Why Do I Hate My Husband Since Having a Baby?

You love him. You're also pretty sure you could scream at him for breathing wrong. Since having a baby, something has shifted and it's scaring you more than you want to admit.

You're not alone. Relationship satisfaction drops for most couples in the first year postpartum: not struggling couples, not mismatched couples, but most couples. What you're feeling is one of the most common and least talked about parts of new parenthood.

Why it's always aimed at him

Because he gets to still be himself in ways you don't. His body is still his. He leaves the house and exists as an individual person with a lunch break and a bathroom he uses alone. You are tracking everything, anticipating everything, running on no sleep and some part of you is keeping score even if you wish you weren't. The rage has to go somewhere, and he's the safest person in your life to aim it at. That's actually a sign of intimacy, even when it doesn't feel like one.

When it might be more than relationship stress

Postpartum depression and anxiety don't always look like sadness. They very commonly show up as irritability, a shortened fuse, and a rage that feels disproportionate and foreign — bigger than the situation, darker than ordinary frustration. If the anger is accompanied by persistent numbness, anxiety that won't quit, scary thoughts, or a feeling that you've lost yourself completely, it's worth talking to someone. Treating the underlying mood disorder often changes the relationship dynamic more than any amount of couples’ conversation.

This is one of the hardest chapters. It is not the end of the story.

You don't have to white-knuckle your way through it — or keep pretending you're fine when you're not.