Why Your Extroverted Husband Is More Annoyed With You After Kids
8 reasons that will make you want to share this post instantly with your partner to discuss it!
Here, I attempted to get men to understand why their Highly Sensitive/introverted wives act even more “difficult” post-kids. This post tries to help women understand their husbands’ perspectives, and why having kids stresses the marriage from the point of view of a more laid-back, extroverted guy. (And flip the genders if applicable, as always.)
Your husband wants the kids to grow up in a stress-free home. For him, routines are stressful, particularly if they approximate crisis mode down-to-the-second planning, which is sadly how he may view your beloved regimens, I mean, plans. For you, routines, schedules, and set plans eliminate stress, and for him, they create it. (Men and women tend to think about planning, at least around the home, differently; read this for more.)
His house growing up was not like yours. When you didn’t have kids yet, you guys created plans together, which may have led to a lot of downtime or couple time (if he deferred to you, as so many laid back dudes are happy to do during the honeymoon stage) without other people around. But, he subconsciously assumed that when you had kids, your life would look more like the one he experienced in his family of origin growing up, where people were around, groups of them, ALL THE TIME. Just, like, hanging out and talking loudly. Even having dinner parties. SHUDDER.
Relatedly, it’s possible that his family is currently implicitly or explicitly criticizing you for being so different than them. Before kids, they saw you when they saw you, but now your introversion or sensitivity is blocking them from weekly three hour Sunday dinners with the grandkids or what have you. Now, they may be making their disappointment over this known to your husband, thereby exacerbating any disappointment he feels on his own. (Check out this post for how introverts and extroverts feel about family get-togethers.)
His love language is sex and now that you’re feeling stressed and touched out, he is way more critical of your general introversion/HSP nature because he is always operating at a love deficit. Not just a sex deficit, a love deficit.
He doesn’t have any physical ailments or chronic pain type of issues, whereas more sensitive people generally do, like migraines, or back pain. Even if he wants to empathize, on some level, he sort of doesn’t believe that your physical pain could be that bad. (Possibly an analogy to this is how many women don’t think a lack of sex is “that bad” for men, when it is.)
If you’re a stay at home mom, your extroverted husband may feel that, if he was in your shoes, his day would be filled with fun playdates/lunches with friends and playing games with the kids. Honestly, being a stay at home parent IS like that for many happy extroverts. So when you find it overwhelming, he just thinks you’re complaining for no reason.
You may be so ashamed of your introverted/HSP nature that you try and “suck it up” and overdo/overplan more than is good for you. This means that you get to the “breaking point” about weekly or monthly, at which point you scream and act “crazy.” The unfortunate consequence of this pattern is that your husband concludes that you are just unreasonable and crazy, and doesn’t at all understand that the reason you’re so tapped out all the time is that you generally are doing much more than you can calmly handle. (The way to best deal with this is to move toward a place of self-acceptance of your limits, and do less if you need to, even if that means your husband may be disappointed with you saying no to more plans.)
All of these points are not “right” or “wrong.” Compromise or at least acceptance on one or both ends is possible on all of these issues. Send this to your husband and take the risk of making yourself vulnerable in order to open up a dialogue and see what can be done to help you both understand one another better despite your differences! And till we meet again, I remain, The Blogapist Who Says, Also Ask Your Husband To Read The Highly Sensitive Person To Better Understand You… And Watch The Below Video To Understand Him!
For therapy, go here for Dr. Whiten and go here for other clinicians in her group practice Best Life Behavioral Health. For coaching with Dr. Whiten, go here. Order Dr. Whiten’s books, Couples You Meet in Counseling: 7 Common Relationship Dynamics That Sabotage Closeness, 52 Emails to Transform Your Marriage and How to Talk to Your Kids about Your Divorce: Healthy, Effective Communication Techniques for Your Changing Family, and listen to The Dr. Psych Mom Show on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. Join The Dr. Psych Mom secret Facebook group for more discussion about these kinds of issues!
This blog is not intended as medical advice or diagnosis and should in no way replace consultation with a medical professional. If you try this advice and it does not work for you, you cannot sue me. This is only my opinion, based on my background, training, and experience as a therapist and person. Also, all examples involving people or clients are hypothetical amalgams, not actual people.