The new intimate

Does having and raising children take a toll on a couple's personal equation? Here's looking at everything they didn't tell you before you decided to add to your happy family

by

Anamika Chatterjee

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Published: Thu 22 Mar 2018, 11:00 PM

Last updated: Wed 4 Apr 2018, 4:54 PM

Some of the most unambiguous stories about love - be they novels or films - end in marriages. But marital unions need not always be fairytales. The imagined 'happily ever after' often entails peeling off layers of familiarity and discovering someone you may love all over again. While the process of learning, unlearning and relearning things about each other is ongoing, the prospect of parenthood often adds a layer of ambiguity to it.
Raising a child is often considered an important milestone in a relationship, a culmination of the deep love that two people have for each other. However, what happens to this love when it is shared between not two, but three or more people? Traditional lore would have you believe that it grows deeper, but there's enough evidence to suggest otherwise.
While there is no denying the collective contentment, more often than not, parental goals take precedence over couple goals (even when the child has grown up considerably) and an emotional disconnect between the couple takes root. In an article in The Conversation, Matthew D. Johnson, author of Great Myths of Intimate Relationships: Dating, Sex and Marriage argues, "For around 30 years, researchers have studied how having children affects a marriage and the results are conclusive: the relationship between spouses suffers once kids come along. It seems obvious that adding a baby to a household is going to change its dynamics. And indeed, the arrival of children changes how couples interact. Parents often become more distant and businesslike with each other as they attend to the details of parenting. Mundane basics like keeping kids fed, bathed and clothed take energy, time and resolve. These changes can be profound. Fundamental identities may shift - from wife to mother, or, at a more intimate level, from lovers to parents."

From two to three
Johnson's words throw light on a less glorious aspect of parenthood that is at odds with the 'a-child-brings-two-people-closer' narrative. It is a dialogue that is the elephant in our living rooms.
Prior to becoming a mother, 34-year-old Roopal Kewalya was a fulltime writer who would write scripts for television shows. Late nights with her husband, who was a financial risk expert back then, meant long discussions on how their respective days went and etching out their career goals. When they finally became parents, they'd divvied up the child-rearing responsibilities equally. "With parenting, a couple finally has one common goal. But it does not always play out like that. It often subsumes individuality. You're no longer a partner, you're a parent. Also, life begins to lack spontaneity; everything is mechanised and regimented," says Roopal. For the first six months, both were equally hands on. But when her husband began to climb the career ladder, her son began to spend more time with her and, as a result, began to attach himself more to her. "Our attention was clearly on the child. Even if there was a disconnect, our anger and love, every emotion was directed at our child. We had very little to offer to each other," she says.
It was equally challenging for Shalini Menezes, who left a lucrative career behind in India to start a life with her husband in Dubai. It was an arranged marriage, which meant the families met to discuss the nitty-gritties of the union and Shalini and her husband only met to give their final go-ahead. The marriage started with genuine attempts to know each other and "look past the differences to find a common platform", when life took a different turn rather early into the relationship: the couple had a daughter. "This was a learning phase - deciphering ourselves and our roles as spouses, parents and, yes, children to our parents. Both of us are the first-born in our families, and were hence being watched by family members on both sides. We couldn't fail in the numerous roles we held at that point," she says.

The elephant in the room
In having a child together, a couple has one goal that is not his or hers but theirs. So, how does something, rather someone, that brings two people together also make them grow apart? Psychiatrist Deepak Kashyap says, "It's funny that, more often than not, the care, concern and sheer hard work that goes into rearing a child kills the same sexual and emotional intimacy that brought the child into the world in the first place. Appreciation of another human being requires focusing on them and investing time and energy in them. The time, energy and focus (not to mention the lack of sleep) that a newborn demands leaves you with very little for anyone else."
Men and women tend to react differently to such distancing. Kashyap adds that the feeling of not being valued is at the core of the problem. "Women may think that while everyone showed concern for them while they were pregnant, the focus has now shifted disproportionately, if not entirely, to the child. On the other hand, the husband might feel the same in terms of attention he received from the wife before the child was born. It sounds irrational, but sometimes, subconsciously, we may harbour resentment for having been dethroned from the princedom of attention."
The decline in the non-verbal form of intimacy, too, can create a void. Dr Shwetank Bansal, psychiatrist and director of Better Me Healthcare in Delhi says, "Women often experience a decline in their libido after childbirth while men have no corresponding dip. The resulting asynchrony can create ego clashes between the partners; surprisingly, this often happens without an actual word being exchanged between the two."
The intimacy between a couple also forms out of their surroundings. For instance, pre-parenting life, for a lot of couples, revolves around outings and interactions with other couples/individuals who may or may not be parents. For new parents, a lot of such social interactions are immediately curtailed as the focus is on taking care of the child. In the absence of these exchanges, many couples may experience a social isolation, especially the stay-at home parent raising the child.

The silver lining
The acknowledgement that a child may bring about an emotional disconnect in marriage is by no means a proclamation that all is over. As someone wise once said, where there is a will, there is a way. Perhaps at some point in the course of parenthood, couples rediscover each other. In Roopal's case, pursuing individual careers and hobbies actually brought intimacy back into her marriage. Though she admits it's not the same as before, she prefers to see it as a new dimension to the relationship. "Now that my son has grown up a bit (he's four years old), we have begun to follow our individual paths to bring in that freshness," she says.
On the other hand, while Shalini and her husband once struggled to find an 'us-time' ("He loved silence, I loved noise"), today they have found a common thread in Toastmaster's International, a non-profit organisation they joined to hone their mutual aspiration for developing their communication skills.
Writer Raksha Bharadia, who edits a relationship website, does not believe date nights can help retain intimacy in marriages where it's dwindling. She adds that it would do couples a world of good to find a hobby together instead, an activity that requires them both to do something together. Interestingly, Bharadia emphasises the importance of touch as a means to rekindle intimacy. "What is missing is not necessarily sexual touch, but a gentle foot rub or shoulder rub... These things need to make a comeback in modern relationships."
BOX/ And what of those who are 'child-free'?
Not too long ago, the word 'childless' got an update in pop culture - to 'child-free'. Today, a number of couples are making a conscious choice to not have a child, not because there is a medical or emotional baggage that prevents them from doing so, but because they feel a sense of fulfillment in each other's company. "You know, you are often told that having a child will make you come closer to your husband. I don't necessarily think that's true. I have been married for 10 years and have not felt that anything or anyone could makes us come any closer than we already are," says Oindrilla Das (name changed), a communications professional.
It's a choice that even men aren't afraid to make. Thirty-two-year-old advertising professional Prateek Suri is clear that he'd rather not be a parent now. Prod him if it is a decision that will remain unchanged, and he says for now, it is. "We are amid a circle where our friends are having children. But I am petrified of them. So, for now, we have decided not to go in that direction. Once you have a child, your entire focus is on raising them. At this point, we can barely take charge of our own lives, let alone a kid's."
Living in societies where the decision to have or not have a child is often scrutinised through a moral prism, the emergence of modern, 'child-free' couples points to a new narrative.
anamika@khaleejtimes.com