In Sickness and in Cradle Cap

Look, I’m not saying that children are the marital equivalent of a serial killer running amok through a frat house. I’m just saying the insertion of children into a marriage can turn nuptial delight into a nuptial nightmare. You know all of that bollocks about children making marriages stronger? It’s not just bollocks. It’s festering bollocks. Now, children can make marriages stronger but only if it makes you cling to each other like shit-scared barnacles or your idea of ‘stronger’ involves two people screaming at each other over a steaming potty of piss. So…

  1. You want intellectual chat about the Arab Spring or your latest career move? Then for fuck sake put on a condom because having kids will do for conversation what the Tories do for the poor. In five years I have had three complete conversations with Conjugal Kraken while in the presence of Kraken Junior and during one of those I physically had my hand over her mouth.
  2. Remember those trips to the cinema, restaurants, theatre, bars and clubs? Well, you can still do that together but only if you’re willing to find a babysitter whose goal is more than just appearing on Geordie Shore before paying them actual currency to keep your child alive.  We once got a babysitter and went to the cinema to see a film that, as it transpired, was shit and it cost us forty-five fucking pounds.
  3. The rot sets in at childbirth, mainly because you have turned to the man of your dreams and growled, like the demonic Regan in the Exorcist, “You fucking well come near me again and I’ll personally rip off your cock and feed it to next door’s spaniel”. It’s a watershed moment for any marriage, especially when there’s a whole human head poking out of your flange.
  4. Those little tiffs you used to have in Ikea when buying Billy bookcases will be eclipsed by the puce-faced screaming over whose turn it is to feed the product of your enduring love. No really, you haven’t argued until you’ve argued at 3am with two hour’s sleep and a leaking tit in one hand. And that’s just the men.
  5. Cuddling on the sofa in front of the telly takes on a whole new romantic meaning too, especially if by ‘romantic’ you include badly fitting pyjamas, drool, sick stains on your socks and the inability to ask for a cuppa because you’re too fucking exhausted to think of the word for ‘kettle’.
  6. Talking of exhaustion, no, sleep deprivation does not equate to your honeymoon period when the constant shagging kept you up ‘til dawn. However, it does equate to finding that you have spawned an East African dictator and that it’s torturing you for its own putrid titilation. If you find romance in that, you’ve probably been possessed by Barbara fucking Cartland.
  7. And yes, you will still be a united front but this time it won’t be because you both want to take a pick-axe to David Cameron’s knees. It’ll be because you’ve agreed to not give into the tantrum of the small Tasmanian Devil that seems to have taken up residence in the back bedroom.
  8. Oh, you’ll be chuffed to know that sex is also possible although the other half loses a certain allure when he or she has actual shit under their fingernails. Oh, and when they tread on a rogue Lego brick before lurching towards the bed while hollering the word “Fuckwank!”. Oh and when you’ve just had a conversation about Sudocreme over a red-raw baby’s arse…

So what about you? Have you survived a baby in the nuptial nook or are you now staring down the business end of a Decree Absolute? The comment box is thataway…

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16 Responses to In Sickness and in Cradle Cap

  1. Angeline says:

    Fuck. Just as I clawed myself back from most of those things and settled into .. well I wouldn’t say marital bliss as that was never going to happen in this house but had sex once to pro create that which is living in my uterus #2.. I am now terrified.

    • The Kraken says:

      Whoa! Swift work there, Angeline! Talk about hitting the bullseye. I don’t know whether to admire you or be scared of you.

  2. Carole says:

    You forgot to mention that female allure diminishes after childbirth due to physical additions such as cellulite, stretch marks, varicose veins and vaginal tears/stitches. If your “other half” is turned off by wrinkled, posset-stained, nightwear, then stripping down to the birthday suit is a whole new set of visual horrors to overcome. Another obstacle to long cuddles is simply that fore-play becomes a luxury when you are on a deadline – if junior #1 will wake every couple of hours, then lighting candles around a bubbly bath and expecting a passionate mutual lathering becomes a re-heating & topping-up of the water left by the offspring (it is less noisy than running a fresh one) and a run to the washing machine to stuff it with your towels and their bibs, then a look into the tumble drier (or on the cloths airer) for something you can wrap up in that will allow udders to be accessible, yet that might make you look more vamp than tramp!

    • Andy says:

      I feel the need to inject at this point as you said ‘female allure diminishes after childbirth’. Bollocks does it. Being a Mum does not stop you being sexy. I asked some of my Dad friends if they found their other half less attractive after childbirth and they all said they found them more attractive. I have also blogged about it because I hate the idea of my wife (or anyone else’s wife) thinking she isn’t beautiful when she is. Have a read if you have a spare moment. http://alwaystimeforbiscuits.wordpress.com/2012/07/31/body-talk/

      • The Kraken says:

        Whoa! I love that blog post! So much of what you say makes sense in that whatever is said to you about how you look the mirror and scales holler at you. Body image is a problem for lots of women and then pregnancy compounds it. Perhaps you could set up twitter account where you tweet mothers every morning to tell them that they look fucking amazing even though there is baby sick in their hair.

    • The Kraken says:

      God, that’s made me laugh and I can’t tell you how many staggering images I have in my head as a result.

  3. I think you know my situation but that wasn’t down to the children, it was down to the fact that we were making each other miserable and decided to divorce for the chance of a better life and to be better people and better parents. But one thing I did think, and have thought, and included in a blog piece I wrote a while back is that my ex and I stopped being friends when we became parents.
    Sorry, a bit of a downbeat comment but – yay! You’re awesome! :-)

    • The Kraken says:

      I remember you writing that blog post. It’s the responsibility isn’t it? I think it can take over to the point that you are nothing but two parents trying to make it through the day which is hardly a recipe for a romance. Oh, and you are never downcast to me. You are always fucking stonking.

  4. John Adams says:

    I was a little bit older than most when I became a father so quite a few of my friends also had kids. I had also been married once before. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I was in no position to do romance and expected pretty much everything you outlined in your blog. I wasn’t disappointed! That said, it didn’t put my wife or I off as we’ve just had child número deux.

  5. The40yearold says:

    Love it. so true. Kids are great, but my god…..nothing is ever the same. a work colleague and I talked about this last week, the chances of future divorce and the “it isn’t you, mummy and daddy just don’t love each other anymore”. BOLLOCKS. It is you, we NEVER argued like this before you came along. Oops. Did I say that out loud?

  6. Oh the endless ‘discussions over who has had the most sleep. Most sleep being the most minutes nay seconds. How can you be jealous over sleep child free people used to ask. I used to smash their heads off their shoulders with my trusty imaginary Le Creuset frying pan.

  7. I am tired. I apologise for the shitely written comment I just posted, with no punctuation. This is because my HG and teenager have had more sleep than me.

  8. Kate says:

    Actual tea came out of my actual nose reading this! Brilliant, Thankyou!

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