A friend and I had a conversation recently about being a parent, the nervousness that comes with it, and dealing with it. I told him, in my somewhat new experience, the one thing you have to remember is simple.
Remember that even though you're now a parent, you're still a husband.
Or in some people's case, you're still a wife. Either way, its applicable if you're married and now have a child.
Jennifer and I have noticed that since the baby has come, we do argue a little bit more and are stressed much more often. We chalk it up to the stress of having a small, crying, diaper-filling baby in the house and we're wound pretty tight due to the stress that comes with that. Things that normally wouldn't bother us, we let get under our skin. So we have learned that we still have to focus on our marriage and make time for it.
Some people don't get this. They think, "I'm a dad now, that's my number one priority!" (again, if you're a woman and reading this, you can change "Dad" to "Mom" and nobody will know the difference but you). But this isn't true. At least, not in my opinion. Before you were a parent, you were a spouse. Unless, of course, you're trying to be a single parent, and in that case I commend you because its hard enough doing this with two people, and you've got a lot of guts to brave through this alone.
But, this is more for those who are married and have a baby now. There are really two ways, we've found, to make sure your marriage doesn't crumble down as your child grows up. After all, you don't want to ship your last kid off to college in 20 years and take a look at your spouse and say, "I'm sorry, do I know you?"
The first thing is probably the most difficult. Make time for each other. We do this by waiting until the baby is fast asleep and then watch television together. Sometimes snuggled up on our chair or couch, sometimes sitting across the room. Other times, its just as simple as having someone baby sit while you go out to a movie. Or just enjoying conversation with one another in the front seat while the baby rides in the backseat of your car on a trip to Wal-Mart.
As long as you're making time to still communicate and relate to one another at some point, you're doing good.
Secondly, enjoy the little things. Notice in the things about the first thing, we're not going out to a restaurant that charges two hundred dollars a plate? We're not taking a couple's cruise to Cancun? We're just watching t.v. and going grocery shopping. The point is, even if the baby is there, we're together, focusing on us for a few moments. It's the little things. Being able to laugh at small things that are said or done, like you did before the baby came along.
For instance, here's an exchange from when Jennifer and I were first married that made me laugh. I'll probably never forget it. I was in the bathroom of our first apartment back in Ellendale, North Dakota when I suddenly remember that Barry Bonds (of whom I was a fan growing up collecting baseball cards) had broken Babe Ruth's all-time home run mark. I shared this with my wife and the exchange went like this:
"Hey, Barry Bonds passed Babe Ruth! Did I tell you that?" - Me
"Okay." - Her
"No, I mean he passed Babe Ruth!" - Me
"What? On the highway?" - Her
I laughed.
Now take this exchange that happened just last night. I had changed the baby's diaper and thrown it away. Here's how that went down:
"I just changed her diaper." - Me
"Did you throw it away?" - Her
"No, Jen, I'm eating it right now." - Me
We both laughed.
So, that is a new parent's pointers on still trying to maintain your marriage while having kids.
I guess that'd be the third to add. Just try.
That alone could keep you from being strangers when you're in your sixties.
