Andrew Smith: Sara and I hardly inhabit the same library

IT NEVER ceases to amaze me when I hear about couples having babies to save their relationship.

As a watertight concept, I would put that up there with Bowie and Iggy – know the lads well – moving to Berlin in the 1970s to get themselves off heroin. At a time when the city was the smack capital of Europe.

Weans increase exponentially the number of areas of potential conflict between those responsible for them. How could it be any different? My wife Sara used to view my sloth-like, cook-lite ways with resigned affection. Now they are capable of sending her into a rage. Understandably, I might add. It is one thing not tidying up and rustling grub up when you are the only one affected. It is an entirely different scenario when a daughter of five and son approaching two are also to be considered.

My own indiscipline, and my failure to be able to construct a coherent strategy for the discipline of my offspring, can be considered a barrel of gunpowder and a flaming torch to my poor, long-suffering wife. The former impacts on her life now as it never did before. For example, I’m not the best at dragging myself out of my scratcher in the morning. It was no skin off Sara’s nose in our childless days. Then she would get up, get herself ready and head off for a 9am start ... a good half-hour before I would rouse myself. However, if we aren’t now both up and on it by 7am, school and nursery runs can be decidedly problematic. Not least because I am the only driver and therefore others in our household depend on my USP.

Almost all our arguments now concern not us straight off, but us through the prism of how we handle situations with these wee people we are nurturing. All the books and websites tell you that, when taking a line with children, both of you must be on the same page. Sara and I rarely inhabit the same library. Moreover, we both seem to think the other is being too snippy and shouty when it falls to them.

There was a survey last year in which eight out of ten people were no happier with children than without them, but less than one in ten wished they had remained childless. Ultimately, then, if the reason people think children might keep them together is that once they are in your life, you would never want to go a day without them, I’m horrified. But what would horrify me more would be the thought that each day they didn’t have the love and care provided by their mother. For being witness to that interaction can bring a joy worth living for. n