Post-baby relationships can go through rough terrain as stress increases, alignments shift and expectations change. These transitions are natural and normal, but will need careful attention. They will require each person to grow oneself up in order to successfully navigate through the rocky roads of post-baby relationships.
Last week, we held an important and enlightening teleclass on enhancing couples’ post-baby relationships, expertly presented by Debbie Pincus, pyschotherapist and coach. In case you missed it, you’ll find a link to the recorded class HERE.
Some words of wisdom from our expert:
“When a new member of a family arrives we experience joy. But with change, positive or negative, stress occurs. Expectations and pressures of one another increase. Attention to one another shifts. When one person in a family feels stressed everyone in the family feels anxious. Family members try to resolve their anxious feelings by taking on familiar postures toward each other. These postures are automatic and we tend to slip into them with minimal awareness. They are emotional and reactive. Below are the typical ones:
- conflict
- distance
- over or under function
- deflect onto another (usually our children)
Although these ways are automatic reactions that attempt to manage stress between us these behaviors actually intensify it.
You can reverse this cycle by managing your part of the dance – if your spouse is loud and angry, get soft and quiet in response. It actually does take two to make a fight. If you can pause, breathe and step back you will calm things down. When you are calm you can think clearly and solve the problem you are facing. Best of all you will help your relationship to thrive!”
We also covered how sleep deprivation affects a relationship. Mommybites has dozens of articles on ways to help your infant and toddler sleep which we hope helps you, the parents, get more sleep! Here a just few:
Creating Healthy Infant Sleep Habits
Creating Healthy Toddler Sleep Habits
Debbie also spoke a lot about self care. Here are a few articles from the Mommybites Archives on this:
Debbie Pincus is a psychotherapist and coach. She has been practicing privately for over 25 years and has offices in Manhattan, Larchmont, NY and Greenwich, CT. She leads parent groups through Greenwich Hospital and The Relationship Center. Ms. Pincus is the founder and Executive Director of The Relationship Center. She writes weekly online articles for Empowering Parents and has a CD series and book entitled CALM PARENT AM & PM, published by Legacy Publishing Company. She facilitates workshops, seminars and parent groups throughout the area.
Debbie Pincus can be contacted by email at [email protected] or by phone at 914 834 4965. Her website is www.debbiepincus.com. Her articles can be found on Empowering Parents.com
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