can AP hurt my marriage?

it depends on the expectations of the couple. if a guy gets married and thinks having a kid in his bed is strange and sick, then yes, cosleeping would have a deleterious effect on that marriage. but it sounds like you and your dh have already worked things out pretty well, and that he is supportive of your parenting ideals.

just like AP isn't for every family, other cultural expectations won't be true for every couple either.

you might want to read "our babies, ourselves." it has some wonderful comparisons between cultures and family traditions... i found it very enlightening, and it helped me be more tolerant of parents whose ideals were very different from mine... it's just that we value very different things for our children, not that one of us is more "right" or a better parent than the other.

let's see if i can find it on amazon for ya: our babies, ourselves by meredith small. enjoy!

katje

What I was going to say has already been said.

It sounds as though this was a husband and wife decision. Not something you decided to do, whether or not dh agreed!

Your friend, perhaps she wants the babies in bed, and her husband doesn't. That's totally different.

My dh didn't exactly want our ds in bed with us, so I did what I could with that. We had a bassinet and I had it right next to the bed. When he woke up, I pulled in him bed, fed him, and most nights, fell asleep doing so. If I didn't, as soon as dh left for work (military at that time) I'd sit up, pick up the baby, and cuddle back in bed. Little funny here, at one point our bedroom heat didn't work (base board, in january!) so When I TOLD (yes told) dh that Jack would be sleeping with us, he said, good because I was going ask what we were going to do about enough covers for him! We were both fully dressed, with two blankets on the bed, and Jack had on two pair of socks and two sleepers, poor baby hated hats so he wasn't wearing one. But pull him in bed, and both of us lost a layer of clothing.

Anyway, sorry to hi-jack your thread, but I don't think it will hurt your marriage. You find time to be alone together, and as long as you are both comfortable sleeping with the baby, then it's the right choice for you!

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oh my, you just revealed the reason to my problem... I am not treating dh with the same respect that I treat my children. I mean... it sounds silly but I actually never thought of it that way!

thanks!

I think that, overall, AP has made our marriage stronger. We spend a lot of time and energy being mindful of our children's needs and showering them with love and encouragement -- a natural consequence of that has been an increased tendency to treat EACH OTHER that way.

Attachment Marriage!!!

There are some things that are more difficult -- having a baby in the bed does make intimacy harder, BF on cue leaves me touched-out, constant attention to our children makes me less interested in talking at night. But, we're both aware that this is a temporary state and that, eventually, we'll have more time for each other again. We also recognize when it's time to put our marriage first -- those are the times that Ean goes to bed early or gets to watch some extra Noggin so that mommy and daddy can talk.

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that's what I need!

any ideas on how to have a happy "attachment marriage"???

This is such an important question, and such an individual experience!

I have friends who shy away from many of the practices dh and I use (extended bfing and cosleeping) because they don't think it will work in the context of their relationships. I give them credit for knowing what they are willing to try and where their limits are...it's a difference in what we expect to "get" from a marriage. Dh and I are raising a family, and we get a huge deal of fulfillment from that--and that is a good thing, since there are certainly weeks in our life when we don't get any "coupleness" at all! At the same time, we waited a little longer into our marriage to have kids, and we were really, really ready to feather and fill our nest!

That said, we are now ready to make a few adjustments into the "next stage" of our cosleeping situation, to give us more time in actual physical contact. I realized I'm really starting to miss it, and he is at the same time, so it's time for a (small) change.

I guess it all comes down to agreeing on parenting approaches. When both parents have truly "bought into" it, I don't think it can hurt. When someone is not totally with the program, I think it is then that resentment can build. For example, if I work hard to approach discipline gently, and my partner thinks slapping hands is appropriate, we need to work that out--or I'll seethe anytime I find out my kid was hit, and eventually it's going to come out somewhere.

Since "AP" refers to so many things besides cosleeping, though...and, while I have left my kids in others' care (rarely and with carefully considered care providers), I consider myself an AP parent...in a healthy marriage.

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ITA with this sentiment. Thanks for phrasing it so well.

I think AP practices themselves might not necessarily be detrimental to a marriage, but could be used to find fault within a marriage that is already ailing, if that makes any sense.

Mia