. Kids just take most of the time of family life.

God first Spouse second Kids third

Ask any politician, doctor, actor, writer, architect, farmer, athlete, race car driver, broker, warrior...they will lie and tell you yes but the truth is their work is their passion and wife and kids are byproducts. Look at our chldren of tomorrow. Yes, each child should enter the family nucleus the day they are born.

If they were, what a wonderful world this would be.

Absolutely not. As far as earthly matters, you should be the center and everything else including family should revolve around the center. I believe this is true, even for folks with no kids.

I believe they should be at the centre of everything you do whilst they are small; as they grow you widen that circle a little to give them their independence. Parental love is unconditional - no matter how big they get, I will still drop everything and go to them if they need me!

Not if you love them. If you love your kids, you need to provide them a stable, loving home. The best way to do that is to put God first, spouse second, kids third. Putting God first means that you are going to give them a stable moral environment. Please don't say that all people who call themselves Godly aren't necessarily. I know that. But people who put God first, not first after themselves, generally are moral and Godly. When people get into trouble is when they put themselves first and use God to justify what they want to do. Putting your spouse second after God gives you the best chance to stay in love with your spouse, so that you can make a loving home for your kids. Your kids should come next, nearly as close as God and your spouse, and very well loved. When you get these out of order, you end up putting kids in a less than adequate situation in life. You also give them the unbalanced sense of being the head of household when they aren't old enough for the responsibility. You want them to feel important and loved. You want them to be important and loved. You don't want to put them in the position of God or of the leader of the household. They aren't able to fill those shoes and trying to will only harm them.

There are actually two schools of thought on this... The first view is that it's all about the kids. In that scenario, what's "right" for the kids takes precedence and the marriage ia almost less important that the effort put into the kids. The kids get first "dibs". This is very tough on a relationship. The second view is that the spousal relationship comes first, above all. This may be very good for the relationship but it isn't necessarily best for the children. Somewhere in the middle I think there is a healthy compromise but I also think we need to keep in mind that the children will grow and leave. What you have left when they do is each other and I would hope that you've tried to take good care of that...