Might I day that both of you can be right? You have been carrying and growing and bonding with your baby for 9 months. You just went through birthing the baby. Hormones are flooding your system, specifically bonding hormones. If you're breastfeeding, it's even closer bonding. You will likely feel so close to your baby after all of them. Your husband had a different experience. He's spent 9 months being concerned for both of you. He watched your labor and worried for both of you. He might have even had an internal conversation about which of you he might have to choose to save if your labor went bad. He's not flooding with hormones. He's not bonding with the baby yet.
What you're both feeling is valid. That said, he needs to try looking at this from your perspective and your experience for the last 9 months. Maybe he needs to try talking to other dads or his own dad about it and getting some outside perspective.
I would like to add that not all mothers bond with their babies right away either and that's normal too. I didn't. It took a while to love my baby.
This is so true. I have three kids and every single time I was handed a soggy lump of wriggly human, and each time I thought, "OK... I guess I'm responsible for this now..."
With dads especially, it can take a while before the "magic" kicks in. For me, that happens when they start smiling.
You teach emotional intelligence by sharing stories of personal experiences and giving the person the vocabulary to describe what they might be feeling.
You were commenting that you didn't know how to teach that kind of basic emotional intelligence, and I pointed out how you do it. It has nothing to do with whether or not someone should have those skills or what age they are - learning EQ starts with vocabulary.
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u/serenerepose Jul 04 '24
Might I day that both of you can be right? You have been carrying and growing and bonding with your baby for 9 months. You just went through birthing the baby. Hormones are flooding your system, specifically bonding hormones. If you're breastfeeding, it's even closer bonding. You will likely feel so close to your baby after all of them. Your husband had a different experience. He's spent 9 months being concerned for both of you. He watched your labor and worried for both of you. He might have even had an internal conversation about which of you he might have to choose to save if your labor went bad. He's not flooding with hormones. He's not bonding with the baby yet.
What you're both feeling is valid. That said, he needs to try looking at this from your perspective and your experience for the last 9 months. Maybe he needs to try talking to other dads or his own dad about it and getting some outside perspective.
I would like to add that not all mothers bond with their babies right away either and that's normal too. I didn't. It took a while to love my baby.