Anxiety/Postpartum and relationship with Wife

[rmohr05]

I will start of by telling you that I am new to this type of thing. My wife and I had our first child 3 weeks ago and things have been going OK. i love my son and I can spend time with him as long as I have someone there to back me up. I started getting severe anxiety about at week 36 of the pregnancy. I had fears of becoming a father, being able to support a family and everything in between.  My Wife and I have been married for 2.5 years and dated/engaged for 4 years before then. The pregnancy was not planned even though we had talked about starting a family some day. Since the birth my anxiety decrease to manageable levels, but I have began to wake up in the morning with the fear that I might have married the wrong women. I think that this thought process was just the fear of being committed to someone forever.  We lived our lives before birth as two individuals and now we are a family. My wife has been great with the baby and helping me with my anxiety.

I feel bad that I have these thoughts about my wife. I don’t know if it is because of lack of intimacy, being tired and a little depressed.

Have any of you guys gone though this?

[rssooner]

rmohr05,

First before anything, congratulations on your wonder son.  My son is 26 months old and I will tell you that it has been a blur.  Everyone tells you that it goes fast and they are right.  Enjoy every minute you can. 

You name the feeling, I probably have felt it.  LOL.  Like almost EVERY father that has posted on here and/or has read the posts, we all have had a HUGE life changing event.  You are full of anxiety, stress, feeling of being overwhelmed, tired, much less patient...should i go on?  =)  All of these feelings and emotions will mess with your mind.  The advise I give most fathers and even myself many times is take a deep breath.  You are in the thick of it with a newborn and all of your emotions can "alter" your normal train of thought.  I felt the same way you did.  I felt like I just wanted to run and not deal with my wife nor my son.  Right now you two are just trying to survive the newborn phase.  If i could tell you just one thing to do that would be to open up and communicate with your wife while being as supportive to her as you can.  You both have to be a team with this huge life change.

I hope this helps.

rssooner

[JimmyBroke]

As a couple you should need to look to still be husband and wife and try to purposely set time aside  for your personal relationship even after the birth of child.Just go for weekly date or simple walk will help you.there must be proper communication between all the family including Mom , Dad and Baby.Sometime parenthood increases stress but be relax and enjoy this luxury of by remembering your own childhood.

[chevdoc]

Easier said than done.  I am going to go out on a limb and state that things are WAY different now than they were when we were children!
The whole time alone thing sounds all well and good, but the wife isn't focusing on the husband (she doesn't have the energy), she is focusing on the child!  There were several occasions -when I felt the distance between us growing, I tried to set up dates with my wife - she either felt guilty that she wasn't attending to our daughter, or she was too exhausted to go out and do anything.  Having a newborn in the house is a 24 hour a day job and there is precious little time for anything else (such as sleep-much less, intimacy).

Let's face it, women today don't even need a man to procreate.  And since they have been empowered, they really don't NEED us for anything else either.  Ask any strong woman if she feels she NEEDS a man in her life.  You should not be surprised by the answer.
Armor, Your wife is doing what she is supposed to be doing and your feelings to flee are perfectly normal.  As the "3rd wheel", you are now expected to abandon the alpha/hunter dominant being you were your whole life- to adopt the passive supporting role.  It is the hardest thing you will ever do for it goes against all you are or were ever taught.

Welcome to the 21st century.
My advice, is to find your own empowerment.  There are groups and resources out there (though you will have to dig) that give us tools to cope with the feelings you are having. It is possible (albeit tricky) -being a good husband and father while still keeping your balls intact.

Best wishes

Chev