I’m posting this here because I live in Switzerland and don’t really have anyone nearby to talk to about this. I moved here from Japan after getting married, and I don’t have much of a support network here. I’m also not very familiar with what kind of help or support is available if I ever need it, so I’d really appreciate hearing from people in Switzerland who might have some perspective or advice. This is going to be a very long post, so thank you in advance to anyone who takes the time to read it. I’m trying to understand whether what I’m feeling is mainly a postpartum mental-health crisis, including postpartum depression, or whether becoming a mother has simply made me realize that my marriage is fundamentally incompatible. I gave birth to our daughter, E, a few months ago. My husband took about two months of parental leave around the birth, and I had hoped this would be a time when we would support each other and learn to parent together. Instead, I became deeply disappointed in our relationship. I had a career and an independent life in Japan before getting married. I gave that up and moved to Switzerland to build a life with him. I never intended to depend on him financially forever. I actually like working, and once E is no longer breastfeeding and can start daycare, I want to find a job and contribute financially to our family again. But during pregnancy and especially after childbirth, I increasingly felt that my role was simply to take care of the baby and the household while he continued living his normal life. During pregnancy, even when I was physically struggling, I often felt that I had to manage things myself. After E was born, while I was recovering, breastfeeding/pumping, and severely sleep-deprived, my husband expected me to resume essentially all of the housework within a week of giving birth. Throughout his two-month parental leave, he spent most of his days sitting at his computer, watching videos and playing games. He rarely took the initiative with either childcare or housework. He would sometimes take care of E when he chose to, but otherwise I was responsible for essentially everything around the baby and the home. Even at night, when E woke up, he would wake me and then go back to sleep. Even on weekends, I continue to do essentially all the housework. This is not only about the workload. What hurts me most is that I don’t feel he naturally thinks about what the other person needs. When the whole family was exhausted and sleep-deprived, he would sometimes go take a nap simply because he was tired while someone else was caring for E. Even when my mother was staying with us, he would sometimes go to bed and sleep without considering whether anyone else needed help. One example that really changed how I saw him was when E was about six weeks old. He wanted to attend a card-game event and asked what I would do with the baby rather than discussing childcare together. I ended up accompanying him and spending more than an hour holding and soothing her in a hot room. There wasn’t even a proper seat for me, and I had to keep standing with her while also being careful not to disturb the other customers. He didn’t come to check on us, and afterwards there was no apology—only that he hadn’t realized the event would take so long. There are also financial issues. I currently don’t have independent access to money and often need his approval even for groceries and household necessities. This is particularly difficult for me because I gave up my career and moved countries to build our family, not because I intended to be financially dependent on him permanently. At the same time, he seems willing to spend money freely on things he personally enjoys, including alcohol and cigarettes, even when they are expensive. He sometimes drinks very heavily at home, sometimes more than three liters of beer. He has even taken painkillers before going to sleep because he was worried about having a hangover. What hurt me especially was that he also took painkillers that had been prescribed for my postpartum after-pains, as if they were his to use, without considering that I might need them. On one occasion, after drinking around two liters of alcohol, he started cutting E’s fingernails and accidentally hurt her. I found it frightening that he would perform this kind of delicate task while heavily intoxicated and seemed to have little awareness of the risk. There have also been issues with physical and sexual boundaries. Shortly after I gave birth, while I was still physically recovering, there were physical interactions that I found uncomfortable. Even after I told him that breastfeeding was painful, he would sometimes touch my breasts when passing by. Before E was born, he also repeatedly initiated sexual activity even when I was extremely tired and physically uncomfortable. These things have changed how I see our marriage. Sometimes I honestly feel less like his wife and more like a combination of a friend and a live-in housekeeper. We can share hobbies and enjoy ourselves when life is easy. But when one of us is struggling, I don’t feel that he naturally thinks, “How can I help?” I feel that his own comfort and interests come first, and that I have to ask for almost everything. Before marriage, I remember asking him directly whether he believed that, when difficult things happened, we would support each other and overcome them together. His response was joking rather than reassuring. At the time, I tried to overlook things like that. Now I can’t. He is gradually becoming more aware that he needs to take responsibility as E’s father, and I can see some improvement. But I don’t only want a co-parent. I want a husband who notices when I am struggling, cares about my well-being, and wants to build a life with me as an equal partner. When I imagine E growing up and eventually leaving home, I cannot imagine myself feeling secure, supported, or emotionally connected to my husband when it is just the two of us. That is why I have started seriously considering divorce. But I also know that I recently gave birth, I’m sleep-deprived, and postpartum depression or other postpartum changes could be affecting how I see everything. So I genuinely want to ask, Am I experiencing a postpartum crisis that may pass, or has becoming a mother simply made me realize that my husband and I have fundamentally different ideas about marriage, partnership, and caring for each other? For anyone who has experienced postpartum depression or a major relationship crisis after having a baby, how did you tell the difference between a temporary postpartum reaction and a genuine realization that the relationship was not right for you? I also don’t really know what my options would be here in Switzerland if I decided to separate, so any advice on where to turn or who I could talk to would be really appreciated. And honestly, I’m also just looking for people I can talk to about ordinary, everyday things, have a laugh with, and cheer each other up a little. I don’t have many people here, and I think I could really use that kind of connection right now. Thank you very much to anyone who has read this far. submitted by /u/DaisyDeCillia
Originally posted by u/DaisyDeCillia on r/Switzerland