For those of you who haven’t seen the movie- “I want you to want to wash the dishes” is the best line of “The Break-Up,” a movie starring Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn. What Jennifer’s character is saying is, I want you to love me. I want you to love me so deeply that you see me struggling to wash all of the dishes from OUR big dinner together. I want you to see me struggling and out of that love you have for me, I want you to demand that you do them instead. His reply was something to the effect of “why would anyone want to do the dishes” to which I always reply to my husband, ” why would you think I want to do the dishes” and a fight inevitably ensues. Like how I did that? I just admitted that my husband and I have had this fight 1000 times. I’ve said to him a million times “but I do everything,” to which he always rebuts in anger.
Having a child is hard on a marriage. It takes all of your “minor” fights and turns them into volcanoes. After 18 months, my husband and I decided that we not only wanted our relationship back but we demanded it.
Our generation is the therapy generation. We are the first generation to break the cycle. My husband and I sought professional assistance to work through our “fights” which we now know as our “negative cycle.” We have a clarity that our relationship has not had since the early months. My husband and I actually sought couples counseling before we got engaged. That was when I knew he was the one. Just kidding, I wanted to marry him after our third date. But this was when I knew that this was the man that I would rather fight with than live without. We both wanted to put in the work to improve what we had. Our current therapist fits us. She is advocating for our marriage. She is teaching us how to speak to each other about our feelings through emotion focused therapy. This has been life changing for us.
I have only this to say about marriage after baby. Marriage is not perfect. It is two imperfect people coming together to create something magical. Sometimes we get it wrong. Forgive yourself. Forgive your partner. Seek assistance to move forward. If separation is what you need, do that. Listen to your heart. Be honest about what you are feeling. You can only receive what you want if you take a risk and ask for it. Otherwise, you aren’t giving people the opportunity to disappoint you. You are disappointing yourself.
MumGene 