As noted in the title, we are both 34 and just had our first child together, after being married for a year and a half, and we were dating for 4 yrs before that. I cut out the rest of the backstory to hopefully get below the character limit.
Since our baby was born, I have done 90% of the diaper changes, cleaned 99% of the dishes daily, kept up house cleaning, delivered water/food/tea from the kitchen whenever she needs it, constantly offered/asked if anything else could be done, held our son while she takes personal time in the bath for multiple hours at a time, woken up in the middle of the night almost every time she wakes up to breast feed, told her she’s doing a great job, and otherwise offered every other means of support I can think of. I’m also sole financial provider.
I’ve been home 24/7 for the last three weeks on paternity leave and the baby is held and cared for by one of us at all times he’s awake…Nevertheless, when I gently asked if she’d be ok if I went to play a computer game for an hour at the beginning of his next 2-3 hour nap (meaning his needs are met and she would presumably have relaxing time too) she flipped out and said I’m always trying to escape and she “feels like a single mom.” Huh?
I have been putting my own mental/emotional/physical health on the back burner, the way I feel a dad should.. Honesty though, I believe a person has to stay healthy and take care of themselves to be able to care for others. Self care is like the first rule of caregiving and therapy, isn’t it? I bring this up respectfully , and suddenly I’m not contributing ANYthing?
I still feel my sore legs from bouncing him for 3 hours because he was overtired, don’t tell me I’ve done nothing.
Now, when she said this thing about feeling like a single mom, I admit, I reacted and got defensive and tried to remind her of everything I’d been doing for the family, but that just triggered her to tell me I wasn’t listening etc…
We got louder, she told me I was a terrible person and to be quiet and not yell, and I retorted that she was terrible too if she’s going to attack my character (in the same breath, I said “I don’t really mean that but I’m saying it so you know how it feels”) and I logically explained that she was calling me a terrible human when I was just trying to calmly make her aware of need I had for a mental break…by that time I think we had crossed the point of no return, and each time I said I was sorry for saying she was terrible (she never apologizes to me, btw) or that I had raised my voice, she threw out a new insult to exacerbate the argument. ie. Me: “I’m sorry” response: “you’re so disgusting and despicable”. very confusing…
Ultimately, faced with her ongoing insults while I was genuinely apologizing and saying, “please stop this and please remember I love you”, I got frustrated with her angry outburts and said something like “alright, if you feel so much like a single mom and hate me so much, be that way and I’ll seek full custody when we get divorced. I have videos of you being physically violent with me” -OK, Not my best look – and yes I felt bad and apologized for saying that, yes it was an emotional outburst, and yeah it made things worse than they had to be, and it’s not justified despite her attacks, but it’s all totally true…we’ve got underlying issues that she hates talking about.
At that point she shut herself in the bedroom, and I went to shower and to cool down emotionally. I felt like I had just needed to beg to take a 30-60 minute piece of quiet time (now no longer happening due to our emotional turmoil) , and was more exhausted than before. After showering, while our son was still asleep, I went in to see her and said, “can we please reconnect? I’m sorry for the things I said.” In response, she told me I was delusional if I thought she would talk to me after what I said. I apologized again, and she made it clear she wasn’t talking, and I went to sulk in the living room, where I slept on the couch, and continued into the next evening.
I feel miserable and alone. I resigned myself to surfing the news and Reddit (a small comfort to read of others’ woes, I guess)….really feeling in the doghouse.
I also know that attempting another apology will just throw fuel on a raging fire. Seems backwards, but it’s true.
Anyway, as she decidedly began the silent treatment and locked herself in the room, she is fulfilling her own gripe and effectively being a single mom, completely taking care of our son on her own for the last 12 hrs, and keeping me from him. I expect she’ll later blame me for not being there for them.
My dad-instincts hate it and I want to step in and pick him up when I hear him cry from the other room, though the door is shut and I physically can’t (she IS taking care of him so I’m not concerned about our son’s safety, btw. )
My vindictive, hurting instincts say, “let her see how it actually feels without me being there,” though I know neither of us is gaining anything through this. She has said this thing about being a single mom before today and she lays the guilt on any time I mention my own mental hygiene and need for brief snippets of mental downtime (like, I can’t even shower, or she says something like “did you enjoy spending SOOO LONG in the shower?”…literally, like if it’s 10 minutes, she’ll guilt me for it being so long, despite the fact that I’ll go out of my way to let her take hours long baths without disturbance).
I’m still handling both dogs and housework, and waiting patiently for her to come around to the fact that we’re supposed to be in this together, and that I am NOT trying to escape by taking a few minutes here and there to maintain my emotional sanity. I guess it’s my take that if our baby is asleep, it’s our time to either nap or do adult things. She seems to think that every single minute, even baby’s sleep time should be 100% either focused on her or on baby boy.
Now, today, she covertly reached out to our couples therapist (as she typically only engages in meetings after we have an argument that she blames me for, and strategically avoids meetings when we are in an ok spot and are able to get down below the surface). And we have a virtual meeting scheduled Thursday (in 4 days), which I only know about because of our joint email account she insisted on having. My guess is that the meeting headline will be that I threatened her with divorce and I’m so unsupportive and we will glaze over anything else…and I will apologize.
But I still won’t and don’t feel settled….
Please advise what you think I should do now, and long term, and how would you make the best of this marriage – or if/how you would you get out – and how I help my kid have his best life.
If I don’t reply promptly, it’s because we are still in the midst of this…
42 comments
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I honestly had to stop less than halfway through. I got the gist of it.
How was your relationship prior to birth or even getting pregnant for that matter? It’s obviously also possible that you’re dealing with a wife who has post partum anxiety or depression.
I saw you mentioned therapy. Forget about what you think might have been discussed without you. Insist on hanging a session WITH you. Don’t focus on thinking your therapist has been influenced. State the facts and go from there. Good luck.
Edit: full disclosure, I’m a guy, happily married and have a toddler. Just letting you know that I can empathize.
You’re both adjusting to a major change in your lives while being extremely sleep deprived. On top of that, your wife’s body has major healing to undergo and her hormones are a complete disaster. Do not underestimate the impact of her hormones right now. I’ve seen it make friends weepy, angry, paranoid, hysterical…you name it.
It sounds like everyone needs a break. And you REALLY, REALLY need to learn how to argue without getting that ugly. You’re always going to have disagreements but you can handle them much better than this.
Is there anyone who can come watch the baby for a few hours so everyone can rest without needing to pop up and check on the baby?
Here’s an idea:
You wrote all this out here. Write an open letter, to read at your therapy appointment, expressing all of this just like you have here. In fact, you can read this post.
A lot of people end up caving and saying whatever will end the argument, without actually addressing their own needs, in the moment. But for therapy to be helpful, it can’t just be a vehicle for one party.
Was she abusive prior to pregnancy? If so, it is unlikely to change. If not, she’s very likely suffering from [Post Partum Depression](https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/postpartum-depression/symptoms-causes/syc-20376617) or [Post Partum Psychosis](https://www.postpartum.net/learn-more/postpartum-psychosis/) both of which are serious medical issues that *need* to be addressed as soon as possible for your safety, her safety and, most importantly, your baby’s safety.
I’m going straight to PPD for this one.
So, firstly, you really cannot go that nasty in arguments with your spouse. It doesn’t matter who is right or wrong, the minute you go straight for the jugular, you show her that you are not a team, you are only caring about winning.
You cannot go back from threatening to take the baby away by using videos of her physically hurting you.
Second. You have videos of her physically hurting you? Talk about burying the lede. When did this happen? Why did this happen? How was this resolved in your relationship? Has the physical abuse continued?
Why are you still with this woman if she was violent enough with you that you had to take videos?
Why does she need to covertly reach out to your couples therapist without mentioning it to you?
Why do you have a shared email that she “insisted” on?
Third. Post partum hormones make it hard to be logical. You keep talking about talking logically, but that means fuck all of someone is suffering from post partum depression. Assuming the violence mentioned earlier was due to psychological issues, those absolutely will get worse during post partum.
Assuming your wife was abusive, she will get worse now that she has a kid to keep you from leaving.
Assuming you both are just toxic adults, you both have to want to change for the better to be better parents for your kid. And it sounds like you are both happy to be assholes to each other.
Fourth. The baby phase is hell on earth. If you handle stress badly to begin with (sounds like it is true for both of you), you will explode. You both need to find good therapy (possibly separately) and work on yourselves for your kid. Assuming you are both toxic people.
If your wife is abusive, then do not go to couples therapy. She will use the therapist to continue abusing you and force you to cave to her demands. If your wife is intending on escalating, you need to get out. Do not let her find out that you plan to leave. Gather all the evidence you have and get a lawyer.
Is there anyone in your life that you trust that doesn’t talk to/like your wife? They can help you escape and help you prove to the court that you need full custody.
Updateme!
Don’t threaten with divorce. Do it.
If she’s physically abusive to you she’ll be abusive to the child. Get full custody asap before she does and puts you on child support
Sounds like this relationship has been toxic for a while and then you went and had a baby with this woman and now your surprised that it’s getting worse? Honestly, you probably should get a divorce and work on healthy co-parenting before you inflict a bunch of emotional damage on your child.
I get that she may be suffering with a postpartum ailment, but are we just glossing over the physical abuse part? Ok cool. If the roles were reversed in this situation, the same people would be screaming “leave him”, “divorce him”.
Another dad here!! I have four with twins in the middle so it doesn’t make me an expert but it does mean I have experience. Three weeks removed from delivery is not a lot of time. Everything you say you do for your wife with your son is spot on. But here is the kicker, that is the expectation. He’s not your wife’s child he belongs to both of you. You are not holding him while she does what she needs to do, it’s your turn.
That being said mental health and your ability to find your own time within the new normal is crucial. What I’ve learned is not to ask for it, take it. When you know your boy is down for the next hour or two because that’s how long they sleep right now, take it. But keep in mind while you take it you are still on duty. I would say the first 6 months you are on call 24/7. After that you can start to get away for real.
As far as your wife goes her hormones are all over the place!! Just because she is no longer pregnant doesn’t mean it quickly resets back to normal, nothing does. She just went through traumatic surgery that resulted in another life to care for. Her body needs to heal all the while she has these new maternal instincts she has to learn how to deal with. If she is breast feeding forget it. Pressure on top of that. Is she producing enough milk, why is he losing weight, the sore nipples, the let downs, and oh yeah she still has to eat something and bath herself. How would you be right now?
She deserves to be on the pedestal you put her on all by herself for the next 3-6 months, then you can you can let her start lowering the pedestal gradually. Just you know the baby has a permanent spot up there.
On the flip side, try not to get taken advantage of. It may feel that way in the beginning but I promise you. It’s supposed to. She gets longer bathroom breaks, meal times, and rest while she heals. Learn to take everything she says right note with a grain of salt.
Let me give you a piece of advice. If she “never apologizes”, your whole marriage will be built upon resentment from unresolved conflict. Ultimately you will be bitter, angry, resentful, and despise the woman AFTER you’ve spent countless hours in therapy trying to figure out what is wrong with yourself for making all of these mistakes in your marriage. Clearly they ARE your mistakes, you’re always taking responsibility for them, apologizing, and doing the necessary repair work. If they were her mistakes she’d be apologizing, right?
Don’t do what I did. Don’t waste 20 years of your life with a narcissist. Recognize what is happening and leave that person before they destroy every ounce of self-confidence, and self-esteem you ever had. It will only get worse from here.
My apologies to others who feel I may have overstepped, but I doubt you are the ones who have been trapped and eaten alive in the grips of a narcissist. It’s pure evil.
Why are you with her if she is abisive?
I think you guys should separate. You seem to hate each other. There’s a toxicity there and it seems to be increasing and overflowing. Maybe split custody would be ideal
Wtf how is no one not seeing that his wife is pretty much a monster? Abusive and psychopathic? Come on now
Why, why, why the fuck did you two have a child together.
Yes I know the newborn period is exhausting and stressful but my god, the way you speak to each other, it’s like you don’t even like one another, let alone love.
Only 3 weeks ago? Wow, yah…I bet she’s not in the ‘greatest’ place right now physically and emotionally. I won’t even be surprised with her dealing with PPD too.
You mentioned her reacting physically, is this pre-baby or post-baby? If pre-baby, that’s not a very good reaction for her to have and since y’all are seeing a therapist soon, better bring this up as one of the issues.
Also, have you guys had issue with you gaming in the past to the point she got so upset over it? Or overreact in her anger? It sounds like she’s so touchy about you gaming period. Might as well put this is in the list of issue.
Make a list of issues that you need addressed and bring it to the therapy session.
You guys probably shouldn’t have had a baby.
I went through a very similar experience with my wife. She was diagnosed with PPD/PPP.
She needs to see someone ASAP. It doesnt get better in time.
So my initial thought was that this is probably PPD on your wife’s part but then you got into the argument and damn OP, there’s a lot more going on here than just whether it’s ok for you to take a break and play video games.
Kids are definitely stressful and it’s easy for resentment to build around the division of labor. My wife and I have a solid relationship and two kids and I still catch myself in moments feeling frustrated with her and we occasionally have to clear the air.
That doesn’t sound like what you’re going through though. During your fight, your wife failed to communicate with you, blamed you unfairly and then ended the fight by hiding for over half a day. And that’s not even mentioning her physical abuse or that you felt so frustrated you brought up divorce. Everyone is different OP but for my part, even in the worst fights my wife and I have had, the D word has never come up. Even if you all are both more flippant than we are, it’s not a great sign.
You need to share this with your therapist. Do they know about the physical abuse? The fact that she hides away for excessive periods of time? That she and you are both so frustrated that divorce will come up? They need to know those things and you need to be asking if this is really a healthy relationship where you’re getting what you need.
You are in an abusive relationship. If you had a friend going through this, what would you tell them to do? Violence is never ok. You’re child is an infant right now but that doesn’t mean his home environment can’t impact him. What outside support do you have? Friends/family? Do you participate in counseling on your own? First open your own email account, start documenting when fights happen etc. FWIW I worked child protection for seven years and if we were involved we’d be making a safety plan to ensure your kids safety. Is this the environment you want them to grow up in?
I’m sorry this happened to you and that your fight got so out of hand.
When I started reading I thought although it’s not great behavior of your wife to be so sensitive and pushing all the work on you, it can be excused with her hormones being all messed up and her ongoing recovery from giving birth. It can take quite some time for a woman to go back to norm after having a child, hormones and their effect are no joke.
But after reading your whole post, this doesn’t seem like a valid excuse anymore. It seems like you got serious issues before the pregnancy and birth already, and her behavior was abusive before as well. I can understand that you wanna try to talk stuff out and maintain the relationship, especially since there’s a child involved now, but if she keeps on behaving like that, guilting you without any reason, accusing and gaslighting you, shortly, if she continues to be abusive and using your child and her motherhood as a weapon against you, you should maybe seriously considering to end the relationship and get custody.
Also be aware that continuous fights and a hostile atmosphere at home affects the child. It won’t be able to really understand what’s going on for a long time, but children can sense from a very young age that somethings wrong. Parents who are constantly on edge and hostile towards each other will make the child uneasy and anxious too, even if they don’t fight directly in front of it.
>when I gently asked if she’d be ok if I went to play a computer game for an hour at the beginning of his next 2-3 hour nap
​
Since no one wants to say it, this is CONTROLLING as fuck lol , how the hell do you have to ask if she allows you to relax after you did everything you mentioned ? It should be like “Okay he is sleeping, ima relax a lil bit on the computer let me know if you need me” .
​
Whatever, I am sorry for you man, you look like you are doing your best and more than what you should do, being THE financial provider, doing half (or more) of the houseworks.. Man you are even serving her tea water whenever she needs it.
​
YOU ARE HER HUSBAND NOT HER SERVANT. If her abusive and controlling behavior continue and if she doesn’t want to her about what she did wrong.. I don’t see any solutions here except maybe divorce (and I wish it doesnt come to that, for the kid and both of you), it looks like your wife is the kind of people you can’t disagree with..
Anyway, since she is locking herself and ignoring you, take this time to relax instead of having the blues , don’t be ashamed to do it. You deserve it.
Did this pattern of behaviour play out before you had a child together, or is this just a post partum thing? Post pastum depression can increase irritability and irrational emotions, so that could be at play here. But if she acted this way before the baby, it is possible that this is just her personality. Every couple has moments of stress and disagreement, but her behaviour sounds unfair and not conducive to reaching a solution.
For the sake of the baby, please get a divorce.
I won’t go into detail but 8 years ago, 10 days after my son was born, my wife had a psychotic break and was diagnosed with post partum psychosis. She became a completely different person, in her case, she lashed out against others but was just distant from me and was actively fearful of our son. She also developed very weird types of OCD, extreme mood swings, and later admitted to having constant suicidal thoughts. We were lucky that she took the prescribed meds and eventually I was able to convince her to meet with the psychiatrist at least once a week. After a couple of months, her old self started to come back to us and a year later it was just a bad memory. For the first months after her break, I did everything related to our son and also did what I could to help her heal.
I know that this is a completely personal anecdote, but it is important that you understand that the effects of pregnancy are not limited to the physical toll it takes on their bodies, the hormonal changes will change their personalities. In most mothers it might just be the strong maternal instinct everyone knows, but it might also turn into post partum depression and in some extreme cases, post partum psychosis.
Before thinking of therapy, separation, and custody; make sure that there isn’t a medical reason for her behavior.
Em dude, it kind of sounds like your wife is abusive. If this is sudden for her it could be a post partum thing. If she was like this before, then yeah, she sounds abusive.
>I have videos of you being physically violent with me
the fuck?
So let’s just recap here:
1. You had to ask your wife permission to play a computer game for an hour while your baby was sleeping.
2. She accuses you of being an absentee partner, then calls you a terrible human being. You then spend most of the rest of the argument apologizing to her.
3. You have videos of her being physically abusive to you (I haven’t seen you respond to any comments asking when this happened and how long it’s been going on).
4. You let her kick you out of your room because she doesn’t want to talk to you.
5. You essentially let her take your baby from you, the farther, because you are too scared to go in the room to get them.
6. You are sitting Idle waiting for her to throw you under the bus to your couples therapist.
Dude, you are being abused. Sounds like you were being abused before the baby. It’s not going to get better. Don’t let your threat be empty. Divorce and fight for custody if only to protect the baby. It’s not gonna stop with just you.
The fact that you left a lot out of the backstory leads me to believe you should have never married or had a child with this woman so you might as well cut your losses now.
You’re both exhausted and you’re both horrible communicators who go for the kill shot the second an argument starts. Both of you. You two need to get into couples counseling NOW or your relationship is toast.
The first few weeks/months of the baby’s life are ROUGH. I remember how intense everything felt! Call it hormones or a life changing event… it’s not easy. Combined with sleep deprivation, uff, it sucks.
But on top of that, in this case, you add the factor of being very toxic to each other. I bet the relationship was already constantly disrespected and fights are your norm, because babies amplify our emotions and now that the baby is here, this is what you both project. Toxicity.
Well, she is abusive and definitely gaslighting you.
The fact that she’s physically abusive should already have you divorcing her and seeking primary custody.
>I have videos of you being physically violent with me”
…
So she’s abusive to you, physically.
Your description is saying she’s mentally abusive as well.
What would you like to happen next? My thoughts are your child shouldn’t be in the care of an abuser. How do you feel about that?
> I have videos of you being physically violent with me
I feel like you slid past this pretty quickly. Was the physical violence before or after the baby?
Why did you write a wall of text about a million other things and bury a one line reference to having video evidence of her physically striking you? Wtf happened there? Have you ever hit her? How long has she been hitting you? Why are you trying to salvage an abusive relationship and what makes you think she won’t hit your kid?
Was she like this before? Did you always do most the chores? Does she work? I know you said you financially support the family but did she work at all?
I think you need to simultaneously take 2 tracks here. Number one is protect yourself. Document these occurrences, communicate with your therapist separately as well (if not also get your own). If you have a joint bank account you need to open a separate one to keep money that isn’t for household expenses. Savings accounts? Investments? Those need to be in your name. Basically prepare for this to go badly.
On the second track, write her a letter like you did here. Engage in therapy and try to build a healthy equal relationship. Set boundaries so you are able to take care of yourself as well. Stop apologizing, until she is communicating with you genuinely. Let her know you’re available to talk, you would like to resolve things, and leave it at that. Ball is in her court.
Hey got check out r/daddit
You are in the trenches my friend. You are in the part where it is at its hardest. Your wife has hormones flying all over the place. Don’t take things personally, and remember her body was just changed and now it changed again. Keep fighting the good fight.
Not saying this from a place of negativity but instead out of concern. Why is there lots of assumptive vilifying? “I assume she will do this and that and say this”….etc. Makes OP come off as a Narc…like a narrative is being built up in OPs mind regardless of her actual participation. I can sympathize from this alone why she would tun to a therapist every time because it is super difficult to communicate effectively when one or more partners have this emotional wall narrative mentality. It puts her in a “damned if I do and damned if I don’t spot”. Also most people do not go to therapy when something is successfully communicated because a therapist is not a “tallier referee of the blame game”. OP should seek therapy for themselves because there is a lot of toxic behaviours and passive aggressive thought patterns here (from one passive aggressive to another here btw – not judging). A therapist can give you amazing tools for how YOU deal with YOUR emotional baggages and great tools on how to deal with someone of her personality type. Also, have you communicated directly with her when she asks questions? ie: “Why where you in shower so long?” Try: “I feel like I needed some me time and it makes me really happy”, Instead of the mentioned habit of just saying sorry and begging a forgiveness or pouting in the couch about it. The latter is all things a good therapist can teach you. It also sounds like she may be suffering from emotional instability due to some Post Partum Depression. Delivering a baby into the world can be emotionally and physically traumatizing for many women. Maybe support her gently while at the therapy session she is organizing and voice your concerns. You can write a letter to read to her in front of the therapist if feeling emotionally “on the spot” is an issue (a helpful tool). If she is also constantly mentioning things about her and her fears it’s most likely she is not feeling understood by you, not just heard. You also seem to be having the same issue with her about speaking up to be understood in regards to your “I still won’t feel settled” comment. In summation; a therapist for you along with a couples therapist. It is a lot of emotional work with not a lot of immediate gratification but massive payout in the long run. I say that because lots of people go 2-3 times and feel they are cured and their partner “should be changed”. If she got physical with OP that is wrong for many reasons, but OP saving the videos as leverage us also wrong (either press charges, forgive or leave). Nothing healthy will come of emotional blackmail, especially now that a child is in the mix. OP, you need to decide if you want to try putting in the emotional work with this woman you chose to have a child with or if it is an abusive situation you should walk away from regardless of the potential PPD. For you and your child, a therapist can also guide you to a social worker who can help you navigate safely (community resources) leave an abusive situation without leaving your child behind and making a bad emotional decision that could prevent you from your share of the custody.