Is Parenting Drowning Your Marriage? It’s a too-familiar story. James and Cindy have come in for couples counseling because they worry they have grown apart. With three children under the age of 12, they want to see if they can salvage their marriage. They can’t imagine breaking up the family even though they feel they are breaking up.
Cindy is tearful. When asked the last time she felt close to James, she says it was probably shortly after the youngest was born. Since then, there seems to be no time for them as a couple. She misses him. She says she loves the active, energetic household and all the kids’ activities. She loves her job. She does love James. How on earth do other people hold onto romance when there is so much to do in a day
James, for his part, also enjoys his kids and the hubbub that comes with family life. He coaches the eldest’s soccer team on Saturday mornings and takes his two daughters to swim team practices when he can. He feels somewhat guilty that he can’t find more time to be with Cindy but resents it that she isn’t more understanding. He’s doing the best he can to do his job and be a dad. He says that other than the kids, he doesn’t think they have much in common anymore.
This marriage is drowning in parenting. What has evolved is a child-centered arrangement that is working for the kids but not for the adults. Jobs, household chores and the children’s activities have crept into every available minute of every day. The only time the couple gets to see each other alone is during the few minutes before they go to sleep, when they are exhausted. These people are great parents and effective partners in the business of being a family, but they have lost much of the connection with each other. READ MORE