IS IT OVER? WHEN THE BABY NEARLY BROKE US

Having a child is probably the biggest life change you'll ever have, I mean it's certainly the biggest for me and John is in agreement on that. When you're expecting, you prepare as much as you can for your babies arrival, reading the books you're meant to, downloading Emmas Diary and heading off to antenatal classes. Everyone is talking about how much joy this new arrival is going to bring, it will complete you, but hang on? What happens when the baby nearly breaks you? When you're so deep in arguments over night feeds and nappy changes that you can't possibly imagine what attracted you to this indifferent human you've chosen as your life partner. What the hell went wrong, and how on earth can you fix it?

It is inevitable that expanding a family is going to change relationships, we must read the word bond every second sentence in 'What to expect when you are expecting', only I wish there was a chapter on what to expect when your other half kindly doesn't hear the baby crying, or what to expect when he declares 'Oh the baby slept well' after you were up sixteen times that night. I'll tell you what you can expect though, shouting, tears and single parent contemplation. I would be a complete liar if I sat on social media and pretended we've had a solid relationship over our eight years, because we haven't, don't get me wrong nothings ever gone really bad but during those first four months after having Noah it was easily our most testing time. I quite honestly, detested John from around week 6-16. I really did, and though I'm sure he would be too kind to admit, I think he felt the same. Our main problem was comparing - we both wanted to be the one who had it worse off, how on earth could he find life so tough when he was at work, getting a lunch hour, a whole hour to do whatever the hell he liked with, uninterrupted sleep and adult interaction. Whilst I felt as though I was stuck at home with a baby for company, surviving on two hours sleep and a bowl of weetabix, I hadn't drank a warm coffee in weeks and an uninterrupted shower was something dreams were made of. However, in his eyes, I'm at home all day - watching television, sitting on my arse and being paid for the privilege. How wrong could we both have been? Of course in a haze of sleep deprivation, raging hormones and a lot of adjustment, neither of us could see the others point of view and truthfully I'd definitely got past the point of even wanting to see his side. I had it harder and that was that.

Obviously, if you're an avid reader of my blog you'll know that Patrick joined us last year so it's safe to say that we managed to find some middle ground after Noah, I'll not say we were best friends again straight away because we weren't, I think it took a lot (and I really mean a lot) of bending over backwards for each other in order to both come to terms with our new roles, having a baby changes everything and to go from two quite honestly selfish people, to now having to devote 24 hours out of your day to another human was crippling for a while. But, you find your new normal and make the best of what you can. After having Patrick we definitely benefited from hindsight, it was a lot easier because we knew what to expect 'been there, done that, got the t-shirt'. Being a brand new parent you are much more anxious over doing the right thing, what society deems is the right thing and what your parents are telling you is the right thing, but with number two I think we realised that we'd managed to raise a two year out quite successfully so we could trust our own parental skills in doing exactly what the hell we wanted with Patrick. (An update, he's not broken so it's going well).

If you're going through a rough patch post baby, don't worry you are most definitely not alone. Though Instagram might be full of over saturated family-day-out pictures, a lot goes on behind the lense and I'm sure 85% of families would tell you they despised their other half at some point during those first years.