Tips to Strengthen Your Parenting Partnership After Babies with Dr. Tracy Dalgleish
Dr. Tracy Dalgleish is a Clinical Psychologist and Couples Therapist in Ottowa, Ontario Canada where she helps individuals and couples navigate the challenges we all face in our relationships and within ourselves to create a more meaningful life through therapy, wellness seminars, and her work outside the therapy room.
For over 15 years, Dr. Dalgleish has provided direct clinical services as well as researching, writing and speaking about relationships. She provides psychological assessments, diagnosis, and individual and couples therapy for a variety of difficulties including depression, anxiety, postpartum difficulties, stress and burnout and relationship difficulties.
Committed to making what she does more accessible, Dr. Dalgleish is the host of the podcast I’m Not Your Shrink where she dives deeper into clinical knowledge and research in a relatable and informal way.
She also offers other e-learning if you prefer to learn on the go, including an online community to help women and couples strengthen their relationships.
The Unspoken Topic
- You are neither right nor wrong in your relationship. The goal is not to find the right way to do things, but rather to connect and co-create together.
What We Cover
- How to co-create in your relationship without blaming one another.
- Tips to rebuilding your relationship when you have not been connecting with your partner for some time.
- Tools to interact with your partner with love and respect and hold firm boundaries for yourself and your needs.
Take a Listen >>
Key Takeaways
- You have a job to communicate your feelings and needs and you are allowed to share them even if it’s hard. It’s your responsibility to share them.
- Your partner is allowed to have their own reactions. You can validate those feelings for your partner without trying to fix them or make it better. We can sit in the discomfort.
- After having kids, there is an overall decrease in satisfaction as a couple. Becoming parents as a couple is very difficult and this is normal.
- It’s okay for us to have disagreements in front of our children as long as they see us resolve it and there is NO name calling or yelling.
Actionable Solution
How to Rebuild With Your Partner When Things Get Hard
STEP ONE: Connect.
- Find ways to build daily connection in small ways. Focus on frequent small actions.
- Hold hands in the morning, express gratitude for your partner, have 30 second hugs, long kisses, leave love notes.
- Take the Love Language quiz if you need more ideas.
- Become aware of the negative patterns and start shifting the cycle so you don’t get stuck in it.
- Look inward rather than outward and blame the other person. Ask yourself, what do I need? How can I share with my partner so we can connect and build from there?
How To Stay Connected With Partner
- Daily rituals are important. They intentionally put their phones away between 5-7pm so they focus on each other. THey also do intentional greetings and pairing. They sit and ask each other questions about how they feel and what they hope for. They share what they are grateful for every night around the dinner table. And they laugh! They find ways to be light-hearted and laugh and they take responsibility on how they contribute to the relationship and connection.
Hardest Decision as a Mom
- Deciding to have a c-section and moving from her midwife to the OB during labor and surrendering the idea of what that birth was going to look like.
Mama Has a Minute
- Favorite form of self-care: Going on walks outside.
- Best parenting advice ever received: In good moments take lots of pictures, in hard moments, take a deep breathe and remind yourself this moment will pass.
- Parenting Hack: Take the blowout onesie down rather than over the head.
- Product Child cannot live without: Legos
- Share 1 book: Attached by Levin
- What motherhood means to you: Motherhood means finding these growth edges and allowing yourself to listen internally and trust you will make mistakes over and over and that you are enough as a mother, just as you are.
Freebies From Us at Raising Children You Like
- Join our Facebook Community
- If you’re looking for a more peaceful home, get the 5 Tips to Pause a Tantrum.
- Download The 5 Screen Time Mistakess if you’re looking to maximize screen time with your tot.
- Join The FREE Masterclass on learning to stay present and unruffled during your child’s tantrum with these 3 Secrets.
Action Steps For *You*
- Have a question or topic you’d like to cover? Let us know!
- Subscribe to our podcast to never miss an episode on iTunes or Stitcher.
- Love what you hear? Leave us a comment + review on iTunes! (WE LOVE YOU!!!)
