My twins are 10 months old, it took years to conceive them through IVF. They are everything I ever wanted and bring me so much joy. I’m struggling however with how my husband behaved in the months that followed their birth.
I have been with him for 11 years. I would say everything was good in the relationship until the day the twins were born. I could see all over his face it wasn’t the instant magical love people describe, more like horror. No bond whatsoever and instant sadness at the loss of “old life”. In the first week of their life when they and I were still in hospital together he drank heavily at home (doesn’t normally drink much so out of character) was generally moody, nasty and unpleasant, and basically made the start of their life what was meant to be a happy time totally miserable. I was truly shocked by his behaviour, no one including myself would have expected it from him. What followed was a couple months of his constant extremely low moods, angry outbursts, he made the first few months of their life extremely difficult, sad and totally ignored the babies, I did absolutely everything for them. I did every night feed. I was exhausted. He basically checked out and did his own thing and said he had post natal depression (… I know it’s up for debate if men can really “get that”). I just took over everything for them. He would walk in a room and not even look at them. It just broke my heart.
I was in shock by the whole thing and gave him the benefit of doubt as really I felt too overwhelmed to make any big decisions then. He was honest about how depressed he felt and asked me to give him a chance to sort himself out. Which, I have to say for the most part he did. Things started looking up about 4/5 months in, he became a lot more interested in them as they developed personalities, he helped out more, and generally things have been fine since.
Even though things are good now and I can honestly say they are - I struggle with how to let go of the resentment I feel about how he acted in those first few months. It’s also broken that trust I had in his character. I just don’t know if I can move on from it. Equally I also think am I being harsh as he was struggling and has dealt with it. I suppose I’m just still angry about how he acted. I don’t know how to deal with these feelings, I feel like I can’t discuss it now as it would be harsh to punish him again so to speak. I just sit and think about it every day and it consumes me though. Can a relationship move on from this?