Causes of Resentment For Parent Couples (And How to Fix Them!)
Resentment is a deep, burning anger that can boil up inside of us and destroy our relationships if left unchecked. Learn how moms like you can use a positive attitude and other tricks to combat resentment and feel happier in your marriage with kids.
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Picture this: you’re knee-deep in dirty diapers, sleepless nights, and baby puke, and all you want is a gold star for your superhero mom efforts. But instead you glance over and see your husband obliviously passed out on the couch with the TV still blaring in the background.
Cue the resentment.
What is resentment?
Resentment refers to the feelings of bitterness, frustration, or discontent that arise when we moms perceive a lack of support, understanding, or equal balance of responsibilities in parenthood.
This emotional response can be triggered by an imbalance in caregiving duties, unmet expectations, or a sense of being overwhelmed by the new responsibilities of parenting.
Resentment can quickly take its toll on your relationship, leading often to snapping in irritation, passive aggression, or total avoidance of your husband.
Addressing and resolving issues that contribute to resentment is crucial for feeling happy in your marriage and for setting up a healthy dynamic for your growing family.
What does resentment feel like for moms
Resentment tends to build slowly over time, so much so that you sometimes don’t even know that it’s happening.
First you feel irritation or hurt at one instance but you dismiss it until it begins to happens again and again. Each time these nagging feelings of irritation or unappreciation come and don’t get resolved, they pile up inside you until suddenly you are completely absorbed in bitterness and anger.
You can identify resentment building inside you with the following tell-tale feelings.
You feel like you’re responsible for making everything in your family work and your husband is just along for the ride.
Resentment can brew very quickly inside you if you feel like you shoulder the majority of the responsibility when it comes to caring for the children and maintaining the home. The majority of this burden and that of the “mental load” (the invisible planning that comes with domestic life) tends to fall to us mothers.
While we are running around worrying about whether our children are ready for playdates, remembering to buy bigger rain boots for the school trip next week, or trying to decide if we should make the chicken or the fish for dinner, our husbands minds seem to be completely devoid of practical thought.
This irritation at constantly having to take care of everything can quickly burn you out and make you resentful of our husbands’ laissez-faire attitudes.
You feel like your husband’s needs always come first.
You’ve been home all day with a screaming, teething baby and haven’t had a minute’s break to even grab a bite to eat or pee in peace when in waltzes your husband from his day socializing with his colleagues and he has the audacity to say that he’s tired and needs a rest before dinner.
Um, what?
Instances like this where we feel our husbands prioritize their needs over ours or even sometimes our children’s can be instant resentment-builders.
You feel like you are constantly working and sacrificing for the sake of your family, yet your husband tends to be in the same me-first mindset that he was pre-kid.
You feel repulsed by the idea of sex.
You have no sense of connection with your husband and the idea of being intimate with him makes you feel almost disgusted. When you look at him all you feel is irritation or disappointment, which doesn’t give you any form of sexual desire. You probably feel like he doesn’t deserve anything positive from you.
OR
He just seems to want sex all the time and you are too tired and touched out to be able to give any more of yourself. You’re irritated that he can’t seem to take the hint that you’d rather sleep or that you just need some time to yourself. But then you give in and give it up to keep him happy. The more you give in for his sake, the more you feel anger towards him for “forcing you” into it.
What does resentment look like in moms
Not only can we feel resentment, but often it comes out visibly in our behaviors.
Irritability
Do you find yourself snapping often at your husband? Do you just assume that everything that he says is going to set you off before he even says it? Does having to repeat yourself set you into a rage?
You might be suffering from irritability as a result of your building resentment towards your husband.
Irritability usually manifests itself in making you react quickly and negatively to whatever it is that’s bothering you – in this case your husband. Without even having an opportunity to think, your irritability causes you to explode instantly.
Passive aggressive behavior
Passive aggression is when you show your anger subtly, usually by giving your husband the cold-shoulder or muttering snide remarks under your breath in reaction to something your husband does that you resent.
Rather than blowing up in a rage, your bitterness seeps out slowly and quietly (but just as effectively). The negativity is still palpable with passive aggression.
Resigning from interaction
Perhaps you avoid your partner at all costs as a result of your resentment. You don’t want to argue or be set off, so you just go your own way and he his. Your conversations are cold and your opportunities for true connection are nonexistent.
Avoiding sex
You avoid sex with your husband at all costs. Him hinting at or asking for sex annoys the living daylights out of you and you always try to turn the conversation. You find excuses, pretend to be asleep, or just flat out shut him down if the opportunity presents itself.
Causes of resentment in parent couples
Never before in your lives together have you had so many new challenges than you will as new parents, and with that can bring some new emotions that you’ve never experienced in your marriage before.
In particular, the following obstacles are common occurrences in your lives as parents that can cause resentment to build in your marriage.
An uneven balance of workload
Taking care of kids takes a lot of work and leaves you with little time to accomplish all of the other things you have to do to maintain your lives, like housework. Keeping up with everything can sometimes make you feel like you are drowning in an overwhelming to-do list.
When we are pushed to this level of stress with constant responsibility, it takes everyone in the team contributing to reach the goals and minimize the risk of burn out. One partner not putting in their fair share of effort therefore quickly leads to resentment in the partner who is.
A lack of self-care
Stress and burnout can also lead to resentment if one partner isn’t getting a proper opportunity for self-care. Everyone needs a break sometimes to “recharge the battery,” or to do things for themselves that help them relax and connect with the person they are outside of parenthood. If one partner is constantly living with a full battery charge while the other is constantly running on empty, resentment is bound to ensue.
We moms tend to have a hard time prioritizing self-care because we feel too guilty to ask for the free time, or we feel like failures for not being able to keep on top of everything without taking a rest. This emotion does not exist for our husbands, which we tend to resent.
Differing sex needs
A big cause of resentment for new parents is a differing sex drives for men and women. We ladies tend to carry more of the mental load, meaning that our brain is so full of stress and worry that sex is the furthest thing from our minds. We therefore tend to want sex less often than our partners do because, hey, we’d just rather sleep. This builds resentment in our partners whose need for sex isn’t getting fulfilled.
On the other side of the coin, many women find themselves “giving in” and having sex with their husbands when they don’t really want to just to satisfy their husband’s needs. This can lead to resentment in women who feel like they are constantly giving too much of themselves for others.
Different work situations
Often after baby’s arrival one parent continues working while the other stays home to take care of the new addition to the family. This can of course continue after the newborn stage as well for families who choose to have a stay at home parent.
The parent at home often resents their partner for going to work. They get to get out of the house, have adult contact, and usually come home to relax at the end of the day.
The parent who goes to work resents the parent who stays at home because it would be a luxury to have more time to spend together with the kids and not have the obligation to a boss or schedule.
Default parents
Young children often have a “default parent” – or the parent that they turn to most for pretty much everything, including help, comfort, and play.
Having a child constantly need your attention can be frustrating and exhausting for the default parent, who then builds resentment towards their partner who doesn’t understand what it’s like to deal with the constant clinging.
The non-default parent, on the other hand, builds resentment towards the default parent because the children always prefer the default parent and don’t give the non-default parent an opportunity for bonding.
How to combat resentment in your marriage after having kids
Identifying your resentment pain points in your marriage is the first step towards banishing this unwanted emotion and making way for a happier relationship!
Ridding your marriage of resentment will take some time and effort, but with a little commitment you can certainly get there. Follow these steps below to help you get started.
Look to your partner as your natural balance guide
Reflect on what you tend to resent in your partner and you may just notice that deep down you wish you had the same feeling of “me first” or “freedom” that drives you so nuts in your partner.
Wouldn’t it be great to be able to relax at the end of the day in front of the TV without noticing the pile of laundry needing to be folded? Or to actually want to hop into bed for a romp in the sheets with your partner?
Perhaps your husband is your natural balance to remind you that sometimes it’s OK to let go and enjoy life a bit more. To not get caught up in the responsibility all of the time and remember to have fun once in a while.
If you can begin to reframe your husband as your necessary balancing force to keep you from burning out, you begin to resent him a little less for his behaviors and admire him just a bit more for them.
Pull each other back towards the middle where you both have an even balance of fun and responsibility.
Balance the workload
Find ways to distribute your workload more evenly between the two of you. It doesn’t have to be exactly 50/50 (and actually aiming for this split will likely cause more drama) but it should be at a level that makes you feel like you’re working together as a team with each of you helping each other towards the goal.
Prioritize self-care
Find ways to ensure that both you and your husband have adequate time for self-care to keep both of your batteries charged.
Have an open and honest conversation about what each other needs. Maybe your husband charges up best by having one night a week to grab a beer with his buddies after work or he needs to play computer for one hour every day after the kids go to bed. Maybe you want a whole Saturday to yourself to go shopping and out to lunch with your girlfriends once a month, or maybe you need 15 minutes a day water the flowers alone in your garden.
Reflect on what you both truly need and communicate that to each other. Don’t feel guilty or selfish or like a failure for asking. Your partner is happy to help you if it means you will resent him less and love him more.
Come to a sex compromise
Have an open discussion about your sexual needs (or lack thereof) and decide together on how often you both agree to be having sex. Choose a frequency that:
a) meets his needs at a very basic level – meaning he’s satisfied enough
b) you can commit to with at least mild enthusiasm (rather than pure resentment)
This is a temporary agreement until your hormones are regulated and you both feel that you are in a better place in your marriage overall. With time and efforts made to reduce resentment in the other ways on this list, having sex more frequently and more enthusiastically happens naturally.
Practice gratitude
Spend some time each day appreciating the good things you have in your life, especially the things you love and admire about your husband. Focusing on what you are grateful for in your marriage will help you to feel more empathy and connection with your partner, and in turn help to minimize your resentment.
Think positively
Similarly to practicing gratitude, you can train your brain to notice and focus on all of the positive things that happen in your marriage. Let negative thoughts and scorekeeping get replaced by thoughts of positivity.
This can be unnatural and quite difficult when your judgment is shrouded by clouds of resentment, but the more you can actively bring positive thoughts forward, the more your resentment is going to disappear.
Show appreciation
Create a culture of appreciation in your home by communicating to your husband that you would appreciate feeling appreciated for the things that you do. A simple “thank you” goes a long way!
Start the culture yourself by saying “thank you” for everything your husband does. You may be thinking “does he deserve a standing ovation for emptying the dishwasher?” and the answer is YES! At least in the beginning while you are establishing this culture of appreciation you want in your household.
Feeling like your work is seen and appreciated (and the same for your husband) will make it feel more like you are working together as a team, stopping resentment in its tracks.
Spend time together having fun
Make sure to have quality time together doing fun things that make you laugh and feel connected to each other outside your roles as parents and homemakers. It’s really difficult to resent your best friend who makes you giggle and brings joy into your life!
Try having regular at-home date nights where you try new things together or just spending a few minutes each day doing something silly together.
Time to kick resentment’s butt!
Are you ready, mama?
Don’t spend another day waiting for your marriage to magically get better as your kids grow older and you and your husband grow further apart. Take charge of your life and get the marriage you want and deserve.
Start combatting resentment today!
This article is part of the series How to Revive Your Marriage After Kids Fundamental 1: Have a Constructive Attitude.
About me
Hi, I’m Bailee! I am a mom just like you who, after having my second baby, was struggling BIG TIME to cope with motherhood and marriage. Divorce seemed like the inevitable option until I decided to fight for the family life that I truly wanted.
I challenged my husband to give our marriage one more go and was able to pull us out of the abyss. With a change in my mindset and some other handy tools and tricks along the way, I brought us back into the light of a happy marriage with kids.
Now I am here now to help you do the same! Are you ready, mama? Learn more.
