"I just want my children to be happy. I want my children to be healthy"
About this Quote
The pairing of “happy” and “healthy” reads like a quiet hierarchy of needs. Happiness is the soft target, the aspirational one; health is the non-negotiable baseline. Saying both acknowledges how easily one collapses without the other, especially for children growing up adjacent to fame, where access and pressure arrive as a package deal. There’s subtext here about control, too: a parent can’t manufacture either outcome, only build conditions for them. That helplessness is what makes the sentence feel honest.
Context matters because Martin isn’t just any pop star; he’s a global celebrity and a high-profile gay father whose family has been treated, at times, as cultural evidence in debates he didn’t start. The quote functions as a boundary: judge my parenting by the only metrics that actually matter. It’s also an insistence on normalcy - not as an apology, but as a claim to the ordinary hopes society is quick to grant some families and complicate for others.
Quote Details
| Topic | Parenting |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Martin, Ricky. (2026, January 16). I just want my children to be happy. I want my children to be healthy. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-just-want-my-children-to-be-happy-i-want-my-102442/
Chicago Style
Martin, Ricky. "I just want my children to be happy. I want my children to be healthy." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-just-want-my-children-to-be-happy-i-want-my-102442/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I just want my children to be happy. I want my children to be healthy." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/i-just-want-my-children-to-be-happy-i-want-my-102442/. Accessed 4 Feb. 2026.






