Q: I have a 2 year old boy. Since he was born, my sex life has changed. Sometimes, we don’t do it for weeks. My husband is into pornography now. Is he not interested in me anymore?
We talked to hundreds of men and asked them about their marriage after kids. Most, if not all, of these men were frustrated about one thing...sex. Read what guys have to say about their unmet sexual needs when they can say it anonymously. All this dialogue comes from a purported “sports fans” website that one of our “traitor” guy friends put us on to (we bleeped out some of the more colorful material): Topic: “Married Men Who M*#*%&%*# ” Bob: Do you make even a modicum of an effort to keep it secret? What I mean is, do you do it when your wife is away, or do you just go ahead and start *#%*ing away in the bedroom knowing full and well (and not caring) that your wife could walk in at any minute?
Last month, as I was eating dinner at a new restaurant in Austin called Eleven Plates, I noticed Dennis Quaid and his wife, Kimberly Buffington-Quaid, talking to one of the servers at the bar. I don't usually stare at celebrities, but in this instance, I couldn't take my eyes off them. Dennis looked unhappy, withdrawn, almost defeated. Kimberly looked like she was trying to make an effort, but still seemed sad underneath it all. As they slowly walked out the door, I couldn't help but wonder, why did they look so miserable? Did they have a bad meal? Were they unhappy with their service? But it was so much more than that. Then it hit me. With two young children, four-year-old twins, at home, they are no doubt going through the toughest stage in a marriage. Maybe they're having marital problems? Fast-forward a few weeks, and here we are reading the headline: Dennis Quaid's Wife Files for Divorce. According to court papers, Buffington-Quaid says she is filing for divorce because things have "become insupportable because of discord or conflict of personalities." Are they, yet, another Babyproofing casualty?
USA Today ran an article yesterday titled "Years of Research Point to Strain Kids Put on Relationship." Not exactly breaking news for those of us raising young children. The article refers to the more than 25 separate studies in the past two decades that find that marital quality takes a dive with a baby's birth: babies raise stress, reduce happiness and otherwise upset the household. There seems to be a never-ending series of academic reports that find that those of us who are married with kids are less happy than our childless married friends. But are all of these studies focusing on the right emotion? Should we really be asking ourselves how happy having kids has made us?
“Trying to figure out what will get my wife in the mood for sex is like playing Whack-A-Mole.” —Dan, married 9 years, 2 kids
It’s hard to have perspective about this stage of our lives. We can’t see too far beyond the next milestone: “Things will be so much easier when he’s potty trained/in preschool/making his own lunch/driving a car.” But we can get some perspective from couples who have been down this road already. Even though marriage and parenting have changed dramatically in a generation or two, the fundamental experience of adjusting to parenthood remains basically the same. The parenting veterans once found it as shocking as we do now. They felt their way along in the dark just like we’re all attempting to do.
When it comes to taking care of the kids and the house, are you a Maternal Gatekeeper? Do you micromanage your husband when he changes a diaper or cleans a dish? Do you often find yourself in a tit-for-tat scorekeeping argument because you want things done your way? Many arguments about the division of labor arise because of our differing standards around the house. Women want things done just so. Men just want things done, period. And they will take that short-cut whenever they can. Do any of these sound familiar? Top Five Shortcuts Men Use 1. Change the diaper. Put soiled diaper on the floor or on top of the Diaper Genie, but not actually in the Diaper Genie. 2. Take the trash out. Don’t replace the trash bag in the kitchen. 3. Never change the toilet paper roll. Use tissue from the tissue box instead. 4. Place dirty clothes on top of the dirty clothes hamper. 5. Dress the kid in the first thing you pull out of the drawer. Whether it “works” or not is not an issue. And what about when our husbands are taking care of the kids themselves? They tend to use up all the Convenience Cards, all the easy activities to get them through the day.
Parenting is an unbelievably exhausting business and a certain amount of complaining, even moaning, about the daily grind is understandable and probably healthy. (Maybe it's just me ... but isn't there something unnatural and Stepford Wife-ish about the mother who never has a bad word to say about her husband and children? Or maybe I'm just jealous.) But many of us moms - including me - take things a little too far and play the Martyr.
For many of us, it takes having kids to realize that men and women are completely different animals. It comes as a surprise when, post-baby, men and women respond to parenthood in drastically different ways and start to assume different and not always complementary roles. Hardwired instincts nudge women into the role of nurturers and men into the role of providers. Given that we stepped out of the caves about 8,000 years ago, just a nanosecond in terms of evolutionary psychology, it shouldn’t be surprising that when we become parents our most basic instincts rise to the surface. We find ourselves back in the prehistoric suburbs, where women wonder if baby might be allergic to mammoth and if there are enough wild berries in his diet, and where men stalk buffalo and question whether their hunting abilities will be good enough to get the family through the winter.
Hillary Duff’s Marriage Advice for New Moms
Tori Spelling: Baby No. 4 On The Way
Is Jessica and Eric’s Relationship Ready for Baby?
Dennis Quaid Divorce: Another Couple That Didn’t Babyproof?
Bethenny Frankel Learns that Parenthood Changes Everything
How Jay Z and Beyonce Can Baby Proof Their Marriage
Gwyneth Paltrow, “The Good Wife,” or a Good Partner?
Why Brad and Angelina’s Kids Want More
Heidi Klum and Seal divorce. What went wrong?
Body After Baby: Let’s Get Real | Babyproofing Your Marriage is available at any major bookstore, or online: |
