To ask if anyone found their relationship was ruined by having a baby

[daffodildandeliondaisy]

Hard to say how.Has this happened to anyone else? We used to get on so well.I am sad this is no longer the case.

Yes it's been a hard long slog.

Dc2 has nearly destroyed our marriage. If dc2 has been our first we wouldn't have had another.

Going from dc1 (who looking back was an angel) to dc2 was just pure hell. I ended up in hospital for 10 days and nearly died, no sleep for 3 years, chuck in pnd, a couple of miscarriages, 2 redundancies, I am amazed we made it.

Saying that DH has always put the children and me before himself he almost burnt himself out. Which is a lovely sentiment but ended up being hard on all of us.

We recently has a couple of days away from the children and it's shown us both how much we have changed (not in a good or bad way) of what we used to do, it's been hard not to be sad about what we have missed out on as a couple.

Saying that we adore both of the children and in all honesty I wouldn't change a thing. DH might!! Our marriage is stronger now than ever before. It's been hard work but we are still here.

It was a huge shock to us. We'd enjoyed 11 totally hedonistic years as a couple, living the good life and doing just as we pleased. I am not a natural mother (DH is a natural), plus I had severe PND after DD1 was born, which made those first few months horribly bleak.

There was a good 18 months where I felt that we were fighting some bizarre type of trench warfare, especially as DD2 came along very quickly. In those early years, we spent a lot of evenings, just staring mindlessly at the TV, barely speaking due to exhaustion.

All the sparkle and the glitter kinda faded away for a while. But the love was always there.

The real turning point for us was a family holiday in Cornwall, and it was the first time we'd gone away, without the DDs needing bottles, buggies, nappies, and daytime naps. We had a really special time, and were able to properly relax and enjoy the moment. From then on everything just got easier and better.

Ruined? No. Bloody hard? Absolutely. We had 3 non-sleeping kids so there was no sleep for about 7yrs. The youngest was very ill for a time and dealing with that (SAHM) made me very ill for a while. We definitely had some ugly rows and lost ourselves for a bit.

The youngest will be 4 this year and light is starting to glimmer at the end of the tunnel. Everyone sleeps now and we get out a bit more often. We're starting to think about ourselves as well as them. It feels better!

It hasn't ruined our relationship but it has changed it. I still love dh to bits and we generally get on well. What I miss is feeling like someone treasures me, which I know probably sounds so selfish. But pre kids I felt like he cared about me more. Now I often feel like he can't be bothered with me. I don't mean he is uncaring, or that she ignores me, but there isn't that same level of attention. I know it's down to how busy we are and how tired we are...we used to pay more attention to each other and take better care of each other far more which I find quite sad.

But no it absolutely hasn't ruined the relationship. I still feel that we are in love and that we have a strong relationship.

It hasn't ruined our relationship, but our sex life is ruined mainly cos I'm just too tired all the time :(

We went through a rough patch when the DC were little. All the usual reasons - sleep deprived, not enough quality time for us as a couple, etc. Now they're all at primary school and things are back on track.

Babies are definitely hard on relationships, particularly the first when it's all very trial and error. Babies tend to come alongside mortgages, lower pay for one partner, higher outgoings and these coupled with a lack of sleep certainly take their toll. It's possible to mitigate and remain a close couple but golly it's hard work sometimes.
As the children grow and fly the nest that lifelong partnership seems to come alive again and the rebirth of the fun and joy of marriage reappear. We've loved being a family, we've loved raising children but we're now reaping the benefits and loving not having to worry about them on a day by day, hour by hour basis. I truly believe if you make the effort to work through the hard times (ordinary hard not seriously abusive) you end up happier in the longer term. Weve always known we were in it for the long haul but now we have a huge shared memory and are remembering why we fell in love.

DP and I dont want kids for so many of the reasons given above.

We like sex we want
We like being able to just do things on a whim
We like being together with no pressure
We like being able to plan things without childcare factors
We like our careers - neither wants to give up that for even a wee while to look after kids
We like the expectations we have of each other without the pressures of extra money being needed, being able to go out with friends without dumping kids on the other parent, being able both concentrate on being us.
We dont want the mental health strains that some many parents go under (PND affects both parents).
We both like being able to save our earnings for things we like, rather than some kind of family fund where individual desires are quashed.

Basically, you have to be sure and have to understand the real impact of having children.

Crumbs thank you - beautifully put.

Can you elaborate op?

I already had a baby when I met dh so we've always had to work our relationship around a child. When we had our second it didn't make an enormous difference.

I can imagine how it impacts on couples if they are used to a certain lifestyle. Often one partner (usually the man) doesn't think anything should have to change for him, and that causes resentment.

Yes though after having DS I realised how much DH relied on me to nurture him and look after him. I no longer have the energy or will to parent him as well as DS, and this has had a massive impact on us.

DS is amazing and will never regret having him, but he is high maintenance and still not a good sleeper. We have no family support so it is often tough. Whether we'll still be together once DS has left home is very uncertain.

DH has always been like a best friend that I really fancy, so we get through the harder times by seeing the funny side and trying our best to make it easier for each other, for example I'll get up earlier and make breakfast for the DC on the weekend if he's had a hard week and he will take over childcare and let me tell me to go and chill out if the DC are being difficult.

DH's happiness is equally important to me as the DC, we put them first because they're children but we look after each other too. The only time we fell out because of the DC was when DH went back to work after DC1 was born, I felt he'd abandoned ship and resented him for being able to go back to his old life as if nothing had happened. I think I was terrified of being solely responsible for keeping the DC alive!
We are as happy as we have ever been, DC are 8 and 5.

Definitely like a hand grenade for us and I suffered badly with PND with DS1 a s I'd had a DD who had died before him - I felt like I should be happy he was alive but actually it was bloody awful at times.

However - 20 years together, youngest DC 8, life is so much easier.

I reckon we stuck it out for 2 reasons:

1. Both our sets of parents are divorced and we didn't want that to happen if possible

But when it got really bad 2. Like the saying goes, we never both wanted to get divorced at the same time

I already had a child when I married ex-h so like some others, our lives revolved around children from the off. He didn't want any of his own and I was absolutely clear that I didn't want any more before we even married. 11 years on, I am past 40 and he decides he wants to be a father out of the blue. He put me under enormous pressure. At this point, pressure was off with DD, we had more freedom, we didn't have any financial problems and I was very reluctant. However, to cut a long story short, I fell pregnant. Had DS at 42. I knew that having baby was a mistake for us, I even voiced that to ex-h. He thought it would be fantastic. Poor DS was troubled from the start, didn't sleep for 2.5 years, subsequently diagnosed with ASD. By this time, ex-h had had an affair and left, other affairs were uncovered. He couldn't bear not being the centre of attention, having a child wasn't what he thought, he had no patience, no understanding. Was a frankly shit father. This Christmas he cut DS out of his life and we haven't seen him since. So here am I, approached 48, with a 6 yo ASD child and wondering how I am going to cope going forward. I adore my son, he's an utterly gorgeous little boy and brings me endless joy, but this was not what I signed up for. Children do put a bomb into your relationship, things are never quite to same. However, there are many stories here that show that most people manage to get through it perfectly well and I think you have to take the rough with the smooth because they are so worth it!

I think both of you being sleep deprived and trying to keep everything as "normal" as before the dc come along takes it's toll. How old is your baby? Hormones can mess with your head especially if breastfeeding. I was very temperamental for months after our dc were born.

We survived the baby period. It was hard but we always say "as long as we stick together, we will get through it" and it works for us. Once dc started to sleep better and we got more sleep and better organised, we were stronger than ever. We were together for over 10 years before Dc so we know each other very well and we cut each other a lot of 'slack' when we need it. I try to reason with myself "what would a reasonable person do/say?" because I know I can be stubborn. Having children has made life better but there are ups and downs. It's part of life. Overall, we are very happy and are very loved up again.

My ex turned from Prince Charming into a narcissistic control freak when I was 4 months pregnant with twins. Or rather, he started showing his true colours. After they were born (at 28 weeks), he just got worse and worse and turned very abusive. He dotes on the DC, but I had to leave him with the help of the Woman's Refuge. I lost everything and just ran. Even now, four years after I left him, he still tries to control me .

We had a fantastic relationship before doing everything together etc. Still like it now but the exhaustion and lack of real time alone has caused an increase in arguments.

I wouldn't say it has ruined anything for us, but its changed a bit and it makes you question your relationship when you bicker everyday for a month.

But I do know we are crazy about each other really.

We have an 19 month old DD and this time last year my marriage was in a real mess. I was convinced having a baby had ruined our relationship and we had been together 10 years at the time. I was furious with him all the time, depressed and lonely. He didn't help enough, particularly at night it was all on me and then I also had to get up with her in the morning. Looking back I don't know why I hacked it but like others have said, I was in a fog and we live overseas so I had nowhere to go without taking DD away from her dad completely. We had our first wedding anniversary last March, when DD was 7 months old, and I remember i cried all night because I was so sure it would be our only anniversary.

Well now things are a million times better. At about 10 months in she started responding to him a lot more rather than being completely attached to me, I stopped breastfeeding (which I had found incredibly hard) and he started to turn back into the DH I knew. Since then things have been great and we are coming up to our second anniversary

I am also 6 weeks pregnant and I have to be honest, I'm terrified how DC 2 will affect things. But Im prepared for it this time and won't be taking any shit - and I've told him so!

Hope you're OK OP. In a lot of cases, it gets better. Having a baby is a huge shock.

My husband says no one should be allowed to divorce for the first 7 years of having an new baby! Well, obviously apart from actual abusive situations. But his point is that having a baby doesn't make a relationship, it potentially reveals the cracks in it instead, and every couple needs recovery time aka biding time until life becomes bearable again! before deciding it's time to part company.

He's kind of got a point. We went to relate with child 2, because he wasn't sure he could take any more. Now they're a bit older he's starting to feel like he's (we're) going to somehow make it after all!

No, but any illusions are long gone. I was pregnant within 4 weeks of meeting dh, so it was a conscious decision from both of us to carry on together - though having said that, we felt from our second date that we were likely to be together long-term.

Dh is chronically ill and when I met him he told me his illness was well-controlled with medication. This was a great big lie massive oversimplification. Not surprisingly, the stress of a new baby made his illness much worse and things were extremely difficult. He really had no energy for anything except work and sleep, and would be in bed for most of the weekend, most weekends. I went back to work pt when ds was 10 months old and thank goodness I did, as by the time ds was 18 months, we'd decided dh had to leave his work before he was sacked - he works in an industry where people never take time off and he was sick quite a bit. dH says he felt very lonely at that time and I kind of knew that, but at the same time I had a child to look after. I don't think he ever understood, at all, the total needs of a child. I spent a lot of time not saying anything, it took a lot of energy not to criticise, but really what was the point? He was too ill, I needed him on my side as far as he could be.

Fast forward to ds being 13, I'm the breadwinner, DH is a SAHD. DH and ds are really close, and so are we, I think we will be all right. It's unrecognisably better than the early years though I was lucky really to be able to make so many of the parenting decisions by myself without conflict. I think we've been able to leave most of our troubles in the past. DH is unalterably committed to me, well, I can imagine he might fall in love with someone else as he is such a romantic and I'm a bit of a slob but that would just be one of those things and nobody's fault.

Pregnancy changed the way I feel about dh. I didnt want him anywhere near me. I recovered after the first dc, but not so much after the second.

He was lazy and in denial with our first baby so that made me angry, exhausted, resentful. Not a healthy combination.

He made a decision when I was expecting dc2 which affected all our lives, and made mine much harder. He made it quite casually at the time and I stupidly went along with it. Now I look back and think I should have fought him.

After all this we are still a happy couple on the surface, but i agree with a pp, arguments are important. You've got to fight fair and get everything out.

We were so close and in love before the dc, but yes that has changed. Now I definitely love the dc much more than him.

truffle I honestly don't know if there's hope tbh. It hasn't changed my opinion of dp, he hasn't shown his true colours or anything like that. He's still a good man, a great day and all round lovely person - we've just lost 'us' somewhere along the way.

We did fine. But don't have a kid with a lazy selfish twit as they will just get worse. Have seen this happen a few times.

I was shocked how difficult it was when ds was born. How much the dynamics changed.

I had dd already when I met dp. She was almost 2. So I assumed we would be fine. Ds was very much wanted and it took 3 years ttc before I got pg.

As a couple we had been through 3 close bereavements together, dp had nearly died, we had had money worries and job worries and had set a business up together that was a very steep learning curve.

Basically I thought we were pretty solid.

However the dynamics changed so much and DP just couldn't cope. I had always been the strong one. All of a sudden I was an exhausted, bfing, hormonal mess. He had to be the strong one and pick me up.

He didn't do very well and when DS was about 4 months old I lost my shit and told him to leave.

After a few hours driving around he came back and apologised. We talked. I told him how let down I was. He said he found it so difficult, blamed bfing, blamed him working away at the time, yada yada yada.

I told him he was being abusive and controlling and lazy and if it didn't change right now he was gone.

It took a while but we found our way back. He is a very good father now to both my dcs. Ds is 3 and dd is 12 and he is calm, patient and a good dad. He does his share of the work and earns enough for me to be mainly a sahm apart from our business paperwork. He is a good partner too.

But it was very, very hard in the early days. It shocked me how much he changed. I still don't understand why that happened but it did and we dealt with it. He says he was just overwhelmed with it, he missed me and our relationship and I think he felt shoved out by the baby.