To think babies shouldn’t ruin relationships

[lighttheresomewhere]

It’s so interesting and genuinely so heartwrenching to see the amount of posts on here (and hear it in real life too) about the amount of relationships that drastically change for the worst and even break after having a baby/babies.

we have a 11 month old and I feel like it’s brought us even closer. My husband is a fantastic dad and husband and last night I got all dressed up for him coming to bed and when we were going to sleep he said thank you for making sure we didn’t lose us. I said what do you mean? He said ‘we haven’t lost us’. He started saying about the roommate phase and how we never went through that etc. I said it wasn’t a conscious decision it was just natural that I wanted to have sex pretty early on again, I wanted us to still have date nights and be us but it subconscious. I told him I fell in love with him all over again in a whole new way seeing him bond with the baby.

im not trying to be antagonistic or anything I just genuinely don’t understand how relationships go to shit so much after babies.

A hundred reasons. You might end up with a baby who is hard to manage and you end up with no sleep and stressed. Or financially strained. Or find out that one or both of you doesn’t love parenthood the way they imagined, or you don’t have a partner who shares the load with you.

Good for you.
Not so easy for all families.

Well whoop-dee-do for you. There are plenty of reason why things might not be plain sailing for other couples. This post will just make others less fortunate than you feel like rubbish.

My understanding is often, after having a baby, people become less deluded, and it just shines a light on the problems that an outsider could see from a mile away.

Here for the comments.

If you’re genuinely one of life’s lucky ones and have absolutely nailed marriage, babies and motherhood whilst maintaining blissful honeymoon status with your partner, well that is great.

You come across as either not terribly self-aware or incredibly naive and I don’t think you’ll have an easy ride with this thread.

I know what you mean, OP. I think relationships that were already strong get stronger. I don't really believe people who say that it all went to shit after the child was born. I suspect that their relationships were less good than they thought, rather than they actually got bad.

What an odd question - I really don't see how you don't understand tbh. It didn't ruin our relationship but it's not hard to see how lack of sleep, financial pressures, lack of time etc can put a strain on things.
Plus from threads on here it sounds like a lot of women find out after they have children that their partner is not going to be equally involved, and they're left doing all the work.

Your post is quite naive and privileged. Even in your situation of having a decent partner/father (which so many people don’t have, but don’t realise until it’s too late), there could be a whole litany of things, off the top of my head:

Birth injuries
Postnatal depression
Sleep deprivation
Change to financial situation
Poorly baby
Just not enjoying parenthood like you thought you would

Etc etc. I’m glad it’s been plain sailing for you but it’s so often not the case.

im not trying to be antagonistic or anything I just genuinely don’t understand how relationships go to shit so much after babies.

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Well !

I've noticed that there are a lot of people on here who resent others' good fortune, so you're right that OP will get a hard time. However, that says more about the people giving her a hard time than about her, IMO.

You got all dressed up for him coming to bed? .... vom.

That’s lovely for you but you must lack a startling amount of self awareness if you can’t see how children can change a relationship- and not for the better.

'we have a 11 month old and I feel like it’s brought us even closer we've been lucky to avoid mental health problems, man being a useless shit bag, baby having health problems or not sleeping or feeding well, financial problems, living in a damp house, landlord throwing us out, husband having an affair, just not finding motherhood easy'.

There I fixed it for you. Having a baby didn't wreck my relationship either but I don't think relationships that go west do so because people don't try to can't be arsed to wear a lacy nighty for dear darling husband.

Thank God I never had a sex life that required me to get dressed up to go to bed. Or to boast about it in front of women who are struggling to keep even a semblance of normal life together.

Err, you’re less than a year in. I wouldn’t be bragging about anything just yet.

But seriously, if you can't stretch your limited imagination by a centimeter, you don't sound old enough to have sex, let alone a baby.

You don't know other people's stories op. I had 11 months of pure hell with my youngest- if your baby had been like that then you'd have had your ups and downs too. Nothing wrong with my marriage, it was just a challenging set of circumstances. Throw zero family support and horrible 12 hour nhs shifts including night shifts into the mix too. We are a strong couple but it hasn't been easy all the time.

It’s lovely parenthood has brought you closer together.
Sleep deprivation and the workload a new baby brings isn’t something you can really fathom until you’re in it. It pushes you to the limits, makes some people more irritable, some people want to escape. Of course for many people, it puts a huge strain on their relationship. Of course some people won’t pull their weight, because it’s hard to do so. And then resentment builds.
It’s great you haven’t experienced this, but surely you must be able to understand how it happens?

Try having another one 😂

What the fuck even is this post?

@HungryandIknowit I was also going to say that! God the arguing 🤣

Your too soon in this game for boasting!

My impression is that happy relationships seem fairly equal until you have a family then suddenly women find themselves overloaded with the mental work of the “project management” of a family life - while daddy is told he is doing a great job for doing normal parenting stuff.

It’s dealing with this, that seemed to cause the most friction both in my relationship and the others that I see around me.

Unbearable smugness often comes before a fall 🤷‍♀️

Bless you.

Have you won the Nigerian lottery lately?