Juggling Love and Parenthood

Ever wonder if your marriage might be taking a backseat after kids enter the picture? Get ready for a heartfelt conversation on "Doing it With the Daniels" as we unpack the often-overlooked shifts that occur in a marriage post-children. By sharing our personal journeys, we shed light on how prioritizing your relationship with your spouse can lead to a more stable family environment for your kids. From redistributing household tasks to managing potential conflicts, we offer actionable advice and stories from couples who've successfully navigated this new chapter in life. Whether you're a new parent or juggling multiple roles, you'll find practical tips to keep your marriage strong.

We shift gears to discuss the importance of prioritizing your marriage over your children for a healthier family dynamic. Too often, couples let their relationship revolve solely around their kids, leading to long-term strain. We dive into how maintaining a strong marital bond, even by something as simple as regular date nights, can prevent dysfunction from becoming the norm for your children—and even your grandchildren. Drawing on biblical principles, we stress that a solid relationship between spouses is the cornerstone of a harmonious family life. Tune in for essential insights on balancing the attention between your spouse and children, ensuring your family thrives in love and unity.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
What I realize is that couples that put all the
focus on children usually end uphaving problems in their
marriage.
Yeah, but couples who keep thefocus on the marriage, the
children are automaticallycareful.

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:15):
Because the husband and the wife are together
Exactly.
Welcome to Doing it With theDaniels, the podcast where we
navigate life, marriage andministry.
I'm Charles.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
And I'm Tisa.
Join us as we share insights,wisdom and practical advice to
strengthen your marriage,empower your life and enrich
your ministry.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Let's dive in together and discover the joys
of doing it with the Daniels.
Hey, thanks for joining us foranother episode of Doing it With
the Daniels, where we helpcouples get it on in life,
marriage and ministry.
We are here today with anotherepisode.
Thank you for joining us.
What's up, baby?
you ready, we ready, ready,ready to jump in.

(00:55):
Listen before we jump in, letme encourage everybody.
We appreciate you guys watching, uh, these episodes and we want
to ask you to make sure yousubscribe to our channel, make
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give us a comment if we, as wenavigate through this episode,
tell us what you're thinking,tell us what comes to mind.
We just want to hear from you,all right, we love to hear from
you guys, so talk to us, allright.
Hey, hey, my dear, what are wetalking about today?

(01:17):
we're talking about marriageafter children marriage after
children, wow, and I mean weunderstand that, because we went
into this with a child and wealso added a child to our
marriage.
So I mean, what do you thinkabout that?

Speaker 2 (01:34):
I feel like you were more affected than I was, so
what is your take on that?

Speaker 1 (01:39):
Yeah, it was interesting.
I mean, obviously you hadalready had the child and was
being a parent.
I mean, obviously you hadalready had the child and was
being a parent, but adding ahusband.
I think you're still affectedby it, you know, because
somebody else is now coming indisrupting the dynamics of you
and your child's life and youknow that's a prominent figure

(01:59):
as a father coming in and ahusband being added to the mix
For me.
I came in with the awareness ofthere's a fathering aspect.
That's a part of this, that I'mresponsible for a child's life,
as well as making you feelcomfortable enough to trust me
to be a father in that child'slife.
So I think we all went throughcertain changes.

(02:21):
We all were affected by it, butit wasn't bad.
No, it wasn't.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
I think we all went through certain changes we all
were affected by it, but itwasn't bad.

Speaker 1 (02:25):
No, it wasn't.
I think ideally is.
We think about couples who aremarried and there are no
children involved and then theyhave their first child.
Yeah, how does that impact themarriage?
Because I mean, when there's noresponsibility to take care of
a child, where do you go fromthere?
Because before that you're justkind of doing what you want to
do.
Both parties can take care ofthemselves.

(02:51):
They're responsible adults.
I mean, you, you want to take atrip, you just go.
You have to worry about schooland packing kids and all of that
.
You just do what you want to doas a couple.
You don't have to worry aboutgetting a babysitter who's going
to watch the child.
You have to worry about rolesof who's going to take care of
the child.
None of that comes into play,yeah, um, in those situations.
But when it does come into play, how do those relationships
begin to change?

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I think it begins to change because there's sometimes
there's conflict you know, intaking care of the child and I
think for the woman is prettymuch the majority of the, of the
of the responsibility is on heryeah she feels that yeah and so
she can sometimes becomeresentful and bitter because

(03:31):
it's like I'm doing all of this,what are you doing, you know?
and then it's like when they'rebabies getting up at night, it's
a lot, you know, you try torotate, okay.
Well, I got up last time.
It's time for you get up.
This is a lot of changes in therelationship when kids come
into play.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
Yeah, and I think every couple is different Just
trying to navigate hey, we addeda child.
What does this look like?

Speaker 2 (03:55):
I think it's really good for every couple to do
what's best for them.

Speaker 1 (03:59):
Yeah, and some couples I think need guidance.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
They need somebody they can trust a trustworthy
couple that can guide themthrough how to handle this
addition.
It's a welcomed addition yeah,it is, but it brings greater
responsibility and can bring astress on the relationship
because it's new.
It's something new, you can'tignore it Right, and it has to
be properly handled.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, and it's not always easy no like you
mentioned some of the things ofgetting up at night, who's gonna
get up?
I mean, in some cases, if amother's nursing, like when we
had trade?
Yeah our youngest child younursed, so there were no bottles
for me to get up and preparefor the most part, yeah, unless
you know it was pumped orsomething yeah, but for the most
part that was something you hadto take care of I wouldn't say

(04:45):
you had it easy, I did, have iteasy, I did.
And that's why we say coupleshave to navigate it based on
their relationship because youreally took control of just that
mothering role and nurturing,and I'm gonna take care of this
child and and so for me it waslike, hey, just go, do you?

(05:06):
You know, I started a businessduring that time and I was gone
a lot of part of part of majorpart of the day, while you were
there with.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
But I stayed home for a while too.
Yeah, and so I think that's abig thing, because what about
when both of them work?

Speaker 1 (05:21):
Both couples work and we did.
We experienced that, yeah, andboth of them work.
Both couples work and we did weexperienced that.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah, so it's like it's a lot that comes in, like
who's going to get the childready in the morning, who's
going to drop them off atdaycare, who's going to pick
them up.
You know all of that that comesinto play.
Who's going to take care ofthem when they get home, who's
going to, who's going to bathethem, who's going to cook you
know who's going to clean up,who's going to get their clothes
ready for the week?
Who's gonna pack the diaper bag, all of that?

Speaker 1 (05:44):
so it's a lot of responsibility it's a lot of
responsibility and I thinkthat's where couples need to
discuss, and some of it youwon't be able to discuss but
because you just won't know, youwon't have a context for these
changes yeah and you've got tobe flexible and you've got to be
prepared to put to adjust, yeah, with the changes that come in

(06:05):
the dynamics of the relationship.
Now I think the key is justbecause children are born into
the relationship.
You can't lose who you are as acouple, right, and that's where
a lot of couples mess up.
They become so focused onraising children that they
forget that they still have tocare for their relationship.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
I think I'm guilty of that.
I remember when Trey was born,it's like, ok, I got this little
life that I have a responsebefore and I got to take care of
.
And I'm like, yeah, you knowyou good, you know, take care of
yourself.
And it was me and him, you know, for the most part, like when
he was first born, right, justall the time Attached at the hip
, attached at the hip.
And I think sometimes wesubconsciously, as women,

(06:51):
because we're nurturers, that wedo that to our husbands.
We kind of push them away andeverything is about the baby and
you got to bring balance tothat.

Speaker 1 (07:00):
And I think we as men take advantage of that to a
certain extent.
We kind of push everythingdealing with the baby on you all
where we can help.
We can't do everything, but wecan help.
And, to be honest with you as aman, being completely
transparent, we don't reallyhave the desire to do all of the
baby care stuff.
You know, we just want to befun dads, we want to be good

(07:22):
dads, we want to enjoy our child, but that, that's why you don't
want the responsibilities yeah,sometimes the responsibility
becomes a challenge.
Now I'm not, you know, theresponsibility of the daily care
yeah, the task I don't wantpeople to be confused of no, we
want to take care of our childwe want to provide for our child
, we want to love our child.
But the daily task, yeah, thoselittle things, yeah, most

(07:45):
fathers aren't really interestedin that.
We'll do it yeah but it's notsomething we're just excited.
Oh, I can change pampers today.
What color is their poop?
You know, mothers look at that.
They evaluate that stuff.
Oh, it's runny, oh it's solid,oh, they need to eat this.
You know, mothers are all intune with what's going on in
that baby, where fathers aretypically going to be like, oh

(08:06):
they, they seem to be all right,everything.
Yeah, I changed the pamper.
What it looked like, I don'tknow.
I just changed the pamper.
You know you don't care what itlooks like, um, and even feel
what they're gonna eat.
Hey, whatever we got, feed themsomething as long as they're
not crying.
That's why you see a lot offathers when the baby start
crying, what do they do?
Take the baby to the motherhere, your baby crying because

(08:27):
many times, like, what do I do?
I don't know what to do withthis, so so women seem to
gravitate to all of that alittle more than men do.
But you can lose yourself in therelay.
You can lose the relationshipin the process of putting so
much attention on the child.
Um, I was talking to a couple,I was talking to someone not too

(08:48):
long ago who was in arelationship.
They've been married forseveral years and they have
raised their children.
Their children are adults,they're grandparents now.
But he was sharing with me someof his challenges in the
relationship and what it camedown to is they haven't given
attention to the relationship.
They became parents and theyput a hundred percent of the

(09:12):
time they were together intobeing parents and so everything
is about the child, raising thechildren.

Speaker 2 (09:19):
We're doing everything for the children and
we get together.
It's because of the children.

Speaker 1 (09:23):
Yeah, all of that yeah, everything became about
the children and, and because ofthat, they lost their spark,
they lost the reason for themgetting married.
Yeah, they lost that, and sonow it's all about the children,
about children, children aregrown they're gone and now
they're.
They're like okay who are we?

(09:45):
yeah, without the children, yeahwho are we without the children
?
What do we have now that thesechildren are gone?
Because that's the part thatwas never nurtured right when it
started going?
I'm sure what probably ended uphappening is they both
recognized it at the time butthey ignored it because they
could throw themselves into thechildren.
Yeah, so we, we come togetheron the children.

(10:06):
We have a common bond, a commongoal.
We want our children to succeedand be successful, but we're
ignoring the failure of ourrelationship and you recognize
that once the children arepretty much out of the household
yeah, you would think so, buthere's where the conversation
went to beyond that.
Now they have grandchildrenguess what?

Speaker 2 (10:28):
everything is about the grandchildren?

Speaker 1 (10:30):
it shifted yeah so, now that we can't put the focus
on the children, we're going toput the focus on the
grandchildren, still allowing usto ignore that something's off
here and this is where kind ofthis conversation went to with
this man who was just like Idon't know if I want to be in
this anymore, Like I'm at apoint now where I'm ready to

(10:51):
deal with the reality of whatwe've been ignoring exactly and
I think a lot of couples end upgetting in that place.
It may not get to the point ofchildren growing up and now
grandchildren some get, getthere before that they realize
we're missing something we don'thave.
We've lost our reason for beingmarried.
Our togetherness, ourpartnership has has gotten lost

(11:13):
somewhere and now we're focusedon other things, trying to fill
in the gap, just to staytogether, and I think that's, I
think I understand that, but Istill think it's a danger it is
very dangerous because it's justlike they.

Speaker 2 (11:30):
Now you're married, but you don't.
You don't really know thatperson anymore.
You guys didn't grow together.
You put everything centeredaround your kids and we even
talked about that in ourrelationship.
We was like, okay, we gotta dosome things because these kids
are growing up and they'rethey're gone.
They're going like one'salready out, the other one's

(11:51):
gonna be out four or five years,yeah.
And so we was like, okay, sowhat is our life gonna look like
once he's gone?
you know, for me and you,because it's just gonna be us
yeah and so that's why, you know, we try to tell couples to stay
together, date, get to know oneanother make sure you like each
other yeah make sure you stayin love with each other.

Speaker 1 (12:10):
Make sure you have a life outside of your children
exactly raising.

Speaker 2 (12:13):
That is good, because I feel like a lot of people.
Once you start having kids,they become your life they
become your life and it's fine,but you gotta have balance with
that.
I feel like you know if you'regoing on a family vacation, you
need a vacation with just youand your spouse yeah, you know,
and it may not be a vacation.

Speaker 1 (12:31):
You may go out of town for the family, you might
do a staycation for you and yourcouple.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
Yeah, but whatever it is, you got to learn to do both
.
If you're going to, you know,do a family day.
You need to do a day with justyou and your spouse.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
You got to make time for just you and your spouse
without the kids, that's true,and for just you and your spouse
without the kids, that's true.
And I think it's hard becauseyou got kids, you gotta find
babysitter, you gotta findsomebody that you can trust.
You know nowadays so much goingon with kids so you gotta find
somebody that you can trust towatch your child so you guys can
have that alone time to go backand reconnect.
It's all about reconnecting andmaking sure that you stay

(13:09):
connected.
100 I think that's that's vital,and to maintaining order yeah
the proper order, the godly, thebiblical order for family,
exactly, I think, keeping thatin mind yeah, becomes important,
and so the biblical ordernumber one is god or jesus is at
the head yeah right, the biblesays christ is head of the man.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
uh, yeah.

Speaker 2 (13:31):
And so we got to keep that in perspective, that God
comes first.
Yeah, and then second is thehusband.

Speaker 1 (13:38):
Right.

Speaker 2 (13:39):
Yeah, okay.
And then third is the wife, andthen fourth are the children
yes, okay.

Speaker 1 (13:46):
The children.
The children are number four.
They at the bottom.

Speaker 2 (13:51):
Yeah, they at the bottom, although're so cute and
we love them and oh my god, butthey still at the bottom what I
realize is that couples that putall the focus on children
usually end up having problemsin their marriage.

Speaker 1 (14:06):
Yeah, but couples who keep the focus on the marriage,
the children are automaticallycared for because the husband
and the wife are together.
And then, when God is in themarriage and they keep God first
, god begins to be the center ofall of that, all of what they
do as a couple and as a family.
But when they lose sight ofthat, it never fails.

(14:28):
When a couple loses sight ofwho they are as a couple and
they only focus on the children,it gets bad yeah, it is chaotic
yeah, you can't.
You may.
You may do great at taking careof children, but if you're not
taking care of your spouse andyou all are in a healthy place,
the children are affected by itbecause you become dysfunctional
.
Guess what?

(14:48):
Those innocent babies, nomatter how small or how big they
become, if they're children inyour household, they are
affected by that dysfunction.
They notice.

Speaker 2 (14:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:59):
They notice when things aren't right.

Speaker 2 (15:01):
They notice when y'all not talking.
Yes, they pay attention.

Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yeah, they notice when somebody is frustrated,
they notice when y'all notgetting along, they notice all
of that.
When y'all not getting along,they notice all of that and if
it doesn't change, it starts tobecome their norm and they start
to be like, oh, this is just,this is how relationships are
and I mean we're going down theroad.
Yeah, but if you look down thefuture for a lot of those
children, they grow up thinkingthat's a relationship.

(15:27):
So guess what they learn?
dysfunction at home and they goand carry out that same
dysfunction in theirrelationship.
Yeah, as they get older andunfortunately that becomes
dangerous.

Speaker 2 (15:38):
It's very dangerous.

Speaker 1 (15:39):
Yeah, it starts a cycle of dysfunction.
And it's all because the orderof the family changes Got
rearranged from what Godordained it to be.
But if we keep that order andwe make sure, hey, we got to
stay together.
We got to stay on with oneaccord on the same page.
We got to make sure we'rehealthy, make sure we're loving
each other, we're respectingeach other, we're spending time

(16:01):
with one another and we'remaking sure we're good.
Yeah because if we're good,we're going to make sure they're
good together.
We're going to function as twoparents not just maybe one
parent, putting all theirattention over here, but
ignoring this side of things,and it's easy to do, very it's
very easy to do.

Speaker 2 (16:19):
I'm guilty.
I think I did that with theboys.
Everything was about the boys,making sure they were together
and make sure everything wasfine with them, and I'm thinking
you're gonna be okay becauseyou're grown and you know.
You know how to take care ofyourself and I'm not slacking,
you know, anyway, when it comesto you.
But I think my main focus wasthe kids.

Speaker 1 (16:38):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (16:39):
And so I had to adjust and shift and change, in
that, when I realized that I was, the balance was off.

Speaker 1 (16:46):
Yeah, people would be amazed how important attention
is in a marriage.
Children need attention butyour spouse also wants attention
yeah, your spouse wants to beengaged with you know, and if
you're always blowing them offor you're, you claim to engage
but really your mind issomewhere else.

(17:07):
You focus on the kids, it's,it's.
It can bring a separation inthe relationship.

Speaker 2 (17:13):
Yeah, yeah, so you always have to keep that order
in place, even when it comes toum spending time with god.
Yeah, you know you gotta makesure that you do that, but then
you also have to make sure youspend time with your spouse.
So it's it's the order it's.

Speaker 1 (17:30):
It's balanced all the way across the board.
How do we maintain balance withchildren, with our spouse and
with God?
And we got to constantlyevaluate.
Yeah, because you can get offreally easy like you mentioned
earlier yeah and because you'rejust going through the most
you're doing, many times peopleare reactive yeah they do what
they think is most important andso, as a result of doing what

(17:54):
they think is most important,they ignore some other things,
when really you just need tolook at how do I balance all of
the important, because all of itis important.

Speaker 2 (18:01):
All of it is important.

Speaker 1 (18:02):
How do I balance all of the important things in my
life so that I keep building,keep growing and everybody is
taken care of?
Because a husband who's nottaken care of is not a happy
husband.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
Not happy.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
Not happy.
A wife who's not taken care ofis not a happy wife.
You see what I'm saying, sothat attention is necessary on
both sides.
Where men, it's not alwayschildren Sometimes they get
distracted by other things,whether it's their hobbies,
hobbies hanging out with otherpeople, whatever the case I'll
say video games is a lot of.

Speaker 2 (18:32):
I hear a women, a lot of women saying stuff about
these days yeah, that's thesedays.
Yeah, these days, I think, whenwe were coming up, mostly men
were going to play basketballyeah so, and that was a lot.
You know that he gonna playbasketball, you know, but that's
what they did then.
But now it's more of the videogame yeah and so trying to
navigate all of that and makingsure that, hey, I'm getting the

(18:56):
attention I need and not thevideo game is getting all the
attention.

Speaker 1 (19:00):
Yeah, yeah, it's a lot and it's easy to do, because
when you have children, if ahusband's looking at his wife
give a majority of her time tothe children, well, naturally
he's probably thinking, well,what can I go do?
And in that little window, inthat span of time, the woman can
become so engaged with thechildren that it becomes her

(19:22):
norm.
Yes, the man, if it's videogames or whatever, he becomes so
engaged with that that thatbecomes the norm yeah and then
they look up and a year haspassed and it's like what's
going on?
why am I always in this roomplaying games and you're always
in this room with the children?
You see what I'm saying.
And then, once the childrengrow up, now the problem really

(19:46):
shows up.
Yeah, like, wait a minute, why?
Why are we even here?
Once again, we're back to beingroommates.
Yeah, what we're doing, or it's?

Speaker 2 (19:54):
like when the kids go to grandma's house for a week
or they go to a summer camp.
Then you're kind of looking ateach other like, okay, what we
do, what we do without the kidsand be happy when the kids come
back.
Yeah, because you don't have alife without them.
You haven't created a lifewithout your children.
Yeah, so I mean, if you, ifyour children, go away for a
week, you should be findingsomething to do together with

(20:15):
your spouse something exciting.
You should be excited aboutbeing together alone, with the
kids, I mean all of that, yeah,100, I totally agree, yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:24):
So I think that's important, so I think that help.
That will help couples who,after they get married and
children, come along yeah justkeep them, to keep things in
perspective.
The marriage is still important.
Yes, your spouse is stillimportant.
Yes, you have anotherresponsibility to take care of
this child, but it doesn't meanyou can now ignore the
responsibility to provide thatattention, that love, that

(20:47):
nurturing for your spouse.

Speaker 2 (20:50):
So keep the order.
God, husband, wife, children.

Speaker 1 (20:56):
And it'll be a blessed family, all right?
Well, y'all, that's what we gotfor you today.
Pray, you're blessed by this,and don't forget to like and
subscribe to our channel.
Make sure you share this andcomment below.
Let us know what you thinkabout it.
Let us know what you want us totalk about.
We'll be happy to give you moreinformation, all right, god
bless.
Hey, thank you for joining us,for doing it with the Daniels.
If you wanna keep up witheverything going on on our
channel, don't forget to Like,comment, subscribe and share

(21:19):
this podcast.
Absolutely.
We'll see you next time.