I hesitated on writing this post out of fear of what others would think. Would it change their perceptions of me or would they look down upon my marriage? But the truth is, most married couples experience this roller coaster of high and low moments . . . . I just chose to write about mine.
It’s no secret. I’ve shared before that my husband and I got married shortly after finding out we would become parents. Yup! We’re that couple. But we were confident in our decision and knew it was what we wanted. We loved each other, and we wanted a family.
However, we didn’t think about the drastic changes to come when our dynamic duo became a trio.
Adding a small person to our lives greatly highlighted issues that were hiding under the surface. Lack of communication, lack of balance, jealousy, resentment. I mean seriously, how dare he gets to sleep while I nursed our son into the wee hours of the night?
I often looked at my husband and wondered to myself who was this man. Why doesn’t he understand me, and why can’t I understand him? Speaking to him was once so simple, and it got to a point where we couldn’t exchange two words without it becoming more.
Those once cute nights of cuddling and binge-watching a show on Netflix turned into fighting back tears from a heated argument and getting baby to sleep. We barely spoke to each other. We wouldn’t touch one another. It was all about baby, and no longer about us.
I hated it. He hated it. We were miserable.
The worst part was realizing that our darling son was getting used to seeing us this way. He was used to mommy being in a separate room from daddy, and that crushed me.
I missed the man I fell in love with. And even more, I missed being happy WITH HIM. I had to remember that at one point, we loved each other so much that we decided to share forever together. So, I chose our marriage.
It wasn’t easy to fix, but agreeing that it needed to be fixed was the start.
We started counseling, communicating more, and truly listening to what one another had to say. We prioritized time to be together, time for ourselves, and, of course, time to be a family.
Although we took baby steps to turn our marriage around, once we got to a great place we realized that months had gone by since we last argued. We realized we couldn’t wait to see one another at the end of the day. We remembered how happy we make one another.
Marriage in itself is hard.
Marriage after baby can be harder. But with time and patience and choosing your marriage, it can work.
