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One of my biggest fears
Someone just posted the article below on my local board and it totally made me tear up. One of my biggest fears as we endeavor to start a family is the way that children will change our marriage. I love my relationship with A but there is no doubt that it will change when babies are thrown into the mix and sometimes that terrifies me.
Thoughts? How do you think your relationship will change with kids? How did it change?
Here's the article - forgive the fact that its completely hetero, I think the general idea can apply across the board:
Missing the woman I fell in love with
My wife and I share a home and a bed. We kiss goodbye in the morning and hello in the evening with such ritualistic regularity that if one of them somehow gets missed, I worry it means bad luck.
We have a marriage in which we tell each other things, without large, dramatic fights, a marriage that in our affection and respect for each other seems awfully good in comparison to those of most of our friends.
But somehow in the past ten years or so since our first daughter was born, in the mad swirl of breastfeeding and colic, of Pull-Ups and wipes, dinners and playdates, car repairs and sweeping, versions of each other that we used to take for granted -- versions of our relationship -- have gone missing.
Christina and I met around 20 years ago. The friend of a friend of one of my college roommates, she appeared to me first at a party a few weeks after graduation. I thought she was gorgeous, and remember standing in the kitchen talking to her, trying to make her laugh.
She left the party early, and I later heard she'd gone off to Europe. There was a boyfriend.
But through the coincidences of social life in a big city, I ended up living with a high school friend of hers, while she returned to New York to work in the same office as another friend of mine from college. We became part of each other's circle of friends.
Over the next year or two, as we spent time with each other on a semi-regular basis, our banter became more flirtatious, and I finally asked what she was doing Friday night. She answered "Something with you," and we've been together ever since.
What I remember most about our first years together was our laughter. We giggled in bed at night and over the course of long weekend mornings, lying on our backs, legs draped across each other's legs. Shameless hilarity in restaurants, malls, on the sidewalk -- a private world of absurdity and delight, in love with the ridiculousness of the world and each other.
We moved in together, married, and bought an apartment. Jobs gotten and lost, money pressures, depression, a relative's drinking problem, fertility issues -- the stuff of adult life -- all pounded at us but ultimately pushed us closer. At last we became parents together, sharing the shocking face-smack of responsibility and obligation that comes with the precarious-seeming beauty of infancy.
Of course we were still silly together -- it's who we were -- but there was less time, less energy. Christina's body, during pregnancy and breastfeeding, and even after, it seemed, was owned by our daughter Olivia. The baby was lavished with affection, but maybe not husband and wife so much.
The baby was tickled and sung to and spoken nonsense to and made to laugh, but maybe not the husband and wife so much.
A new job, more fertility trials, the dehumanizing infinity of adoption paperwork capped by waiting, waiting, and finally our baby, a second daughter, Lucy. Our life continued, almost on autopilot.
The children grow and their needs change. They must be fed, the mortgage paid, the sidewalk shoveled, bedtimes enforced. The obligations -- to the preschool, the PTA, my job, Christina's work, Olivia's preposterously plentiful homework -- are a constant, staticky background to our lives.
My wife and I support each other, can count on the other, and on random weekends away can recapture flashes of that old lightheartedness.
And there are new shared pleasures: looking at each other in baffled rapture at the half-wit brilliance of 4-year-old Lucy explaining "how they make grass"; beaming with outsize pride at 9-year-old Olivia's dance-recital seriousness and grace; witnessing a spontaneous, unexpected gesture of affection from an older sister to a younger. And the attempted mom-dad hugs in the kitchen dissolving into four-headed laughing kiss-fests.
But it's too little, too fleeting. We spend so much of our lives passing each other on the way somewhere. Me on the way to see whether the sudden, eerie silence from the girls' room is Lucy scaling her dresser like a climbing wall (it is). Christina on the way to the basement to put the laundry in the dryer because no, I have to admit, it wouldn't occur to me to do it on my own.
Our bedtimes drift apart -- Christina's closer to the girls', mine later toward a precious hour or two of private, need-free quiet time listening to music, reading, or watching bad TV.
What's gone is the pure selfishness that brought us together. Something that belonged only to us, that was unique to us and part of us, has gotten lost.
But isn't this what happens in life -- that what I remember was a time, not a thing, and we can no more recapture those versions of ourselves than we can travel to ancient Rome? That a normal part of becoming an adult, of raising a family together, is leaving behind treasured swaths of the love affair that got us here -- the mindless lust, the inside jokes, the laughter? Perhaps. But even so, selfish though it may be, I miss my wife.
So we must build on what we had -- what we still have. We're different people now, in different lives. We've changed, and so our love must change. The problem isn't really that something is lost. It's that we've been looking in the wrong direction, sitting there waiting for something to materialize instead of getting up and making it ourselves.
We'll have to try a little harder to see past the day-to-day. If I do, I'll find my wife -- she's in the basement taking stuff out of the dryer.
And if she can postpone bedtime for just a few minutes (please!), she'll find me down in the living room watching bad TV. I can't tell you how easy it would be to get me to turn that damn thing off.
Blogs: Our Growing Family - CT Working Moms
Re: One of my biggest fears
E.M.'s take on how children will change our relationship: "I honestly think they will bring us closer; because we will have to work together on a lot of it; a lot of what we do now we can do on our own. It's part of us, it's ours"
My take on how children will change our relationship: I am not too sure, I know E.M. and I have spoken about making it a point to have dinner as a family every evening. to not lose our sex life, to not stop talking about our days (Even if they do consist of laundry and diapers and finger painting!) We've also spoken about making sure we go out once a month after the baby is a few months old for "adult" time.... goto dinner, go dancing, get a hotel room. Mommy and Papa time. I worry sometimes because we do fight... things I think should be common sense (taking the trash out when you leave for instance) aren't always what's on his mind... I've had to learn to be a bit more flexible and realize it won't make the house colapse if the dishwasher isn't unloaded the day it runs or there are absolutley no marks on the hard wood floor. I've had to realize that I didn't fall in love with E.M. for his cleaning habits I fell in love with him for his personality and eagerness to do right in all he does... much like I am sure he has had to remind himself he didn't fall in love with me for my temper that can sometimes get out of hand but for the reasons he loves me. I think as you spend more and more time with someone you do indeed take for granted the little things.... you just have to sit down and take a deep breath and remember to be together.... to make the time to be with one another.... if we waited for time to appear in our schedules I wouldn't have seen him since 2 christmas' ago... I believe much of what we have learned since becoming a couple will apply with children... and as always we will learn as we go.
The fact that children will change our relationship is one of Sylvia's greatest fears about having kids of our own. I struggle every time she brings it up to find the words to reassure her and quell her fears. I don't think I've really fully succeeded yet.
My own personal approach is this: Yes, children will change our relationship in both predictable and unpredictable ways. But our relationship will change regardless as to whether or not we have children of our own. If we desire children, but then don't have them just because of our fears about the changes in our relationship they will bring, then our relationship would be forever changed by that decision (and, I suspect, not in a positive direction).
We've talked about this a lot (how our relationship will change and our feelings about that) and even now are still working through some of these issues with our couples counselor. The best we can do at this point is to talk about how we might handle challenges we encounter-- how we can strategize, find ways to carve out time for each other, communicate effectively about parenting decisions, etc.
Sometimes, I feel very hopeful. Sometimes I feel that a strong marriage with good solid lines of communication (and an action plan for when we are not communicating well) will see us through. Sometimes, though, I am less optimistic. Being partnered with Sylvia through her daughter's teenage years has highlighted what "rough" can look like for us-- we get stressed, don't sleep well, disagree on how to handle particular situations, and snap at each other. At those times I just try to remind myself that we'll have at least 15 more years of practice as a parenting team before we have to do this again (thank goodness and knock on wood)!
ETA: I don't mean to imply that Sylvia's daughter drives a wedge between us-- dealing with the issues frequently does bring us closer together-- it's just that she's 20 and it's been an exhausting couple of years. *feeble smile*
IUI #3 gave us the best 2nd anniv. gift ever: 2 babies! (born 03/09/10)
Peanut and Little Man are getting so big! 2 years old already!
finally blogging again at This Will Be: An Adventure
S wrote her thesis on how children change a marrigae. The statistics are sobering. The answers in the surveys were scary. They really put a strain on so many couples.
Because we researched and read so much about it I think we will be better prepared to head off trouble before it really starts.
excellent point, I definitely agree.
Blogs: Our Growing Family - CT Working Moms
sahm ~ toddler breastfeeder ~ cloth diaperer ~ baby wearer
L, my MIL, and I were talking about this yesterday. No matter how much you prepare, plan, or think you know about children - they change your life, your relationships, and your being. Both L and I had spent a considerable amount of time with children (she having 7 nieces/nephews and having raised her younger brother and me babysitting/nannying/working with children and parents professionally) but nothing prepared us for having our own children.
There are times it has really rocked us to our core (which is saying a lot since we've gone through a lot in nearly 9 years and even briefly split before the kids were conceived.) But I think that having no family around/available (the only help we've gotten was for 4 days immediately after the birth of the boys) and having twins (the divorce rate for parents of multiples is significantly higher than parents of singletons) has certainly had an impact on us. There are certainly aspects that have brought us closer together, but exhaustion (we have one child that has only slept though the night 15-20 times in almost 3 years) has really driven a wedge in our intimacy (not only sex - but just general intimacy) and communication (especially now that the kids are talking and understand everything, we just don't have anytime alone until they go to bed at 9pm.) At the end of the day, we are just exhausted. We need to get back to realizing how important that aspect of our relationship is.
It also doesn't help that L is working on her PhD full tilt right now (in addmition to working FT) and isn't home M, W, Th nights or Sat/Sun until 3pm. This is going to go on for another 2-3 years. Really, if we can make it through this, we can make it.
Re-reading this, I know I sound like Debbie Downer. But we've been shocked how much life has changed and how deep our love is for our children. While it is harder than we even imagines, we wouldn't give it up for the world. Our kids are a contant sources of smiles, laughs, and amazement.SOmeone posted this on TIP and our consensus was that this dude sounds like a total pansy, with the whole "woe-is-me" attitude. Get off your a$$ and help her with the kids already!
But yeah, it's a fear I have too, if we ever have kids (probably not going to ever). I don't think that's a challenge I, personally, can handle.