My Husband Changed After Kids

We all know having kids changes a marriage. Less time, more poop, lots of stress, and less sleep. On top of all the kisses, snuggles, and endless laughs. While parenting with your partner is beautiful and joyous, it is still challenging, no matter how you look at it. I fully expected changes in my marriage after our first baby. The whole world shifts, there are never enough hours in the day, and your primary role during those newborn is most definitely mother and father. Wife and husband fall pretty far down on the list. My husband changed after kids. While I knew there would be changes, no one ever shared with me the other part of the change. No one told me about the magic.

Marriage Does Not Change Things; Kids Changed Mine

My husband is a great husband. He is exactly what I knew I was getting and what I wanted for my whole life. Marrying him was one of my greatest decisions, not because I expected marriage to be blissful and to change our relationship, but because I knew what I was getting and I knew that all of the good was so much more than any of the pain points. And that is exactly what happened after the wedding. Literally nothing was different because I knew who I had married and what to expect. This meant our usual arguments around splitting of household chores, finances (he is a spender while I am a saver) and in-law involvement. Marriage included all of the same pain points, and we continued to work through them exactly as we always had. Marriage did not change my husband. But our first child did.

Now we still have the same pain points we always had, and truth be told they are usually exacerbated and worse than they used to be because well, KIDS. None of that changed.

But my husband changed after kids. My husband showed me something so magical when he became a dad and a co-parent with me. And he doesn’t even realize it.

My Magical Husband

My husband amazes me daily with the things he notices about my children. The extreme attention to detail he shows in their up bringing without even trying. Before the kids arrived, he was not one to be in tune with me. He did not notice my emotions or when I had a bad day. He did not notice a haircut, or new apartment decor. Something I knew about him, and not something that bothered me but just the way it was with us.

But he notices when our daughter starts preferring a different brand of banana (yes, apparently that is a thing), or when one of them is as he calls it “not herself today.” He knows how they like they hair, which shirt they prefer even when they don’t tell him, and how cooked they like their pancakes. When they yell from the playroom, he knows which toy they are fighting over before going in, and which cry means serious business. He calls me at work to tell me how cute they were when he woke them up in the morning, and how excited he was that he heard a new word they said. He knows each of their personalities so very deeply, and makes sure to meet them where they are.

Thank You Husband

To some, these might sound like normal parenting things. But when I see how he dove into parenting without any guidance or help and how many things he has changed in his own habits for our kids, I am simply in awe of the magic.  I know that the mental load of motherhood is very real, and it can be hard to keep it all together with multiple kids, working, and all the things that come with adulthood. But my husband shows me daily, that it is not just me. That he is right there with me in the journey of parenthood, and that we both make up the strongest team. He still doesn’t notice when I get a haircut or when I have been crying on my way home from work. But he is so very magical every single day as a father. And that makes him even that much more magical as a husband. Thanks for choosing me Jimmy, and for being so very magical. Now, how about that date night?

All the best,