This is very new

[Harry07]

Hi, I felt it was finally time to reach out to someone. I am nowhere near comfortable enough to talk to friends about the way I feel, so thought I'd start here. There's a lot going on at the moment. I'm leaving Australia after 7 years living here, I have a 17 month old who has never met any of her family and becoming a parent for the first time has had an incredible strain on my relationship with my wife.

We are so different on how we think she should be brought up but we have no one to mediate because all of our family is back in England. I love her, I really do but I feel like anything I do, big or small really gets on her nerves.

My mind goes to a really dark place and the feelings I have towards myself are really low after an argument, even the really small arguments and carries over the days following when we are back on talking terms, it takes a while to snap out of it. I have the Beyond Now app installed incase those thoughts progress any further.

I don't know how to get on the same page as my wife but hopefully once we have some family support our relationship can regrow. It feels odd posting this to strangers, but hopefully this will be the first step of many.

[mmMekitty]

Hello Harry, welcome & thank you for sharing your thoughts & feelings.

I wonder if you & your wife are able to write up a list of the parenting practice & theroy you agree on, or can give a little on.

What sort of things are you in disagreement about? Are there some things more important to each of you & which things are less important?

& which need immediate resolution & which would you be able to discuss over time, for a resolution , in six months, a year, longer into the future, when the need for a resolution comes due?

While I think it is a great idea for parents to have clear ideas about their parenting, they also need to be able to talk about them, what they can agree to & what not, & why, in a respectful way. Arguing back & forth, getting louder & more upset by the second, isn't going to create the wonderful home you both want.

If you can't discuss without arguing, I would suggest something like Relationships Australia, who could help you both with this. I don't have their number on hand, & once you move away from Australia, you may want to find some similar organisation where you are more helpful.

I wish you all the best, & hope others will be by with a more personal response than I can offer.

mmMekitty

[tranzcrybe]

Your child is 17 months old - what is there to argue about?
Are you determining her future education, employment, spouse, sexual orientation??
Imposing your will over that of your wife, or hers over you, is surely missing the point. Many of the decisions will be an amalgam of both your desires where ultimately your daughter will be the determining factor.
Regardless, entertaining such notions is worthwhile even if you have a different view. Some people like to toss these ideas around to find what sits well with them, and arguing the point will be seen as denigrating such fanciful whims placing barriers to optimistic outlooks.
Replace the 'I' with 'WE' in all conversations about your daughter and see how that goes.
Reality kicks in eventually...

[Petal22]

Hi Harry07,

Wellcome to our forums!

Im sorry you are going through this I understand it really does put a lot of strain on the relationship being new parents….. it’s tough.

I understand mum and dad would both have different ideas of how the child should be brought up.

Sometimes I believe these ideas come from conditioning ( how you were brought up) how ever just because we were brought up a certain way doesn’t mean this can’t be changed.

Im sorry that you have been getting down from your arguments.

I’m here to listen if you want to disclose more about how you believe your child should be brought up and your wife’s.

Sometimes after having a baby the mother or father can experience postnatal anxiety or depression.

If you are feeling anxious or depressed please make an appointment with your gp and discuss how you are feeling.

Please come back to us when you are ready.

[geoff]

Hello Harry, when parents have their first baby much is spoken about and depending on the gender of it, the dad has ideas for his son, as does the mum if it's a girl and both envisage great ideas for the future.

It can change the relationship between the father and the wife as they have to change the routine they were once having and the responsibilities needed to look after the child, so the mother has more knowledge of how to address the problems raising the child, only because she has been carrying the baby for 9 months and that's not to say the dad wants to try different options, so disagreements can occur.

To be able to get on the same page as each other is when the baby takes it's first steps, the way it laughs, what it can start to eat and any other little achievement it has suddenly been capable of doing, so try and let the baby develop, their future can be decided later on, not now, she is too young and likely to change from day to day and as she meets her little friends along the way, her attitude won't be the same, except for her manners.

Going back to England to visit your family can't be assured that they will agree with how you want to raise her, it's a different country and not the same as Australia and the climate is not the same and may alter the situation, so going back is not necessarily the answer, but it's your choice.

Geoff.