A woman I know once announced that she loved her husband unconditionally. I don’t remember what led up to the announcement, or how I responded, exactly. I might have laughed; I sometimes do that at inopportune moments. I do remember saying, at some point, that my love for my husband was definitely not unconditional. She looked stunned. A little confused. I worried for a few seconds that I hadn’t spoken in English, even though it’s the only language I know.

We let the conversation go. Friends do that sometimes. They decide to stay friends, pour more wine, talk about rainbows and pandas.

But recently the lovely, talented Becky Sain wrote a blog post on the subject of unconditional love, and it made me want to address the topic because… I don’t know why, actually. Maybe I’m just curious what you think…

Here’s my take. I think I love my kids unconditionally, and my parents, which is good because, let’s face it, in the course of a lifetime, parents and children do a lot of damage to each other. Unconditional love may be an evolutionary imperative.

But that’s it for me. Beyond those four people, my love is absolutely conditional. I think there should be conditions – things like respect, reciprocity, honesty… I could list more, but I wouldn’t want you to get the idea that I’m hard to please.

So what do you think? Is your love conditional, unconditional, smokin’ hot and chocolate covered? (C’mon, it’s just us. Share…)