I love studies, studies done at Ohio State University have found that parents who have a strong marriage are more equipped and better able to cope with a difficult or fussy baby. A temperamental baby can be difficult to cope with on the best of days, but the study identified that the parent’s relationship with each other offered key insight into how they will react when their baby is challenging.
The co-author of the study published in Infant Behavior & Development, Sarah Schoppe-Sullivan said:
When couples with a supportive marital relationship have a difficult baby, they tend to rise to the challenge. Couples who don’t have a strong relationship with each other are more likely to undermine each other and get into conflicts when they have to deal with a particularly challenging baby.
There is Strength in Unity
There is ample evidence to support the value of a strong relationship between married couples. Married men live longer and are often healthier. Married women may experience far less stress and feel more secure in whom they are. Married parents need to be on the same page when it comes to discipline and parenting later in life, but when the baby is young – having a strong partner who is strong enough to support you when your baby is temperamental or fussy is an ideal situation.
When I was pregnant, one of the things that my doctor told my husband and I was that my job was to listen to my body and look after the baby. She told my husband that his job was to listen to his wife and take care of her. That if we both focused on those things, we’d be working together and it’s a philosophy we focused on during the first year of my daughter’s life.
I listened to her and took care of her and he listened to me and took care of me. When it was necessary, he took over with the baby so that I could get sleep and he could have time with her and it all followed in line with that piece of advice. It made us stronger as parents and it helped tremendously when she was ill or when we were struggling.
As parents of an older child, this methodology still works for us. We’re both her parents. My focus is on listening to her and taking care of what she needs and my husband focuses on listening to me and taking care of me. So I’m not surprised by the Ohio University’s study – it makes sense. We are stronger together than we are apart.
For more on this study and for another perspective, check out Valorie’s Baby blog on the Ohio State University study.