Sunday, March 27, 2011

Adjusting to Parenthood

The Huffington Post recently ran an article by sociologist, educator and parent, Dr. Christine Carter, about the challenges of adjusting to parenthood and the need for empathy with our spouses throughout this adjustment. She makes some great points - check out the article.

Earlier this week I wrote about the adjustment to marriage. For me personally, adjusting to marriage was a lot easier than adjusting to parenthood. It's just hard to love the total loss of your free time, even if you completely love the bundle that wakes you up.

The adjustment to parenthood is sometimes seen as a marriage killer: as Carter mentions in her article, 70 to 90 percent of couples report being less satisfied with their marriages after a baby is born. Here's two contributing factors:

1. The obvious: children take the focus off adults. So Mom is suddenly jealous that Dad is cuddling Junior instead of her; Dad would like to push Junior out of the way and regain access to Mom's breasts. That's a total over-simplification, but you get the point.

The remedy for this is equally obvious: regular, sacred time for each other. This may require hiring a babysitter, or sticking to a bedtime routine for the child that leaves couple time at the end of the day. Whatever it is, it has to be a priority. Even if you don't feel like it.

2. The less obvious: new responsibilities around the house reveal inequality in the division of household labor. Women bear more of the housekeeping burden than men, and we don't like it. Tara Parker-Pope's book For Better (read my review here) has a whole section on this. New baby = new chores. And often, though certainly not always, these responsibilities fall to the mother, who may have more time off work to accomplish them in. The habits of the early months of parenting leak into the years ahead, and can unintentionally cause rifts in marriage.

It should be noted that sometimes these inequalities in division of labor are perceived rather than actual. Sometimes the wife is more particular about how a chore is done, and her preferences negatively restrict her husband.

The fix for this is less formulaic. It has to start with honest conversation, followed by an honest accounting of what has to be done. Letting some of the work go might be the best thing: who really cares if the bathroom gets cleaned every three weeks instead of two? Finding a crutch, which I write about here, might be possible.

I suspect there are dozens (thousands?) more contributing factors to the challenge children bring to marriage. Finding your factors is the first step to greater satisfaction in your marriage, and probably to better-adjusted children too.

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