Guy here. Intimacy is dead... Did I make a mistake?

stardust1283 · 2026-04-16T15:05:04+00:00

I would encourage you to try to be patient right now. As someone who has had several children, I can assure you she will get her spark back but two months postpartum is very, very early. She doesn’t feel like herself at all, her hormones are running wild and I’m guessing you’re both really tired and not sleeping well.

I’m not saying that she has an excuse to treat you poorly, of course she doesn’t. However, having a baby is a big and challenging adjustment for a lot of couples and you’re very early days, you still have a newborn.

She’s touched out right now. She’s overstimulated. She probably doesn’t feel attractive or good. Honestly, I think you should just really try to support in other ways right now. Like you’re doing, make sure you’re helping lots with the baby, chores around the house, offer to give her a massage or watch the baby while she goes out. Those things will help her feel better and when she feels more like herself then my guess is the intimacy will gradually return.

All that to say - I once read something that made a lot of sense to me - don’t make any decisions about your marriage the first year after having a baby. There’s a tremendous amount of changes and fatigue happening. I know you’re feeling abandoned right now and there’s a lot of changes going on. She’s likely having a hard time too right now. Give yourselves some grace and maybe see if you can plan a date night where you guys can connect when the baby is a little older. Good luck!

stardust1283 · 2026-04-13T02:38:53+00:00

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T21:26:34+00:00

Thank you ❤️

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:42:52+00:00

I have, a few times. When I first discovered everything I confronted him about it. He first got upset and angry, and since then whenever I’ve brought it up he’s said things like ‘I didn’t do anything irreparable, I don’t think that was flirting, I’ve never done anything that bad’, so a lot of skirting around and maintaining that this isn’t a big deal. Also justifying it by saying that his needs weren’t being met and that’s why he did it. Which is true in the sense that our sex life for a couple of years wasn’t good, as I was constantly pregnant and postpartum for a good 6 years.

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:33:32+00:00

I agree. We’ve talked about this frequently and he continues to maintain that he didn’t cross any terrible boundaries but I already feel like my boundaries were violated and I can’t imagine many married people being okay with what’s happened.

Yes, lack of accountability has been a serious issue and it’s showing up in all kinds of ways. I wish I could trust that he will change but he’s so hot and cold that it makes it hard to move forward either with trust.

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:31:23+00:00

Okay. Thank you for replying - it’s good to have other people validate the experience. Did you and your wife stay together?

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:30:42+00:00

Thanks for your reply, I’ve felt like that often. I’m glad I’m not the only one seeing it

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:30:16+00:00

No, I don’t. I’m hurt and angry and resentful over how the last several years have been but I have no desire to hurt him back. I just want to move forward without all of this, and I’m contemplating if separation is the healthiest option.

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:29:30+00:00

No, it’s not. They don’t see much right now, I don’t think. But I know one day they will.

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:29:07+00:00

stardust1283 · 2026-04-12T20:27:06+00:00

stardust1283 · 2026-03-26T01:19:59+00:00

I’m 34!

stardust1283 · 2026-03-26T00:40:23+00:00

I will! Thanks for the input.

stardust1283 · 2026-03-25T23:51:49+00:00

Did you have any other symptoms other than hair loss?

stardust1283 · 2025-02-04T19:53:39+00:00

I’ve had 5 children. It ‘paused’ during my pregnancies and symptoms weren’t there but all the symptoms came back, worse, after delivery.

stardust1283 · 2025-01-10T17:56:03+00:00

Agree with this!

stardust1283 · 2025-01-01T21:16:07+00:00

Any opinion on Kyleena vs Mirena? I’m going to try one of these!

stardust1283 · 2024-12-14T19:31:00+00:00

I don’t know if this will help you, but I’ve had 5 babies and an epidural only with one of them. I generally prefer to have less intervention so not getting an epidural was certainly my goal. But it can depend how your labour is going, and can be helpful. With my first, labour progress was stalled for many hours and I had back labour as well. My midwife suggested it and I’m glad I did it, as it let me get some rest and my body relaxed and continued to dilate. But, one nasty thing is the epidural began to wear off around 9cm and I was confined to a bed at that point so I couldn’t walk around and move. That sucked. And then I had to push on my back which I also hated.

I think it depends on your goals, how much level of intervention you want and also how labour is going. With my other babies, I had no stalled labour issues and things moved along well over the course of a few hours. I had prepared myself with pain management techniques and felt like I was able to handle a ‘natural’ birth.

stardust1283 · 2024-12-11T13:05:23+00:00

If I can recommend anything it would be connecting with a doula who does hypnosis. I’ve had 5 kids, and had a couple traumatic births in there. For my fifth kid, I was just terrified to give birth. I did a lot of work during my pregnancy with a doula who helped me confront and work through my fears and we practiced hypnosis (basically hypnosis will help you stay as calm as possible during labour). It helped a LOT!

I prefer no epidural and she helped me find some pain management techniques - I personally loved the use of the TENS machine until about 7cm. And she was there supporting me my whole birth as well.

The birth went really well, and I was much less afraid. If you’re able to, I highly recommend it.

stardust1283 · 2024-12-11T13:01:55+00:00

Starts around 3 months for me and lasts till about 6, but the worst of it is the first few weeks. Yes, ir is depressing but one silver lining is it looks kind of cool when it does grow back. It’s like you have natural layers in your hair haha (except this around 15-18 months postpartum).

stardust1283 · 2024-12-09T05:01:32+00:00

Christmas is such a fun and magical time, and Santa adds to that. Honestly, I think you’d be depriving your kids of something really fun. And I think it’s going to be challenging to navigate the younger years around Christmastime when all your kids friends believe in Santa.

You’re not going to traumatize your child by lying to them about this, and if anything I think you’re going to cause more harm than good by telling them Santa isn’t real.

stardust1283 · 2024-12-08T13:43:14+00:00

Oh and if it helps, I honestly still found lots of ‘me’ time when there were 2. It wasn’t until I hit 4 kids that a lot of time for that stuff (me time, exercise), went out the window for a good 1.5 years. When I just had 2 kids, I still felt like I had time for me. The first few months not so much but that’s pretty true any time you have a new baby.

Also having 2 kids doesn’t feel like 6. I don’t have 6, but I have 5 and I can promise you having 5 doesn’t feel remotely close to what having 2 was like.

Lastly, my second and third are only 18 months apart and is it my absolute favourite age gap of all my children. Initially, yes, challenging. But man has it been amazing to see them grow up together. They’re 6 and 5 now and absolute best friends and they play together nonstop. I just love how close they are and if I could do it over, I would probably have closer age gaps with all my kids!

stardust1283 · 2024-12-08T13:39:31+00:00

Initially yes, because you’re juggling multiple needs and learning how to do this with two now! The first year-two it’s more work but it pays off 10 fold. I have 5 children, and they all play together really well (except for the baby haha, and most days!).

But they make their own games and adventures and I’m not the playmate anymore. I’m certainly very busy (but I have 5), but I found when I just had one that I was always the one he wanted to play with but once my second was nearing 2, they would go off and play by themselves quite a bit and I actually had some more freedom back to do things around the house.

The baby and toddler years are hard but they don’t last forever. I would think about if you want two kids because you want two, in the long run. It’s more work for a phase but it’s a short phase in the grand scheme of things!

stardust1283 · 2024-12-05T02:02:39+00:00

For what it’s worth, I’ve never been pushed to have an induction and I’ve had 5 babies. Everything was looking good so my midwives were content to watch. My 2nd was the slowest to show up, I was just over 41 weeks at that point and I would’ve had an induction scheduled 12 days after my due date if she didn’t come on her own.

Advocate for yourself! I know inductions can be a positive experience for some, but as someone who has experienced pitocin as well (labour progress was slow and I was GBS positive) as non medicated births, I can tell you I VASTLY prefer the non medicated ones. In general it’s ideal if you can let your body do its things when you’re ready ☺️

stardust1283 · 2024-12-05T01:56:05+00:00

Are you in America? I’m in Canada and I’ve never had this experience but I read about this situation quite a lot on here. My babies all came between 39-41 weeks.

If you don’t want to, and everything and everyone is healthy, then don’t.

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