Dennis and Kimberly Quaid were on the path to divorce, but now they're giving their marriage a second chance. Marriage with kids is hard work, but well worth it. Time and time again, we see couples, especially celebrity couples, split after kids. Why does this happen? No one really talks about it, but we will: Marriage after kids is a tough business. Here are the main challenges:
Google “happiness and having children” and you’ll find a lot of depressing studies that seem to conclude that we have a national epidemic of miserable parents on our hands. The three of us have to admit that, in some respects, a good response to our own “what happened to my body/career/marriage since I had kids?” questions would have been a fairly swift kick in the ass.
When my first kid was about three months old I reached my breaking point. I was downright exhausted and needed my husband, Ross, to pick up some slack. (Let me preface this by saying that Ross is a great guy. This happened during the early days of parenting when 'he just didn't get it.') One time, I remember telling him that all I cared about was stepping on some sort of exercise apparatus, improving my overall hygiene, and getting a few hours of shuteye. At the end of the day, he was no where in sight. Where's Waldo? I called him on his cell and of course he said he was on his way shortly. And what did I hear in the background? I could swear it sounded suspiciously like a combination of Golden Tee and a keg being tapped.
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 Dennis looked unhappy, withdrawn, almost defeated.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?
“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.
As we’ve said, in most relationships, women are the primary scorekeepers. But men play ball, too. In the following entry, we’ll try to unravel the reasons why. Here’s what we think they are (brace yourselves!): 1. To preserve parity. Men feel like whatever they do, it is never enough. 2. To maintain control over their lives. Men express irritation that, often, their wives control (or attempt to control) their relationship with their kids, their home environment and, inadvertently, their free time. 3. They need acknowledgment (just like their wives). If the “Thank yous,” the “You’re working really hards,” and the “You’re a great Dads” are few and far between, they begin to wonder if their wives take them for granted. Just as most women are stunned by, and rarely happy about, the domestic obligations associated with motherhood, men, at times, rail against the lack of freedom that accompanies fatherhood. Some men despair that fatherhood has reduced their life, outside of work, to one of relentless domesticity. It is this fear (that nagging “is this it?”) that serves as a backdrop to much of male scorekeeping.
“Despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, I have not been able to answer . . . the great question that has never been answered: what does a woman want?” —Sigmund Freud All Dr. Freud really needed to do was spend a day with a mother of two preschoolers and he would have had his answer: we want a partner, not a helper on the domestic front. We want the gender equality we were raised to expect in our marriages and our parenting. And we’d also like some validation from our husbands to go along with it. “We had our first kid and almost overnight I felt like I went from being an equal to being the lesser partner in my marriage.” —Becky, married 8 years, 3 kids. “Why am I the only one in the house who knows where the pacifier, diaper wipes, and sippy cups are? Where the hell has he been living for the last three years?” —Rachel, married 6 years, 2 kids. In the course of writing about this topic, we realized women tend to keep score more than their husbands. There are two very good reasons for this:
Dennis and Kimberly Quaid Know Marriage After Kids Hard Work, But Worth a (Second) Try
Hillary Duff’s Marriage Advice for New Moms | Babyproofing Your Marriage is available at any major bookstore, or online: |
