An unnamed three-year-old girl went viral for all the right reasons after her parents released a clip of her watching their wedding day years after the fact, and before she was even born, eliciting tears of joy at seeing her mom and dad’s happiness. THe video prompted comments on the joys of marriage and a loving, stable household as well as plenty of opinions on the inverse of such happiness that results upon the breakup of a marital union through divorce.
For context, a short video began circulating the internet on or just before August 2nd. The little girl can be seen watching awestruck at a younger-looking version of her parents all dressed up. She notes “there’s daddy” and “there’s mommy” as the wedding videographer’s camera pans, soon crying and hugging her mom. Some viewers suggested she was merely mirroring what she saw, as the father himself was crying at the altar in the video, though most took it to a deeper level.
One of the many X accounts that shared the post captioned their post by writing: “Parents show their 3-year-old daughter their wedding video for the very first time… and her reaction is absolutely priceless.” To date, their own post had amassed close to 800,000 views.
Reacting to that original post, a longer response touched on what some researches have discovered through observations of young children being raised in a home where the father and mother’s love for one another is seen and felt. “This little girl is not in the video. She wasn’t even born. But she is moved to tears watching her mother and father get married. Why?” the post began.
“Marriage researcher and family therapist Pat Fagan once told me: ‘When a child sees their mother loving their father they feel like their mother is loving them. When they see their father loving their mother they feel like their father is loving them. It is the only time in the human experience where you can be loved indirectly. No one’s even looking at you or touching you or talking to you, but you feel loved,’” the post continued.
“That is not the case with a step parent, he said. The child may tolerate the romantic expression. But they do not experience that same circuitous love. More often they feel competition or jealousy,” it went on. “If every child could order their own world, this is what they would say: ‘I want my mom and dad to love me and I want my mom and dad to love each other.’”
Concluding the post, it acknowledged the ugly reality that many marriages do end in divorce and that parents do not get this ideal home life. “Sometimes that’s not possible. Woe to a culture that intentionally denies that to children in the name of adult freedom.”
Much in the same vein, several comments on the video felt inclined to point out the opposite of what the child’s emotions and aforementioned research noted above. If a child can feel the love of their parents through witnessing positive interactions, then similarly they can feel torn apart watching them divorce.
“We like to put massive amounts of lipstick on the pig that is divorce: ‘It was for the best,’” one user replied. “The best for who? If seeing her parents get married moves this little girl like this, what do you think happens to her heart if they get divorced?”
“This is real. As a child of parents who divorced when I was young, there is almost nothing I wouldn’t give to see my parents the way this little girl sees hers. How I wish I even still had memories of my parents being married. Praise God my own child gets to see what I couldn’t,” someone else wrote.
Another user wrote: “If this is her heart watching them get married… imagine it when we divorce. Remember, your love is theirs too.” Watch the video that touched countless hearts below:
Featured image: Screen shot from embedded video