253: How to Keep Children from Wrecking Your Relationship - The Baby Bomb with Kara Hoppe and Stan Tatkin
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How do you keep your relationship strong and thriving when you have a new baby or children in the mix? It's a classic situation where the attention that children require can introduce distance and tension to a relationship that was perfectly fine beforehand. So how do you manage the kids and your relationship? That's what we're going to talk about today. Hello and welcome to another episode of Relationship Alive. This is your host, Neil Satin.

I think we've either seen it happen or maybe even experienced it ourselves, that the addition of a new life, a new being to a family can create big changes. And some of those changes are amazing and wonderful and life enhancing. And some of those changes can feel almost cataclysmic. And so I

We are here today to talk about how to navigate a new addition to a family, whether it be a baby or adopting an older child, or even if you've had children in your life for a while and experience the impact of children on your relationship. We're going to talk about how to steer your couple ship in a way that's going to help you

in a way so that you can strengthen your relationship and strengthen with each other and with your children and hopefully have a little bit more joy and a little less cataclysm. To have today's conversation, we have two very special guests. One is Kara Hoppe, who is a marriage and family therapist.

And the other is Stan Tatkin, who you may be familiar with from being on the show before, the author of Wired in Love and Wired for Dating, among others, other books. And together they have written the book Baby Bomb, a relationship survival guide for new parents.

Because as we were chatting about before this interview started, there aren't many resources to help people not just navigate what's going on with a new baby, but actually navigate how that impacts their relationship and how to have a strong relationship despite all the ways that the new addition or additions to your family might make the waters a little rocky. Yeah.

I don't know why I'm going with the boat metaphor today, but it's happening. Anyway, if you are interested in downloading the transcript for today's episode, you can visit neilsatin.com slash baby. And Kara Hoppe and Stan Tatkin, it's a pleasure to have you here today on Relationship Alive. Thank you, Neal. Happy to be here. Great. Well, we're off to a good start. Okay.

So, I sometimes like to do this, which is to start at the end. And in your book, Baby Bomb, which is great, by the way, you offer 10 guiding principles for how to help couples stay strong in their relationship, despite however having a child in their life may be impacting the relationship. Yeah.

And at the very last guiding principle that you have, I'm going to just read it verbatim here. I think I dog-eared the page. Guiding principle 10. You and your partner parent and partner with sensitivity, respect, and trust. And I wanted to start there because...

For one thing, I'm not even sure people necessarily nail that down before a child comes along. Right. And so much of getting things strengthened and resilient has to do with those very things. So I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about why those things are so important, sensitivity, respect, and trust.

and why their absence might lead to some of the common things that people experience when a new edition actually throws things into chaos.

Yeah, Neil, I love it that you started at the end, the last guiding principle. And I immediately, when you were saying it, was thinking about the beginning of parenthood. When two people become parents, neither one of them really know what they're doing. They've never done it before. No aunt or uncle or godparent experience speaks to that.

And so they're both learning in tandem how to do this. So it's a really vulnerable experience. So having that respect and sensitivity and trust in themselves and in their partner as they learn how to do this is so critical, right? I'm thinking about like when we brought Jude home from the hospital, neither one of us knew how to burp him. And so...

And it's such a simple thing, but I didn't know how to burp a baby. You know, nobody had taught me before. And I remember like watching Charlie do it and feeling in my body like, oh, God, like fear, you know, and like wanting to jump in. But then like pausing because I wanted to give him the respect like he was giving me the respect to learn how to do it.

And all of that like increased our participation and showing up for our son Jude. But it also like made our relationship feel like a lot, a safer place for both of us to kind of fumble around learning how to be parents together and be witnessed as parents together. So, yeah. So much of what you talk about in the book has to do with, you know,

battling in some ways the cultural expectations that we have and I think some of that

includes this assumption that you're somehow gonna know what to do. And so I appreciate your highlighting that it's a very vulnerable act to suddenly have a child in your arms. Or if you're a step parent to find yourself with a with an older child potentially in front of you and to not necessarily know what to do. There are all these ways that

That we're kind of fighting in internal messages that we've gotten from culture, from family, etc. Right. Like, I mean, you know, that idea of the maternal instinct kicking in, like, yes, and maternal instinct doesn't cover everything.

It doesn't cover like putting on diapers. It doesn't necessarily cover even breastfeeding. Like all of that has to be taught like in real time, learning how to do it.

And so there can be like a lot of internal pressure because of that external pressure that if I don't know what I'm doing, I'm somehow failing. And that can be acerbated. Of course, we know like people like partners doing that to each other and like, come here, I'll take the baby. I know how to do this. And like,

you know, just kind of cutting each other down. And what Stan and I really wanted to do with Baby Bomb was to like help people recognize the importance of supporting each other during this vulnerable experience and like how they could do that, like with really practical ways. And we just wrote the book to kind of walk people, you know, through that journey of how to show up for their relationship that way. So lest we make any assumptions here about what sensitivity is,

respect and trust mean, can we do just kind of a quick breakdown of what you mean by sensitivity, what you mean by respect, what you mean by trust? Because we'll circle back to those principles along with the principle of circling back as we continue this conversation. You mentioned something important that as many people go into this without a prior knowledge. And while there is no study guide really for having a child or raising a child,

There is a structure, and I think that there's a natural hubris to human beings going into things without predicting, planning, without thinking ahead, and having a structure, an architecture going into something, whether it's step-parenting, whether it's marriage, whether it's having a child. And so people go into this without really thinking ahead, right?

Why does the couple, like you said, have to start off with a structure where you have in a free society, two individuals who are coming together based on conditions and terms. They're supposedly sharing power and authority, and therefore they have the same stakes, right? Same things to lose, same things to gain. And that is,

In any free society where there is mutuality and shared interests, a shared purpose and a shared vision, there has to be fairness and justice. There has to be sensitivity. Otherwise, people will do bad things. So it only makes sense that the couple is starting this family, right? The couple is the...

is the constant that's running through this whole thing. Kids are passing through, right? They're being taught how to live in society and then how to go off on their own and be good citizens and so on. And the parents are supposed to be exemplars for this, right?

So everything starts and ends with the couple. And if the couple is not intact, if the couple is not functioning properly, according to collaborative and cooperative fairness and so on, then everything else is going to come undone. Right. So we really want couples to be prepared to be a good couple and

Their party is so wonderful that they're inviting this third, this other child into their party. Right. And and they are ready to lead. They are ready to be parents. They are ready to show, not tell how to do this thing called relationship. Right.

That's why it's essential that trust be there. It's the foundation of these voluntary relationships that are based on collaboration, cooperation. Without trust, people begin to do terrible things to each other. And that's what we want to avoid. We want a system that is operating really well with two executives that are first and foremost a couple and

And that they are in a leadership position to handle whatever comes. And in this case, something quite marvelous, but very complex and very disruptive. And that is a third human being that's going to change all the roles in the couple and the duties. And that has to be predicted and prepared for.

Okay, so when we say, I'm going to just give you the quick like quiz, Stan. So when we say trust, at its simplest, what do we mean? What are we trusting?

I know that I'm an idiot and I do stupid things. I do things automatically and reflexively. And I'm going to I'm going to hurt you, not because I want to, but because I I'm just going to do something that will be offensive, hurtful, insensitive, maybe unfair to you because you're another human being.

You're going to do the same thing to me. So first of all, we trust each other that we have goodwill. We trust each other that we're doing this, you know, in a good spirit. Not that we're perfect, but that we're perfectly imperfect and that we're prepared to repair, fix misdeeds,

We put the relationship ahead of the self. The relationship is what protects the self. Therefore, if you feel I hurt you, then I fix it. That's what builds trust. What erodes trust is the human tendency for us, all of us, to protect our own interests under stress. That's everybody. And what we're trying to teach people is how to be really good at

at taking care of each other under the most stressful circumstances. Otherwise, we always revert to our own self-interest, and that is adversarial, and that leads to war. And that's what we want to teach people, that all human beings have this proclivity, and we have to watch out.

Right. So what you're saying is like that trust is like knowing yourself and having faith in yourself and your partner to overcome the challenges by being committed to the dialogue, to like a process of repairing with each other. So it brings in like the sensitivity, which would be attunement to each other, of watching each other, giving each other like the benefit of the doubt, like

Like you said, like recognizing that link most of the time when we hurt each other, like it's very unintentional, like very rarely do partners intentionally hurt another part, like their partner. Usually it's because like Stan was just saying that there's like, they're scared and they're self-protecting and then they go into that mode. And the, and like the outcome is pain to the other person at the cost of the relationship. Yeah.

And so, and then I think about like respect, it's respecting your commitment to,

that you've made to your like committed to yourself to be with this person, even when they're being less than desirable to be around as they do the same for you, knowing that sometimes I am, you know, with my husband less than desirable, I get irritable and, you know, make all sorts of mistakes, but there's like a respect that we have towards each other. And then the couples that we work with, they help them with that mutual respect.

But I want to say something about like respect when it comes to parenting, because like kind of going back to what we said at the beginning about how when two people become parents, they don't really know what they're doing. I think respect is really important. How you can respect your partner as they make like make mistakes as a parent, but basically just learn how to parent, you know, like parents.

Try all of these different ways to soothe the baby, you know, like bouncing, burping, changing a diaper, you know, busting out Dr. Harvey Carp's like five S's. Like you like allow your partner, as long as you're sensitive and attuned to them, like they don't need relief from you, but they want to stay engaged, right?

to figure it out, to build that confidence that's so important in early parenthood is building confidence from actually parenting. Like, oh, I can do this. You know, like...

My baby was upset and I was able to figure it out after multiple attempts. I feel like that's a level of respect, too, that is really important in early parenting of like respecting each other's learning curve. You know, like I know like when I was struggling with Jude, it would have felt very misattuned if Charlie would have jumped in.

And like, Ben, like do this. It would have been, you know, it's such a vulnerable time. It's just like, and, you know, I like appreciated that mutual respect and really leaned on that. And it really, we wanted to highlight that in Baby Bomb about like,

allowing each other to make mistakes in parenting, just allow each other to make mistakes in partnering too. Mistakes are great. I mean, that's how we learn, you know? Yeah. To think of it as a team, you know, the model here is what people do when their lives depend on each other.

Other things that are different, differences fade away. They have to do things for the mutual good. If one person goes down, the team suffers, right? And so this is a team of two. Neither of them are experts. They're both improvising. They're both learning. And they're both working out the best possible solution at any given time for now. That's going to change because conditions are constantly changing with child rearing.

And so, again, the couple is a team. They're always doing the best thing that is possible in the moment, given their strengths, right? Given their opinions or ideas, given their common vision to have a child that is healthy and emotionally intact and a good citizen, all those things, right? They're working together.

And that's, I think, the main thing about the book is a couple reorienting to a two-person system of teamwork, fully collaborative, fully cooperative with all the mistakes and bumping up into each other that they're going to do. But they have big things to accomplish. And people sometimes really do sweat the small stuff. Why do you think it's so common for couples to grow apart?

even though they're sharing in the joy of raising a child together? In my experience, couples can be predicted to grow apart when they are drifting or when they have a tendency to drift. These are generally people who we consider on the avoidance side of the attachment spectrum.

people who are on the avoidance side have a tendency to drift. And by that, I mean lead separate lives, be siloed in a particular way. And whenever people do that, they stop influencing each other and they start getting influenced by outside elements. It's just natural. And they'll drift and they'll start to get interested in other things. They'll start to find that they're pointing in different directions eventually. And so that's very predictable drift.

And that can happen with the first child. They stop being a couple. They stop being lovers. They stop being best friends. They stop working together. They divide and conquer. They start to assign each other certain roles that are not really collaborative, but are basically outsourced.

And they don't understand that they're setting a course that if they follow a logical line in terms of trajectory, they're going to eventually dissolve. Yeah. Go ahead. Yeah.

Go ahead. Well, I was just going to agree with Stan. I was like, yeah, I think like different attachment styles definitely like play into it. But and also, I mean, having a baby, especially like the last two years, having a baby during the pandemic is like a very resource demanding endeavor. And so it's like it's really easy for couples to put their relationship on the back burner.

and just try to make it through the day. And, and I say, I think also there's like a simply like not knowing that there's another way to do it because maybe that's what they witnessed, like their first family, like their parents doing is divide and conquering and outsourcing all the things that Stan just mentioned, you know, they grew up with that and they think, okay, this is what you do. And like, and also like, you know, and, and there's the whole culture part about

like mothers, like thinking I talk about this with other mothers. I talk, talk about this with my mom. I make decisions with other mothers. I make decisions with my mom. I'm not inclusive to my partner. I think like some of it. And again, like, I think like that's why we wrote baby bomb is because for anybody who didn't know that there was another way to do this,

just because of not having had that experience. We wanted to show people there is another way to do this. If you want to parent in a very, like Stan was saying, shared power, collaborative way with your partner where you're building something new. And this is having a baby is such a great opportunity to do something like that.

Like you can do that. You can practice it on a day to day basis. And it doesn't matter if it wasn't modeled for you. Let us tell you some ways to do this. Practice it. Talk to your partner about it. Hash it out between the two of you. See if this resonates with you, if you like it. Yeah, we really wanted to empower people. Yeah.

Yeah, as I step back and look at the bigger picture and incorporating some of the things that we've talked about, because we started out by pointing out how vulnerable it is to...

bring a child into your worlds and you, in, even if you think, you know what you did with, let's say child number one, like child number two could be totally different. So it's this constantly evolving thing. And if you as a couple, aren't really prepared to witness each other's mistakes and vulnerabilities and you're, and you're in this high stakes situation where you have, you have a life on your hands and you got to get it right. You know, even though you won't, um,

then it's like the perfect recipe in some respects for pushing people apart or making people retreat a bit from each other into like a zone of safety where they're not offending each other necessarily, but they're also missing out on the impacting each other that will keep their relationship vital. Yeah.

Right. Right. Like, like if the relationship's not safe, people still need safety. So they will find that by themselves or with somebody else. I mean, we need a sense of safety. So if the relationship isn't safe because there is misattunement, because if they're shaming or criticism or absence, you know, we will find that and that will cause a drift in, in partners. Yeah.

Yeah, one of the things that I think you do really well in the book, and I have to say that with all the books that I've read, I've gotten to a point where I tend to not like anecdotes in the books because I'm just like, come on, like that didn't really happen. You just made that up. But one thing that I really like in Baby Bomb is the way that you describe situations and how they might unfold in a way that would lead people apart.

create more pain more more anger more hurt and then you offer them a redo of sorts in in the book so that we get to see how that particular dialogue might have unfolded were people to be putting some of these principles into practice were they able to truly attune to each other to truly see each other that's one aspect of the respect that I think personally is so important is

is being willing to pause, to respect someone is to like give them your attention and to be willing to see them as they are and to work on accepting them as they are. So I love how in your book you give all these vehicles for allowing people to stop in the moment and

And recognize like what you were saying earlier, Stan, like people are trying their best, even if it really doesn't seem that way to kind of realize that in the moment and find your way to each other before things go off the rails. Maybe you could talk a little bit about developing the, the ability to attune like that when you've got another little person, you know, that, that,

talk about throwing the neurobiology a bit askew when you have another little being in your life who's screaming or whatever, and then you're trying to actually attune with your partner and come to some sort of agreement about what's going to happen in a particular moment. It's complex. So what are some of the hints that you offer?

for people in those circumstances? - So we have nervous systems, right? Nervous systems that respond to internal and external stimuli.

A baby making noise and crying is certainly going to create arousal in both partners, particularly the primary. The primary is wired for sounds and is more inclined to be more reactive. But make no mistake, it doesn't matter. The two adults are the big tuning forks. Their nervous systems are intertwined where one goes, the other goes.

Now you have a little tuning fork that's making all this sound. There's a tendency for the big tuning forks to start to argue and to start to fight because of the alarm systems that go off into the brain and body. And so basically you want the sound to stop because the crying or the screaming is a threat cue.

It happens to be a threat cue that the primary moves toward instead of other threat cues or you move away. Right. So and so first things first, the couple has to be able to calm each other and the baby. There are lots of ways of doing that together instead of dividing and conquering. They can do that together and be with each other fully present, fully attentive and

at times split, but still coming back, they can soothe the baby together.

Just as they can in adulthood face the children together as a couple, that they are the big bells. They are regulating the small bells. Put a couple in the front of a car, put kids in the back of the car. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, because everyone's facing forward. Nobody can regulate the kids in the back and they're going to make a lot of noise and drive parents crazy.

There are ways of predicting that and there are ways of working so that the parents are OK and then they manage the children. But first, they put their oxygen masks on before they take care of the children. It's a very hard thing to do because it's intuitively difficult.

Not what we want to do. We want to take care of the noise. We want to take care of the emergency right away and not do it thoughtfully, right? So again, this is thinking. This is understanding. It's not simply intuitive. It's understanding how people operate. These two people have to be in each other's care first, and then they care for baby. That can be instantaneous thinking.

It does. It's you don't put the baby in the closet while the parents regulate each other. Right. It can be done at the same time, you know, but it doesn't occur to people because when we hear an alarm, we react and we often want to shoot the alarm or the person who is reacting to the alarm.

That's a human thing of threat, right? And that's what we're trying to help people understand. We're threat animals. We do things automatically that are in our own interests, but not in the interests of the greater good and the team. And that's something people have to plan for, predict, and they have to understand, fix. You make a mistake, you put something in place for the next time because it'll happen again and again.

Yeah, there's so much resistance, I think, in our culture anyway to making mistakes and making allowances for mistakes. And so when you're in a high pressure situation like an inconsolable child...

then I think it can be tempting, like you're saying, to just like, I just want to fix this problem and oh, you're not doing it right. And so I'm going to, and there's all this inner panic that can arise for people, which could either result in someone panic in their panic, leaning in too much or someone in their panic needing to get the hell out of there, which of course you talk about in terms of how people's attachment styles impact how

how they show up in these moments? Dictatorship is easy. Partnership is hard. It is. Collaboration is hard. People are too difficult, right? I can do it myself. I can do it better than you. You're not doing it right. I'll take over. And that is a problem in the team, right? That's not a two-person system. That's a one-person system, which we all default to under stress. And that's the single biggest problem facing human beings.

Under stress, we default to a one-person system, which looks very threatening to the outside world.

Right. It looks threatening to every other one person system. Every other one person system. Right. And that creates that creates consequences. Right. And then you see consequences building and spinning out of control and accruing to where people then find it hard to get out of this thing. This this threat response that's reflexive and keeps building. That's why repair is so important.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry I did that. I'm sorry I yelled at you. That was wrong. I should not have done that. Repair and then also like being friendly during these times of high stress. I think like Neil, what you were saying, like the baby starts crying, both partners or parents, like their nervous systems activate, right?

And that could be a time that they fight or it can be a time of intimacy, too, by, you know, just even a glance and a softening of the eyes. And like you got this.

I know you can, you know, I know you can do this, like this being soothe the baby, you know, like that encouragement of the team. We will come back. We will come back to this, you know, like whatever it is that they're discussing, but just like communicating verbally or non-verbally or both, we are on the same team. We care about each other. And like, this is a difficult moment. And,

And we're going to be allies in this moment. And that can be like, it can be taught, like just kind of doing like a contrary action of like leaning in. And like, I'm just thinking of times when it was like, I was feeling like a lot, all of my alarm bells were going off because of my son. And I can conjure up right now, my husband's face and the softening of it and how much strength,

that gave me in that moment, I mean, about our partnership, but also to be able to, okay, like I can do this, you know, and then to come back to Charlie and be like, you know, thank you for having my back and like, and helping me in that moment and helping our relationship, you know,

ultimately too, but it doesn't have to be these grand gestures of like, we're going to figure everything out. I really think about like a softening in a face, a smile, a touch, you

Putting a hand on the knee, you know, a hand on your shoulder, like, okay. Like all of those little, those little things mean so much during these times of stress. Yes. They're everything. Yeah. And you, you talk about how people can,

in less stressful moments, talk to each other about what might actually comfort them in a stressful moment so that they can offer that to each other. And then you also talk about the tells. Kara, maybe you could talk a little bit about your process of

figuring this all out with Charlie. I'm assuming that you had it all figured out ahead of time, what your tells were, how you were going to show up for each. No? I see you shaking your head. No.

No, no, no, no, no. We were solid. We were a solid like couple and team and parenthood through like a lot of curve balls to us. It was a whole nother level of vulnerability and of needing to really team up, like level up our marriage that I didn't anticipate. And the journey to do that was,

I mean, that is what Baby Bomb is. Like that was like our journey to do that. And during the process of doing it, I mean, luckily, like Stan had been my friend for so long. I'd studied with him and like, you know, so I started bringing all of the stuff that he was really talking about, that nonverbal knowing each other's tells like before Jude.

And Charlie and I were we could take it for granted that we could read each other. We could we read each other great for that moment in our marriage. But then when Jude was in the mix, it had to be even better. So we had to get more specific, like about how like, yeah, the things that are soothing to me, which is like touch, which is like reassurance.

It's not the same for Charlie, like for him, like verbal reassurance goes a long way. And it like and being like I can say like small pithy things to Charlie that are attuned to how I know Charlie and nobody else knows Charlie that can carry him. But I had to really like.

re not just like it's not relearn but reinvest maybe and deepen my knowledge of like what that is for Charlie and I noticed as we were doing it kind of like um coming back together um you know after the explosion of our baby bomb into our lives like how how intentional it could be and how um knowing that like I said it's these little moments would really carry like I could see if I didn't

like one thing in the day of that was really attuned to Charlie and just the specific way he needed it, that his attitude for the day would just be different. Like he would be, he would show up for me more. He would show up for Jude more. And I remember being like clocking that, like that worked, you know,

So I'm going to commit to doing like that worked for both of us, the three of us really, you know, and like, I'm going to do that often. And like, and I noticed Charlie doing that for me, like how he would do the softening of his face and kind of get on my level and, and do the touch thing.

And like, so we, and we talked about it. So it was intentional, but, but we had to really discover it post baby, rediscover it post Jude, post baby bomb. Can I dovetail on that? Because I've seen them grow. I mean, they, they became a very tight team and, and because they had good bones to begin with, but they discovered, you know, with load bearing comes a whole different ball game.

And that's what we really want people to understand, this idea of leveling up. Off the factory line, the average human being is not going to handle load-bearing very well. Relationships will not last with the average human being because we're energy conserved. We do the least amount possible. We operate according to what we know, what we've experienced from childhood. That's about as fancy as we ever get.

This calls for much more awareness, much more discipline in two people raising the bar on what is going to be the right thing to do when it's the hardest. What is the right thing to do when it's the hardest? We're constantly doing that. It's a matter of purpose and character that we're setting that bar because we know as human beings, we will do the least amount necessary and we will always default to our own interests. That's how we roll.

And if we go down, everyone's screwed. If, you know, generals are fighting, soldiers die. If parents aren't getting along, the kids suffer. And so this is vital that that this couple learns how to handle this third thing, which is load bearing. But it's not the only thing, because there's covid. There's there's there's financial downturns. There's all sorts of things that are going to hit us as we move through time.

And if a couple is not really a good team and not working well, the wheels will come off. And that's not a function of him or her or they or them. It's a function of the team. They're not really a team and they don't really see it correctly in terms of their lives depend on each other. They have to work together full stop.

They can make mistakes, but they have to fix it and move forward and to know what their purpose really is. And that it's not based on love. It's based on purpose, right? This is what we do. This is what we never do. And the testing ground here is this first child.

It's one of many. Yeah. I'm wondering if we can get specific here and talk about a couple things that I think are pressing issues for a lot of couples in the midst of child rearing. And that's what can happen with sex, right?

and also the concept of balance and fairness or equity, parity in a relationship. Maybe to keep everyone listening, let's talk about balance first and we'll talk about sex after.

But right, those are the things where it's like people can feel siloed. And I've experienced this when my kids were young in particular, just that sense of like, wait a minute, I'm doing all the blah, blah. Or when was the last time you, et cetera. And feeling like things get all askew. And sometimes that's even done from a perspective.

a with a positive intent where where a partner might say oh well i'm i'm good at this and they're not so good at it so i'm just going to take that all on and that could be parenting related and you talk about kind of parental gatekeeping in the book where you're like i'm just going to do all the parenting stuff but the ways that that excludes your partner from being a team player a collaborative with you but that could be true of anything in that domain it can get so out of whack that

And then people get really resentful. So what's a couple to do when they find themselves in that position? Yeah.

Well, I mean, you bring up a couple of different things there, Neil, because like immediately when I was thinking about like a lot of couples do that scorekeeping, you know, like, but I'm immediately when the couples that I work with or when this happens to me in my own marriage, I think like I go like a step below, like what's happening, you

what needs are not being met here? That like all of a sudden I'm like tracking this or couples are tracking this. Like, I mean, it's like, it manifests as a feeling of inequity, which maybe it is inequity. It certainly can feel that way. But also like,

what needs aren't happening? Is there a lack of connection? Is there a lack of emotional attunement? Is somebody not in the relationship, especially when it has a new baby, able to care for themselves? Do they have time to exercise? Are they able to like have a few moments for themselves? Like,

When that's not happening, I think that the scorekeeping can happen more so because it's just an, instead of, you know, we're so trained to like this, like this isn't fair and it probably isn't, you know? But it's so hard. I think people have a hard time identifying like our, like the physical needs or even like below it, like our emotional needs, right?

Like I need to be seen right now. I need for you to stop what you're doing and attune to me and see how difficult parenting is for me, you know? And a lot of that happens like early in early parenthood, you know, for birthing people it's very difficult on the body giving birth. And then if you're breastfeeding, that's very difficult on the body. And a lot of that is invisible. Like certainly culturally it's invisible and,

And then it can be invisible in the relationship. And then when things are invisible, it can feel like nobody's appreciating this. And rather than being able to have that conversation of like, I notice I'm feeling insecure because I'm feeling unappreciated by the culture at whole. And then by you that I'm like generously sharing my body with this person and completely tethered to them. And then you're asking things of me, like,

It becomes like, it can become like a scorekeeping thing. So I think helping people recognize, like that's why we have that whole chapter on needs, like helping people like connect with like, what are their physical needs? There are spiritual needs, their emotional needs, you know, their needs for connection, not just with their partner, but with like their outside support with the greater community, all of that's like shifted in early parenthood.

I mean, especially early parenthood during the pandemic when it was like so isolating for new parents trying to protect their babies from and themselves from COVID, you know, but like all of that really can deplete people. And I don't think people are necessarily attuned to that. And then it manifests like sideways. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Just amazing.

Going deeper to this question of what are you what are you what do you need that you're not getting and then you get it you get the opportunity to say well is this thing that I was worried about is that really the issue or is it something deeper.

And I'm struck by in your book, there were many times where I was like, of course, what a couple needs to do in a situation like this is step back and be like, what's really going on here? Right? Because a lot of it kind of boils down to that. People either kind of spin out in whatever is happening emotionally within them. And that, as we've talked about already, tends to drive people apart, right?

Or they can like take a breath or see that something is actually happening with their partner. And I realize we didn't really define what a tell was here. But a tell is that you offer often nonverbal cues, but sometimes they can be verbal cues about your emotional state.

So you offer those to your partner and your partner offers those to you. And the more well-versed you are in knowing those things, the better you'll be at understanding either your own emotional state or what's happening in the person across from you. So there's this opportunity when you see something going on to step back and be like,

Wait a minute. Like, what's really going on here? You know, is this really about the, you know, who's getting the laundry done right now? Or is this really about how I'm late for dinner? Maybe it is. But maybe on a deeper need, it's not about that you're late today. It's about that I don't feel seen by you or I don't feel like you appreciate what I'm doing.

And if you stopped and appreciated me, I wouldn't care how late you were as an example. Right. That's the paradox of it. Right. If you give me like what I needed to do deeper level, then the other stuff isn't quite as important, you know? Yeah. Yeah. In my, if we were in a relationship, you and I, Neil, if we were doing this, it's my job to keep tabs on you. It's

It's my job to make sure that you're getting your needs taken care of. It's my job to make sure you're absolutely safe and secure at all times. That's self-preserving because if you're not, I'm going to feel the consequences of that. So if I'm doing that and looking at you and watching your tells and looking to see what you find most soothing that I can do, you're doing that with me.

we're handlers of each other. That is the proper way to do it. Not to, for me to ask you what you want all the time, not for me to ask you what would soothe you, but for me to know you just like I'm learning the baby. I don't ask the baby, what do you want?

I have to intuit, I have to find the baby in the baby. I have to find the baby in Neil and Neil has to find the baby in me. And our jobs are to minister or to serve each other. This is how we get taken care of.

And so it's more than just the techniques. It's an understanding. It's an orientation that we are in each other's care. And that's the way it works. It works best that way. We serve each other and this way we get served. So I'm responsible for being your handler. I'm responsible for knowing how you work. Okay. So we have to talk about that a minute before we talk about sex. Yeah.

And underlying all of this, I think, is this sense of operating from a place of generosity. I'm going to generously pay attention to you, attune to you, create safety for you, care for you. And hopefully you're doing that for me as well.

If, or we're, or we'll have a problem. Yeah. I wouldn't, hopefully I would say it must happen. It must happen. Both partners have to jump in equally into the deep end. Otherwise this doesn't work. Right. Right. So because this is so important and because I think a lot of people listen to the show because they're not in a situation where both people are being generous and

How would you approach that in your relationship if you felt like, well, I'm doing a great job paying attention to so-and-so, but I do not feel that being reciprocated.

Then we have to have a come to Jesus, sit down and say, this is you're not somebody I want to be in the foxhole with. You're not you're not somebody that makes me feel safe. You're not playing the same game I am. Let's talk about what we want. And are we really on the same page? And if we are, you got to start doing something.

Yeah, I guess it's like, Stan, what comes up for me hearing you say that it's really being accountable, accountable to the choice that you made in being a partner with this, with whomever you picked. It's like practicing accountability every day, even when you don't want to, just like we all parent every day, even when we don't want to, we all partner every day when we don't want to. I mean, that's because you're making an investment in something bigger than you. Right. Yeah.

And, and I think a lot of people like, you know, we talked about this at the beginning and I just want to say it again. I think a lot of people don't have that kind of partnership, not because like, no, I mean, after saying accountability and then in the second breath saying no fault of their own, I feel such a generosity or empathy towards that. Because if you didn't know that it was possible to do this, how would you know?

And that's why it's so important that I really appreciate the opportunity to being on this podcast to be able to talk about this. Like this is not the first family I was modeled or my husband was modeled. Like we didn't see our parents sharing power equally and caring for each other equally. I didn't know that that was like a possibility. So any listeners listening that don't have this right now, it doesn't mean you can't.

You have, you know, do like what Stan said, like talk to your partner. Like I would, I would like to talk with you about maybe doing this differently than we have before. This is how I think it could benefit us and our children. If you know, what do you think? Let's discuss this idea together and see if we can, if this feels like something that could work for us and kind of holding it in the sense of like, we're pioneers. We,

We weren't we haven't seen this. We don't see it very much in the culture either. And so but but that also doesn't mean it's not possible. It entirely is. And this can be learned. It doesn't have to be modeled. And once you learn it, then then you're teaching your children it. Then they grow up and they're like, well, this is what this is what I think relationships. I think relationships are supposed to be fair. Right.

and you're not being fair, well, then we got a problem. You know, it's a different orientation. And parents are in a very unique opportunity to make some really, really,

big ripple changes, you know, for their children, future generations and for themselves. And, and like I said, it just, I feel like really hopeful about it because Charlie and I learned how to do that. And Stan and I for like our, you know, in our clinical work, this is what we do with couples every day is help them like little step by little step by little step, make these changes. Yeah.

And I can say with confidence that there is no other system that will work. There is no system that's sustainable. If anything is too unfair, too unjust, it won't last. If it does last, that's when people are miserable and unhappy.

There is no way to sustain a long-term relationship unless it is absolutely fair and just and collaborative and cooperative. It can't work. And it never has worked across the history of civilization, whether it's a company or whether it's a community church or a community or whether it's a country.

As soon as people are feeling that there's a have and have nots, people start to rob and steal and people do bad things and people fragment and split off unless there's a dictatorship. And so here we're only dealing with two people. What's their excuse? What's their excuse for not working in a way that's collaborative and cooperative?

There is no excuse, actually. So it's not an option. It has to be done. It's hard. And I can attest to that every day. It's hard, you know, but it is worth it.

It is absolutely worth it.

I could see that in any system where there's kind of a war for resources that part of why that's happening is because people don't believe that they're going to get taken care of if they're not fighting. Right. So so being able to to depolarize in a way and and and see how, oh, like, actually, if we are.

working collaboratively, if we're being generous with each other, that's like a positive feedback loop where things get better and better. I would imagine that most people in that more conflicted situation, they feel it. And, and in my experience and the experience of people I've worked with, I think, and people who listen to the show, they

It is that sense of, well, we're here and we don't entirely know how to get out of it. We don't know what the path forward is. People would know if their lives depend on it. Bullets were flying over their heads. They would know. People that I've worked with that are homeless or people who are mentally ill, they do it. They know their lives depend on each other. They do not have these fights.

People in war-torn areas, people who are in the foxhole, people in the military have to worry about the partners to their left and right. They don't worry about this stuff. They know their lives depend on each and every one of them. They understand what's important. In the couple world, this is non-existent.

The couple is the only union that doesn't seem to get it, that this is not a luxury. This is actually their lives do depend on each other. If they thought about it, they would get it. But they don't think about it because they think this is this is their childhood home where they can do whatever they want. No, this is partnership. This is this is us together against the world. The war cannot be in the foxhole. That's simply self-harming, self-destructive.

Period. So, I'm hoping it's okay if we go a couple more minutes because we do need to talk about sex. And I think this is a good, actually a good place to be talking about it because this could be one of those things where, you know, Stan, as I was listening to you, I was thinking, yes, of course, and...

That's why a lot of people split up because they think, well, this isn't working for me anymore. And if you're in the foxhole, you can't be like, I'm out of here. Like I'm joining Germany or whatever. Like you're, you're going to get shot. But if you're in a marriage these days in, at least in the Western world, it's,

You're not going to get shot if you leave your marriage. And in fact, you might have, you might think that you're going to have better luck getting your individual needs met without that person, which may or may not be true. Sex is one of those areas, right? Where once it starts evaporating in a relationship, if sex is important to a person, then

they may start to feel a certain kind of desperation around like, whoa, what? And there's nothing that can potentially put sex on the sidelines like having your infant co-sleeping with you as an example. So let's take the last few minutes that we have together and just talk a little bit about

How to keep sex and intimacy, physical intimacy, how to keep that also in this realm of two people being generous with each other, particularly with a new little one around. Yeah.

I have a lot to say about this, but I'm going to yield first to Kara. You do have a lot to say about it. I can't wait to hear what you have to say. I think about this a lot. I've been writing about it a lot, a lot of articles lately about sex specifically, because people are desperate to hear about it because there isn't a lot of talk about how much our sex lives change after having a child. You know, for birthing people, there is potentially birth trauma, right?

There is healing that needs to happen regardless of trauma. Sex might need to be redefined after having a baby for a while. It might not be like penetrative sex. And it's going to be different. And so, and people are, this is a very tender area for people understandably. And so yeah,

I think just having a conversation about it in of itself so people don't feel alone and shame about our sex life was destroyed or we have sex only a handful of times since our child was born. I mean, the research says that that's the majority and this goes down both genders.

You know, both genders are saying like after the birth of their first child that they're feeling sexual dissatisfaction. So it's I mean, if that's happening to you, you're part of the majority, you know, first of all. And I think it is because like, yeah.

For example, with birthing people, I do think that the birth in and of itself is so important to talk about it with your partner and with others and have a healing experience within your own body. However, that baby came into the world.

that that's really jumped over. You know, if we think about like for birthing people that they get one appointment at six weeks, that's like, okay, now you're ready to have sex. It's, it's not intimate in and of itself. It doesn't recognize what happened to your body.

And what's happening to your body continue to. And so then they come home and like, they're not talking to their partner about it. And that in and of itself can make a divide. And I think that there's a lot not talking about because they simply don't know that it's helpful to talk about it. Like the non-birthing partner checking in on the regular, not specifically about sex, but about the birthing partner's body.

How is your body? How are you feeling about the birth? You know, like how is the healing journey? Can I pour you a bath? Can I do things to help your body physically? I mean, that really helps. I mean, that's intimacy right there. That's going to build trust. I'm seen here with this person. You know, I don't have to hide that I just had a baby.

which that's what our culture wants us to do is to pretend we didn't just have babies. And then we're like, I got my body back. I got my sex life back. I mean, that's completely, you know, irresponsible to do to not just birthing people, but to couples, you know, both partners are impacted by this. Even the non birthing partner is impacted by this when it's a completely unrecognized event.

event. And so I guess by recognizing it and really empowering a non-birthing partner to know how to be attuned. And again, this wouldn't be by instinct. This is where like psycho psychological education comes in by knowing like, you know, ways to help out their birthing partner, feel at home and safe in their own body again. Yeah.

And like appreciating their body, not asking them to go back to the way they were, because that's asking a birthing person to do something that's impossible. Their body has changed. That body is done. It's over. There's a new body that both partners can get to know together.

And that's the journey there. Right. And like, that's not necessarily. And I mean, then that's sexy. That's redefining romance. You know, like you have a new body. And so does a non birthing partners. Bodies are always changing. I mean, we were talking about at the beginning of the podcast. Time is moving forward and we don't have to fight that.

we can, you know, be inclusive to that reality and really be attuned to that reality and support it and support finding a new sex life again. However, that looks like, you know, to both partners that is like inclusive of both partners needs enough, you know, the need to heal and the need for, for touch, you know, it's important for both people. So. I'm, I'm really appreciating that.

what you're saying about how the, the actual physical experience of birthing is and, and what happens after that is overlooked a lot of the times. And I think what I'm hearing in, in what you're saying that really is standing out for me is what an opportunity it is. If people are not, um,

letting say too much time go by but if they feel into the fact that okay we we actually have a responsibility as partners to be to foster our intimacy and to recognize that it's going to be different now but that doesn't mean like we're just putting it all on hold it means that

Now that there's a baby here, as an example, we're going to find ways to still give each other pleasurable experiences that actually match where we are currently at, where we're not trying to be what we were prior to, but where we're actually paying attention and attuning to each other and asking, like, what would feel pleasurable to you? And it may be that a birthing partner needs a bit more restorative time than the non-birthing partner needs.

And yet I still am hearing that there are ways that they can show up for each other that offer them a deepening of intimacy and finding pleasure in new ways while they recalibrate based on all the changes that have happened. I will condense what I was going to say into just this one thing.

Growing up and moving through time is about being able to grieve as we move towards greater complexity. That means that we're constantly adapting to the realities of life. We are in the present moment. We are what we are today, not what we were yesterday and not what I thought I had.

That is how we move through time together. And we're in the present moment, making love for who we are at this moment. It is not about sex per se. It can be about orgasms, but it's, but this is about making love. This is about two strangers who will always be strangers constantly trying to get to know each other. And that's lovemaking. Okay.

And that takes two adults knowing that they're constantly losing things as they're gaining new things. But are they aware of what they're gaining and are their eyes on the ball or is it always looking over the shoulder into the past? That is the big mistake that most people are making. Well, there's, as always, plenty to talk about. And I think, Stan, this is maybe even one of our shorter conversations. Yeah.

But if you want to hear more from Stan about how attachment theory plays into all the things that we've been talking about, then definitely go to neilsatin.com slash baby. And I'll have a list of all the other episodes that Stan and I have done where you can dive into that. In the meantime, you've been listening to Kara Hoppe and Stan Tatkin talking about their

Really well written and simple, easy to follow, but very practical book, Baby Bomb, A Relationship Survival Guide for New Parents. And Stan and Kara, would you each mind mentioning if people want to find out more about you and your work, where can they do that?

Sure. Thank you. Um, come to my website, Kara hoppy.com. Um, you can find me, um, at Kara hoppy on Twitter, on Instagram, on Facebook, I'm on all the socials, um, producing content to take these complex ideas and try to make them applicable for couples. Um,

And then I'm also teaching retreats for based on the book for parents, expecting parents and parents of all ages to practice these principles and bring them into their partnership. And that's on carehoppy.com as well.

Great. And just Hoppe is spelled H-O-P-P-E for people looking for KaraHoppe.com. And take it away, Stan. Where can people find out more about you? And if people want to reach me at thepactinstitute.com. If you're interested in training as a therapist, we offer trainings around the world.

If you're a couple and you're interested in couple retreats, my wife, Tracy, and I do a couple of retreats again around the world. That's where you can find me also, Dr. Stan Tatkin, anywhere on social media. And it is a pleasure to have you both here with me today. Thanks so much for taking the time to share your collaborative wisdom about how to

how to survive and thrive in a relationship when you've got little chitlins in the mix. Always a pleasure to be with you. Thanks for having us. Thank you. Okay.