Boy oh Boy am I tardy on postings. Needless to say, we've been pretty busy over here at Casa De Sam. And that's part of the reason for this particular posting.
I KNEW parenting would be tough...tougher than anyone ever warned or cautioned us. Most likely the toughest thing we'll ever do.
But I didn't know, and wasn't prepared for the toll on marriage.
I'm sure some fly through this "new parent" thing without incident. Not us. Things have been pretty rough since we came home with Sam in July. Now, there are several legit reasons for that, such as the fact that it wasn't G's decision to be a SAH: it just didn't make sense for the attorney to stay home and the chef to keep working, financially speaking. His new role is hard on his ego and frankly, immasculating. Because of the demands of work, G now does the cooking, cleaning, laundry, you name it, all in edition to caring for and nurturing our son.
It wasn't my decision to be a working mom. I feel a tremendous amount of pressure being the sole income: am I bringing in new clients and billing enough at work? Am I putting in enough "face time" ... how are the partners viewing me as a new working mom? But most of all, is 2-3 hours a day enough time with my son?
Because of the stress of our new roles, and frankly, the fact that we are older and SO VERY set in our ways, we bicker a lot. I will admit, I usually start it: I pick on G for some little thing, and then the it brews into a fight. We make up, we always do...but the stress and strain remains in the background.
This weekend everything came to a head. We had a HUGE fight and then spent 5-6 hours talking. I mean REALLY talking. Baring hearts and souls and crying. Expressing frustrations, hopes, dreams, feelings of failure. We laid it all on the table. And you know what? It was fantastic. G and I are stronger than ever because we came back to the foundations of our relationship: friendship, communication, understanding and love. I think over the past 7 months we have forgotten about the communication factor. Well, I know we have. But no longer. Now communication is our No. 1 objective, our biggest goal.
As tough as the past few months have been on our marriage I wouldn't change a thing. Sam is the best thing that's ever happened to us, and we are navigating this "new parent" thing to the best of our abilities. So long as we keep this weekend in mind and keep the lines of communication open and strong, we'll be terrific parents and partners.
How is your communication with your spouse? Any room for improvement?
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1 comment:
We have a great therapist, and I belong to a women's group with that therapist. I have read and reread The Passionate Marriage many times....Things did not "improve" until we started talking about how bad things are, and what a breakup would look like; which neither of us wanted. My therapist always says to me; "people who don't have conflict are the most likely to break up". Glad to hear you cleared so much up together! Hurray!!
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