From Partners to Parents: A Gottman Perspective

Becoming parents is one of life’s most joyful—and most challenging—transitions. Research shows that two-thirds of couples experience a significant dip in relationship satisfaction after the birth of a child. The Bringing Baby Home program, developed by world-renowned relationship experts Drs. John and Julie Gottman, offers practical, research-based tools to help couples stay connected, reduce stress, and build a strong foundation for their growing family.

In this episode, we’re joined by Beth Goss, a Certified Gottman Educator and Bringing Baby Home specialist, to explore how couples can prepare for life with a new baby while also nurturing their relationship. We’ll discuss common pitfalls new parents face, strategies for maintaining intimacy and teamwork, and ways to foster healthy emotional development for children right from the start.

Whether you’re expecting your first baby or already navigating life with little ones, this conversation offers encouragement, guidance, and tools to help your family thrive.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:00

We all ask each other all kinds of questions when we first meet, when we're first dating, first get together, and we kind of know each other's life stories. And then time goes by and we change. And if we don't keep up with kind of our partners, like mental map of the world, then we really lose touch. Welcome to perinatal and reproductive perspectives. This is a podcast where we empower birthing individuals, partners and health professionals with evidence based insights, holistic strategies and relatable stories hosted by a healthcare expert. This podcast fosters understanding equity and growth in perinatal and reproductive health. Here's your host, Becky Morrison gleed,

Rebecca Gleed: 0:52

welcome to another episode of perinatal and reproductive perspectives. We are here with Beth Goss of the Gottman Institute. We are going to talk all things perinatal and the healthy transition to parenthood and some of the work that she's doing through bringing baby home. Welcome to the show. Beth, thanks for having me. Before you introduce yourself, give us a bit of a general idea of what the Gottman Institute is, and then tell us a little bit about your role within the institute.

Beth Goss: 1:26

Sure, the Gottman Institute is here in Seattle, where I'm based as well, and started by Dr John and Dr Julie Gottman. They're married, and it's an institute where they're doing a lot of research around relationships, really. They do some work around early childhood education as well, but it's primarily relationship based, adult relationship based, and they're looking at what are, what we call the Masters doing, what are, what are folks who are really doing well in handling their relationships and handling conflict, and what kinds of things are they doing? And then it's something that they're researching, and it's something that they're teaching in a variety of ways, to couples, to therapists, a variety of people, so they can kind of share that information. Yeah, what I love about the Love Lab in Seattle, and that's where they do. They've done longitudinal data. I really appreciate the pieces around it being data driven, evidence based, and the use of biometrics. So this isn't just folks watching couples. They're tracking hormones and heart rates, and they've done this research for now decades out of Seattle, my understanding and so we have some hard data to pull into couples therapy and relationship work, which I love, because oftentimes, for for example, myself as a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, the last thing I want to do is to bring in subjective loosey goosey techniques into the therapy room. I love this method because it is so evidence based. And something that I really like that maybe you can speak to is they've deduced it to a sound relationship house, and this, they've pulled in different components of what makes a relationship sound I'm guessing, and maybe you can speak to this later. Now, whichever makes most sense for the perspective we're going to cover today on the healthy transition to parenthood, before we go into that, though, please tell us a little bit about yourself, your role, what you're doing? Sure. Yeah, so I, I do. I wear several hats, like so many of us do. I am a full time instructor at North Seattle College, and I work with new families, so that's kind of my, my area of expertise, and supporting them and coaching them and educating them around parenting and child development with the Gottman Institute, specifically, I work with their bringing baby home program, and I've been involved in that since 2005

Unknown: 4:12

and I started out by teaching this bring baby home program, which we'll be talking about, to couples, and Then a few years later, kind of moved into doing the trainings like a train the trainer situation, right? So I'm doing trainings for others who want to bring this information and these tools into their community. And we have people from all over the world who attend our trainings. And so we've got, we've kind of spread it everywhere, which is amazing. So primarily, right now, I'm working with other professionals on the research and how to kind of how to teach that with the families in their areas. Amazing.

Rebecca Gleed: 4:54

I for two reasons, the Gottman Institute is so near and dear to my heart is I was born. And raised in the Pacific Northwest, and then it was 2007 I was, I think it was Sacramento, California. I ran into John at one of the amft conferences, and we just had this incredible conversation. And I said, Okay, this method is really worth exploring. And so I got trained up to level three, but then, as I've followed, and I'm surprised that you say 2005 that this has been really in the making for years, because as I've been following you all, I've seen kind of this emphasis more recently, on supporting couples, specifically parents. And when I saw that, I said, aha, thank you. This is so important

Unknown: 5:48

for me as a professional. It's it's kind of all the things I'm interested. That's why I got involved. It's the Early Childhood perspective, it's adult education, it's family systems and relationships. It's supporting a family through various stages, right? And the adult relationship dyad is it doesn't it's not in a vacuum, right? And once you have children, that plays a huge part in it and the way that you relate and interact with your partner really affects your child's experience, right? So when I learned about this program, I believe we started the pilot study in 1999 actually, wow, yeah. And it was a few of my colleagues at Swedish Medical Center where I used to teach childbirth education who were involved in kind of developing the curriculum for this. It's rose, Alice Peele, Carolyn Perak and Joni parthemer. And so I'd hear about it at staff meetings every month, and I thought, I gotta get in on this. So once they started training other people to teach this, I was one of the first cohorts, because I saw how important it was, and it's really changed the way I work with families. I can use the information from this class, from this program, in almost every topic that I teach. So it's really had a profound effect for me as a professional.

Rebecca Gleed: 7:19

I think that's something the Gottman Institute does very well. And clearly there's multiple champions, but the collaboration between some of these different entities, not just the Gottman Institute, but the Swedish Medical System, and then these other champions that I'm guessing were also moving out of some different systems. Can you tell the audience a little bit more about this pilot study, what it was, some of the results that came out of it? Sure.

Unknown: 7:49

Yeah, so I believe it's again. Started in 1999 it went for about five years, and what we did is we followed families, and we followed them from before they had their kids, and then through, right having their child, and then having a young child at home. And as you said, This is none of this is anecdotal. It's all data driven, which I think is amazing. It's a psycho educational program, so it's not therapy, and they were just following these families and looking for outcomes, right? And you'd mentioned the Love Lab before, and they noticed in the Love Lab with couples who had children, about 67% of them would say that they were less satisfied with their relationship after they had a baby than before. And so they started looking at, well, why is that? And kind of broke it down like they do with with couples, whether they have children or not, into what they call masters and disasters. And they decided, well, let's study the masters. What are people who are feeling good about their relationships doing? And is that something that we can teach? And they found that, yeah, you can. And a few cool things came out of this. One was just in terms of self reporting, couples were saying that they were just much more satisfied with the their relationships with each other. After they'd taken this workshop, they felt that they were able to navigate conflict in a more, I guess, equitable way. And they also, and this was a kind of a surprise, but found that there were much lower rates of postpartum depression among the women who went through this program, and that's not something they were initially expecting. And so that has become part of the program, one of the chapters that we cover, or units that we cover is around Postpartum Mood Disorders and Perinatal mood disorders, and just giving families like the information on what to look for and what's the difference between baby blues and postpartum depression. And if there's a male parent, can. This affect the male parent if there's a non birthing parent, what does that look like if it's adoptive parents? So it's curriculum that's kind of really we've expanded it to a variety of types of makes up, makeups of families. And in the study itself, originally, it was among heterosexual married couples in the Seattle area, which is a very small portion of people, right? So since then, there's been a lot of extended research like, does this apply to other people? Does this apply to other Family Constellations? Does this apply in other countries and other cultures? And they've found kind of time and again that, yeah, this, this stuff works regardless. Yeah, this is

Rebecca Gleed: 10:46

incredible and so important. And thank you for highlighting the piece around the perinatal mood and anxiety disorders. I think that'll be a helpful takeaway for folks you talked about more equitable, you know, affective communication around conflict. What were some of the other nuggets that the Masters demonstrated?

Unknown: 11:11

Yeah, so they they did. We found really simple things. And I find that when I teach this to couples, it's not like new information necessarily, but it's put in such a way that they can see, because it's been research tested, that it works, they just have to do it right? So things like, we call it making love, maps of each other. So just like continuing to know each other, right, we all ask each other all kinds of questions when we first meet, when we're first dating, first get together, and we kind of know each other's life stories. And then time goes by and we change. And if we don't keep up with that, we don't keep up with kind of our partners, like mental map of the world, then we really lose touch. So part of the emphasis, and you were talking about the house paradigm, this is kind of one of the lower layers, right? Making sure that you keep talking to your partner, keep asking open ended questions and, like, find out where they're at. Okay, because things change, especially after you have kids expressing appreciation and respect. Again, a really simple thing, but it's just noticing the stuff you like about your partner and saying it out loud, and just that makes a huge, huge difference, right? Because it feels great to feel noticed and to feel appreciated. And I think that after we get to know each other for a while, and especially after we have a young child at home, we kind of take each other for granted. And that's that's a big piece of why folks get resentful. So being able to just say, Thanks for folding the laundry. You look so cute playing with the baby today like just you notice it, but you don't verbalize it. So just making sure you verbalize it is a really key piece. Another one, it's kind of noticing bids. And bids are just a way that we express needs, right? And so we know that even in the masters, they miss most of the bids that their partners are thrown out every day. So like, it takes a lot of effort. So we talked to them about, like, what are what do bids look like, and how can you respond to those bids? And what is it like for a couple if someone makes a bid for connection or conversation or emotional support, and you turn towards them, all turning towards them has can be is just like, Oh, you're like, or I Oh, I see that. Yeah, it doesn't have to be aging the other person's feelings. And what is I talk at the end of the class about how, like, at some point you're going to get through just getting through the day, like, believe it or not, and you're going to think about, well, what do we want for our family? What's important to us as as a couple, as as a new family, as opposed to our families of origin.

Rebecca Gleed: 14:08

So what I heard you talk about for some of the masters to really underscores affective communication, love, maps, appreciation, respect, making bits for connection and learning how to recognize those if there's a rejection of a bit, even unintentionally, how to make a repair intimacy and then values and dreams for the family. Something I also see, and maybe you can speak to this, is not just changing in love maps, this is a major life transition, so of course, there's going to be change, but also resurfacing as we become parents, some of our own stuff from our own childhoods, whether it be conscious or unconscious, does resurface, and I. Know, if you see any of that, but that's all

Unknown: 15:03

see absolutely yes. And in fact, one piece of this workshop is reflecting back on our own experiences, like being parented and the influential adults in our lives when we were children, and what we want to bring to the present. And you know, we can, you can look at it in a variety of ways. What makes a good mom or a good dad, or what did my What did an influential adult do that I really want to emulate, or that type? So we have that conversation actually in the class and as an educator, both with this program and outside of it, that's the most common thing that I see, I think, is we all bring our own baggage to every relationship we have, right? And so the way we were parented, the experiences that we have, are going to naturally affect the way we interact with our child, the way we interact with our partner, the way we react to controversy or yelling or kind of whatever it happens to be, we can kind of fall back into our our childhood cells. And so, yeah, a lot of it is examining that and what, what was the past, and what do I like and what, what do I want to do? What do I not want to do? How is it for you? Are there, are there triggers for you? And then, how do we want to do things together as parents, not necessarily replicating our like families of origin, but okay, this is 2025 what do we want to do with our family, and so that's an ongoing conversation.

Rebecca Gleed: 16:44

Yeah, I love this idea from the Gottman method, this idea of we Ness versus eyeness. And I think that's what I really heard you say as parents, there's an emphasis on we Ness. How do we do this together, even if we're bringing different histories that? And that's the beauty I love. The art of compromise is, what are those core individual needs, and then how do you use that leanness and kindness and compassion and humanism to explore how do we intersect some of these very different needs and beliefs and childhood experiences to create something new, something that we're doing together,

Unknown: 17:24

right exactly, and bring baby home. We talk about moving from me to we to three. Oh, I love that, you know, because it runs right. Say that again. Work folks from me to we to three. So good, right? Because it's my my, my colleague Joni, talks about, kind of like the family mobile. And I really like this analogy of, like, who you are. I've been me since I was born, and I'm somebody's Daughter and Sister, etc, and then you meet a partner, or life partner, and the mobile kind of goes wacky, and it takes a while to get things kind of balanced again, and then you have a kid, and that pulls things out of whack. It's just, it's funny. I've always thought of myself as Beth, but then I haven't thought of myself as mom, right? And it's this huge, huge philosophical shift that we have to make, and for our partners as well. And it's kind of like I've always been a daughter, but now I'm a mother. I'm a partner. I'm when my kids think of mom, they're thinking of me, which still kind of cracks me up. My kids are 30 and 26 and I still, every once in a while have this thought of, like, wow, I'm mom to them. That's so weird. Like, you wake up in the morning next to somebody's mom or somebody's dad, and that's weird too. So yeah, just every time you change up the family that mobile is kind of gets wonky, and then you have to put in work to kind of balance things out again.

Rebecca Gleed: 19:02

I really like that, especially the relational piece, knowing that your partner is going to be evolving and going through this role transition. Do you have any wisdom or tenants from bringing baby home that could help maybe a partner who's struggling to observe or support their partner's evolution?

Unknown: 19:26

Yeah, I think specific to becoming parents, it's this somewhat contradictory thing, right? Part of it is not having to ask your partner as the non birthing partner, not having to ask your partner, like, what do they need all the time, right? Because that becomes mental load for the partner of like, now I have to have this map of like, all the things that have to happen. It's just kind of anticipating it, right? If your partner looks uncomfortable for them, if. They look really hard, offer to believe it maybe for a while, or, you know, run the errand, or whatever it is, right? And then, like, kind of the flip side of that is the other partner shouldn't assume that their partner can read their mind, right? So it's like you have to anticipate, in a way, but also I've noticed, like, specifically women, whether heterosexual relationship or not, feeling really resentful because their partner just doesn't know exactly what they need. And so on that end, it's learning to express your needs, and, like, being really clear about what you need. That takes me back to bids, because you can give unclear bids, right? Like, you know, I give the example often, of like angry cleaning, where you wish the room was clean and everyone else would notice what was in the room that wasn't clean, but they don't. So instead of saying, Hey everybody, let's just stop for 10 minutes. Everybody put stuff away, and then we'll watch the movie. It's like, move your feet, you know, I'm gonna really loudly, clean this room and and that's an unclear bid. That's not asking for what you need. So it's, on the one hand, being able to just say, You know what, I don't have it in me tonight. I can't get the dishes done. And on the other hand, it's being aware of that your partner's making these bids of like, I need help, and being able to step up. So it's complicated, I think. And like I said, the Masters don't do a fantastic job of it, either. So it's really work.

Rebecca Gleed: 21:39

I think that is hard work, especially if you're sleep deprived, to do that check in of what do I need in this moment? And then to also be mindful that it because it can be so you know, involved from an individual perspective, what you're experiencing, because it's can be so emotional and overwhelming and sleep deprived, but then to then communicate to our partners, not jump into those thought distortions like mind reading or assumptions, and then to communicate. And how in the world do we do this when we're trying to manage the needs of a baby as well? Right?

Unknown: 22:21

I think that sometimes we don't know what we need, right? Like, I just need this to not be happening right now, or I need to be me three years ago, or whatever. Like, you know, kind of unrealistic things, but it is hard to know. I think there's so many different things involved, and so that's the piece where, like, this all takes time. If 67% of new parents are not satisfied with their relationship or feel a drop in relationship satisfaction, that's me. That means it's most so this is really normal, and I think that's important too. If you're not getting along with your partner when you have a you know, eight month old, or you feel resentful, or you feel misunderstood, or that that's how two thirds of us feel. So that's an almost like an expected and I think that's, in and of itself, a really important piece of this workshop is like, Yes, don't come in expecting a honeymoon. Like, that's not what this is for most of us, we don't sleep, and we, our roles do change, and we, you know, make assumptions, and babies take way more time than we think. You know, I, I talk to pregnant couples sometimes, and they'll they're just trying to figure out how to fit the baby into their life, right? Like they're going to leave their life alone the way it is, and then how does the baby fit in there? Like, I'll have them out here in Seattle. Ask about, like, how early Can I bring the baby to a mariners game, you know, or a sounders game or something? Can I get those earphones and think you guys are missing the point? And so people are often surprised by how much time and effort a baby takes and how almost everything else kind of falls to the wayside for a while, until you get your footing.

Rebecca Gleed: 24:07

Yeah, I love this idea of normalizing, that it's just that it's a transition period, it's a change period. And so maybe that's something we can also offer folks listening in is patience, kind of normalizing that this is a period. It's, you may not be at the mariners or Seahawks game yet, you you will eventually, but this is a time to to enjoy the change, and to, you know, dance with the season, yeah.

Unknown: 24:37

And to get support, and to get, you know, whatever that support looks like. And it's, it's either, if you, if you have family and friend support that's amazing, and being able to ask for what you need. And we even talk to to couples about, like, make a list of all the stuff you don't really like to do. And that way, when someone comes to visit and watch the baby, you. So them holding the baby for you isn't helpful. Like, it's cute for a little bit, but it's not like, you're going to jump off and be like, awesome. Now I can clean out the oven, but have them hold the baby a little bit and give the baby back. And that might just be like, Oh, she's hungry. And then have a list, like, on the fridge. How can I help? Oh, well, I've got a list. What, what of these would you like to do while you're while you're here, and I'm feeding the baby? And just get really, really practical, because it can be hard. And then outside of family and friends, it's there are new mom support groups, right? And new parent support groups, and I used to run those for the hospital as well. You know, there's couples therapy, there's individual therapy, there's just stuff to do in the neighborhood. In Seattle, we've got tons of programs for families. You know, whether it's like swim or sing with baby or whatever, just like, kind of getting out and being with other people, seeing you're not the only one. That type of thing, I think is super helpful as well. So so just support from kind of wherever you

Rebecca Gleed: 26:08

can get it, yeah, well, it makes me curious about the couple who might be coming to you pregnant and the couple who might be coming to you two months postpartum. Do you have any, you know, observations or wisdom for whether doing it on the front end or, you know, you're

Unknown: 26:31

nodding yes? It's a really good question. When I teach bring baby home workshops, it's typically a combo, right? It's like two thirds of the class is expecting, and 1/3 is, you know, already has a baby home with grandma, or they've brought the baby with them, because we do vapes in arms as well. And I kind of, I mean, in a class, I like the mix, because the parent of the two month old is now an expert, and so I'll steer stuff to them, like, have you found that to be true? Or have you noticed this infant state of consciousness when you think they're awake but they're not, or, you know, whatever, and then they get to be kind of the pros in the class, and everyone really, like, wants to hear what they have to say. But I would say individually, it's hard, because when I'm working with couples expecting a baby, they want all the information, but what they really want is, like, the tangible information, right? Like, when am I going to be able to sleep through the night, and what stuff do we need for the baby? And like, and of course, that's important stuff, right? But they're not really thinking about, like, the emotional health of the baby or the family, or that type of thing, and so they're hearing these really tangible things. And I think a lot of the like important, important stuff, maybe kind of goes and then when I have the couples who have the new baby, it like that's not that it applies to them more, but they get it more because they're living it, but also they're not sleeping. And so they can only take in so much information at a time, right? So I think the cool thing about this program is you can go back to it, because you get all the information, you know. And I just, I tell couples that we talk about emotion coaching for children in this class, and I say, I know that's not what you're interested in right now, but like, dog ear this page, or, like, made it make a note to yourself, because in a year or two, this is the thing you're going to really want to focus on. So I talked to couples about maybe on babies one month, one month birthday, or six month birthday, or your birthday, pull the materials out again and like, just turn to a chapter and then refresh because it's in there. But you maybe haven't had the kind of mental space, the bandwidth to be able to implement any of this. But the reminders are really helpful. So yeah, I'm not sure if that totally answers the question. I just think you take it in differently depending on what phase of life you're in.

Rebecca Gleed: 29:10

I think that's a beautiful answer to the question. Something I hear a lot from COUPLES IS, I wish I had spent less time figuring out what was in my hospital bag, or decorating the nursery, and I wish we had spent a little bit more time together, or we had snuggled on the couch and had this conversation. Those are the pieces that I hear just anecdotally, and I'm sure that some of the studies that you're doing can capture that, but that's what really draws me to this, not just the Gottman method, but bringing baby home, because it it is so comprehensive and important and relationally focused that you're right. You can learn some of these tenets and keep going back to them, because having this. This conversation about bids is going to apply at toddlerhood, as your child enters kindergarten, as you're maybe going through a bumpy economic time, the tenants can be transferable to other seasons of life,

Unknown: 30:16

right? And I also think that one of the things I really love about this program is it looks at relationships from two different perspectives. One is like the parent to parent relationship, and one is the parent to child relationship. And almost every piece of content in this program, I would say, except for the intimacy chapter, can apply to your child, to other adults in your life, to other just how to kind of relate and yeah, kind of come to compromise and or, like, kind of whatever it is, respect the other person. So it's, it's something you can use, to use again and again and again with almost

Rebecca Gleed: 30:54

everybody, yeah, well, and for someone choosing bringing baby home, as opposed to seeking out a Gottman trained couples therapist. What are some of the differences?

Unknown: 31:06

Sure, big differences in that the bring beauty home program is not therapy. It's a psycho educational program. So we're teaching and we're teaching tools, but it's not therapy, which can sometimes be difficult for therapists in our class to grasp, because it feels like therapy, you know? And there's even, like, some group stuff that we do, but it's not, whereas going to a marriage and family therapist is therapy, and it's going to be very concentrated on your specific relationship and the dynamics you have the types of interactions, et cetera, and it's something that you can build on in that way. So I see therapy as kind of this ongoing thing that grows with your relationship and with your family as there are changes. Bring baby home is more of an educational program that you can yourself go back to when you need it, and find the places that you that you want, but it's very specific to parenting and and you don't, you don't have a person with you to kind of to adapt right as you're going. It's more like you have, you've taken the class, and now you have all of these materials. So I think they serve different needs. I also think that if a couple is already in crisis, the bring baby home program isn't for them, you know, because it's not therapy. It's that's not, that's not something that's really covered in that class. It's not an interventional type of a class, right? So that's where therapy, I think, is much more appropriate. And if I see couples during a workshop that seem to be having bigger issues than can be handled in the workshop, I'll take them aside and give them some names and some referrals. And it's not that they're not welcome in the class. They obviously can come back the next, next session was just kind of letting them know that this, this might not meet your needs in this area, and but there are places you can go for support,

Rebecca Gleed: 33:09

yeah. How might a postpartum couple know that they're in a crisis? What are some signals or examples of crises?

Unknown: 33:19

Sure, one person sending to the other, right, or contemptuous of the other. One person looks down on the other, you know, is sarcastic, right? That type of Saul's contempt like sulfuric acid for love. So if it's happening occasionally, it is what it is, if that's the pattern that a couple has, right or stonewalling is another one where your partner's trying to talk to you and you just are so overwhelmed that you just shut down and you just wait for them to be done and leave so that you can, like, un shut down. Shutting Down is a response. Stonewalling is a response that all of us have when we're feeling overwhelmed, but if it's the way every argument goes, that's a warning sign. So things like that, where it's just these these cycles where you're having a conflict and then you come out of it and haven't really solved anything, or one of you feels like they won, and that's kind of a consistent thing, right? You're not really regulating that conflict, you're not compromising, you're not feeling respected. Those types of things, I think are warning signs.

Rebecca Gleed: 34:27

Yeah, you point to some of these, what we call the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stone walling. So it sounds like if those are frequent and prevalent, that that might be a signal that therapy might be a route you choose to go. And maybe, in addition to the education piece, maybe you don't, aren't even aware of what the Horsemen are. But that could be an example. What other? What other like program pieces? Are part of bringing baby home that we haven't already named.

Unknown: 35:04

We, you know, we talk a bit about child development, which is an interesting addition. So even for folks who have taken like some seven principles of making marriage work, or for therapists who are certified Gutman and therapists with a level 123, this is like a new thing, right? So interspersed are these nuggets of sleep cycles and awake cycles and what it looks like when parents are interacting and playing with baby together, versus when when they're at cross purposes. And we have good video of that type of thing and how that helps babies develop emotionally when their parents are like, playing the same game, we call it. So there's information on that. There's information like I mentioned, on emotion coaching and supporting children during big emotions, and when we talk about the stress reducing conversation earlier in the class with couples, where they talk about something outside of the relationship, it's bothering them, and then kind of validating that that's really emotion coaching for your partner. And so then later on, we talk about it with children. There's kind of a tie there as well. We talk a lot about, we haven't really talked today very much about intimacy, but that's a whole chapter of sex and intimacy, and kind of what those changes are and what to expect there, and kind of how to how to work through some of that, and then lots on on shared meaning at the end, and building your own family.

Rebecca Gleed: 36:45

I love the integration of the infant child development and helping parents know some of that, because a lot of us don't get that training, even if we're, you know, college educated, it's very likely that we know very little on infant and child development, and then, like you said, that emotional coaching can help us with our partners, how to actively listen, ask those open ended questions, validate and empathize. And that can be not just for our partners, but also for our children, which is so beautiful. If you're going into intimacy. Let's go there, if

Unknown: 37:25

or and I also want to bring up because I just, it just came to mind. We also have a whole section which started as the importance of fathers, and since we've done like a rewrite, it's, you know, it's the importance of all the parents, right? And there's tons and tons of research around styles of play and all all kinds of things there. So I just wanted to make sure we got that too, because that's a really big piece of things as well, which also plays into the when one partner doesn't feel as involved or as responsible or kind of, how do they, how do they come into it? So didn't want to forget that.

Rebecca Gleed: 38:05

Yeah, I think that's important to highlight. And what I know Postpartum Support International has emphasized in the last few years is the prevalence of pm ads, perinatal mood and anxiety disorders amidst fathers, and that's about one in 10. I think it's so easy to assume that it only affects the birthing individual, but we know from research, and that's probably less than what's actually happening, is that dads get postpartum depression, anxiety, OCD right along with or imagine P PTSD witnessing a near miss or a postpartum hemorrhage or preeclampsia of your partner, they also develop PTSD. And so I love this idea of, how do we get shed light and involve fathers and non birthing

Unknown: 38:55

individuals? So when we're talking about intimacy and sex with couples in these workshops. And so these are couples who are, you know, six months infant at home. I like to start by saying, you know, many couples are not sexually intimate in those last few months of pregnancy and the first few months after they have a baby. And like, Why do you think that is? And it allows them to answer that without saying, like, I thought about my body, right? But it's it, it. They might feel uncomfortable. They might, you know, like the babies might be in their room. So, so just try to, like, demystify it a little bit, and just talk about, yeah, like it's for most of us, it's an important part of our relationship, and it's going to be different after we have kids, and we need to be really intentional about it, and quite often, going to take some work to kind of give back there. And for many parents, you just kind of need to feel. Closeness, the relationship piece before they're comfortable with bringing the intimacy in again. And so really the focus is on friendship. And how do you feel comfortable with each other in a non sexual way? And so we talk about that, because what can happen is you go from, I call it being soulmates to being roommates, and you go from like best friend to Okay, I'll cook the dinner dog for a walk and but the pharmacy while I'm feeding the baby. So you become roommates, and that's not why you got together in the first place. You got together because you love each other and you're best friends and you have fun together. And a lot of what happens in those first few months is you stop having fun together, and so finding ways to connect, whether that's just a kiss goodbye in the morning when one of you leaves for work, if that's how that hat is in your home, or baby goes down to sleep and you get on the couch together and hold hands and try to watch TV, but pass out instead, you know, whatever it is, just the feeling of closeness, without the pressure of sexual intimacy, if that pressure is there for either of the people can really help with, helps to do things and feel closeness, so that you can be more open and like ask bid for a lot of us. And so ways to do that in a way that are kind of lower risk, right? So that if your partner says, No, you're not as hurt. So it might be like the code that couples have where it's like, oh, it's a little it's a little cold in here. Are you cold? So the other person has an opportunity to either say, No, I'm fine, got it, or, oh, yeah, it's a little cold. Oh, come on over very low risk ways to have those conversations, because it can be a really touchy thing, and I think that for a lot of birthing women, they maybe don't feel so great about their bodies, or they're not super comfortable. Or I had one mom in a support group many, many years ago come back to the group and say, I wrote up an agreement, like a contract with my partner, and the things on the contract were like, I will have sex if the lights are off, if I can keep my bra on. Like they were just, like certain things. And she said, and he, like, happily signed it, and we're having a great time. So figuring out, like, what makes everybody feel good and feel comfortable and like, your things are going to be different. But again, for most couples, that's a really important component of relationships. So finding your way back to that is going to be important in terms of feeling close to each other, just in general.

Rebecca Gleed: 42:59

Yeah, I love what you just said about things are going to be different. Yes, our bodies transform. Maybe that's a mom who's breastfeeding. Maybe there's a second degree tear or some pelvic damage that is painful. And so this idea of, I love this example of the contract, because it's an example of a compromise. Here's what I'm bringing to the table. Can you meet me and compromise around this? And let's have a good time. I love that, that idea and that things are going to be different, right?

Unknown: 43:33

It actually, interestingly, I think, set the tone for the group. It was, I think, like a six week group or something. And subsequently, every week, the women would start, like, reporting if they'd tried it or not. And so they're all really, like, up on each other's sex lives, which is not usually what happens in a new mom support group, but they're all, like, really supporting each other in that specific area. And it was actually really, like, interesting and nice to watch because it was, it became, like, really positive for everyone, and everyone felt really encouraged, and like, brought that back into their relationships in a way that I have not seen before.

Rebecca Gleed: 44:13

Yeah, well, and for anyone wanting kind of the medical perspective, we have Dr Maria Cantor, who is a urogynecologist, and she speaks beautifully to some of the medical reasons and having conversations too, I think what you're these low risk conversations of, hey, I went to my doctor's appointment today, and this is what's going on. I need a little bit more time and making them kind of the sound piece. And I love this idea of make it a little easier, this gentle runway, this gentle startup, as opposed to this sex can be so taboo, it can be a hard conversation to have, depending on your comfort level. And so some of these tools and techniques you can learn through bringing baby home can help you. Reduce the risk of the vulnerability, right? Exactly, yeah, anything else around intimacy that we can share with folks,

Unknown: 45:11

I guess the just the one other thing we talk about is the value of time together, away from the baby, which is like a whole other, like, kettle of fish, because we talk about two things. One is like going on dates, and another is like an overnight, many new families are not ready for the overnight for, like, a long time for various reasons. And I totally understand that. So I really push the Like, what if once a month, you guys got together without the baby. I know you've gone to dinner with the baby. What if you didn't go to dinner with the baby? Or we talk about you're really tired. Maybe dinner's Not a thing. Maybe it's if you have family or friends in the area, they hang out with baby in the morning for their morning one of their morning naps, and you guys go for a walk, you know? And even if you talk about the baby the whole time you're you're connecting and like remembering why you liked each other in the first place. When I tell the story of after my second baby, I I mean, I don't know about other people, but I felt like having one child was really hard, and then having two children, I felt like was having 10 children. I did not double it. It felt way, way more, and I was working, and I was taking care of my two kids, and I was in my relationship, and I was just having trouble. And about five, six months into it, for my birthday, my husband gave me tickets to San Francisco, like a couple's weekend away. And the significant thing about that is we've never done anything like that before, and so what that showed me was he noticed, he knew I needed to get out of there, and he arranged for his mom to come from the East Coast and watch the kids. And he arranged the whole thing. I didn't have to do anything. And we got there, it was just fun. We just acted silly and, like, went out for a drink and walked around like it just like the stuff we used to do. And that was just immeasurable for me in terms of how important that was to, like, the health of my relationship with him, because he really saw me. So, yeah, you can't, kind of, like, overestimate how important it is to just have a little time together without your kids. I think the flip side of that is many, many moms feel very, very guilty for doing it. And so when I tell them things like, maybe sign up for a class on a Saturday afternoon, like something that you had to pay for, so you'll go and your partner has to figure out what to do at home, often, I'm really met with like, Yeah, but I feel so bad, or I feel guilty, or I'm not, any number of reasons, and I try to explain, you've had all this time with the baby. You've made a ton of mistakes, and then you figured out what they were, and now you know how the baby likes to be held or fed, etc. Your partner maybe hasn't had that time to make the mistakes, and that's why they don't know, and if you give them that time and that trust, they're going to figure their own stuff out, and then they're going to feel better about it and more competent, and you're going to raise the kids together a little more, because you won't feel like you have to be the only one who knows how to do All the things. So there's, like, all these benefits of that, of having your partner kind of help with baby or do primary baby care while you do your own thing, and not just discover yourself as like the couple you used to be, but yourself as who you used to be. Because that's a whole other piece that we don't get into a ton in this class, but super significant, right? Your your whole identity changes, and so feeling good about yourself helps you feel good about your family.

Rebecca Gleed: 49:11

I see this so often, and I love that we're going there, because it's one thing to try to tend to the guilt internally. It's another thing to actually go out to that class and do that experiential work of, okay, how do I look guilt in the face, and how do I expose myself to it and really practice it, knowing that I gotta trust it's one of the pillars of the Gottman work, is trust and trusting that not only can I receive the support, but reframing it in a way that this is allowing my partner to learn some of these skills that I've mastered, and it's so important for those opportunities so they can not just support you, but they can also develop that relationship with the child. Child. I think this is beautiful. And then also, to come back to your San Francisco example, that level of the house around outside of sex, passion, romance, friendship, and reclaiming some of those parts of the relationship that there's, it's so easy to put that last on the list when you're tired, you know you're not eating as much as you should be, or, you know, moving your body. It also

Unknown: 50:28

makes me think of the house analogy, because we use it in all of the all of the Gottman things. And I talk to couples when I'm teaching about the house, and say, if you're building a house, like really building a house, you don't start with the baby's second floor room beyond right. You have to start with the foundation, and you have to build up. And so kids do better when their parents have a strong foundation, and those strong like first layers right of the love maps, etc, and moving on to positive perspective that makes a stronger family. You can't just put your kids first. It's okay to put yourself first, and it's okay to put your relationship first, because by doing that, you're taking really good care of your kids.

Rebecca Gleed: 51:21

Another reframe that I think will resonate with a lot of people when they want to tend to just the child, which is so easy to get caught up in, but the importance of by tending to your own self and your own relationship, that's going to trickle down to the child and maybe as a final exploration, which is, you know, we could have put this on the front end, but I actually like that we're putting it on the back end. Is the why? Why focus on this perinatal period to support the transition to parenthood? What's in the why? Yeah.

Unknown: 52:00

I mean, it's just, it's a it's a huge transition. It's a key moment. Most people who have kids talk about timing in terms of, like, before the baby was born, after the baby was born, your whole timeline turns into, Oh, yeah. I remember when she was three. That's when we moved to that next house or so. It's kind of this very pivotal moment and moment where, for the most part, couples are feeling excited and positive. It doesn't mean they're feeling excited and positive about everything, but there's a lot of hope for many, many couples in this moment, and it's a good time to kind of to get them, and it's because, if they understand that their relationship is really important to the family they want to build, at that time, they're more likely to start kind of earlier with it right? Any time can be a touch point. You can teach this stuff at any point, I have people who come to class because they wish they'd taken it with their first child. Now they have a seven year old and a newborn. Now they want to try it now, but it's just such a big change that it's a great time to introduce some really positive stuff, some amazing strategies that they can do that are going to help them for the rest of their lives and help their kids with their emotional development, physical development, health, like all of the things we know for kids who who grow up with families who don't have a ton of conflict, they just tend to do better in all aspects of life. So starting from the beginning, if we can, that's why it's such a great time.

Rebecca Gleed: 53:47

Yeah, you talked about this idea of shared dreams. What would be some examples of dreams that couples might have for their child, or children, right?

Unknown: 53:58

Well, I mean, there's, I don't know. There's like, micro and macro, right? There's, there's things like, they want their child to be happy, they want their child to be a caring person, they want their child to be self sufficient, right? So there's like, these big overall goals, and then there's just like, the goals for the for the family. We as a family are respectful of each other. We as a family spend Friday nights together and rent a movie. So it's all of the little pieces, right? It's even things like, when we have dinner, what do we want dinner to look like? You know, maybe in my house, we all sat down to dinner with no screens and ate and talked to each other. And in my partners, he ate sandwiches on the way to practice three weekdays, you know, a week, I mean the car or or whatever. Or like, the whole family watched TV or game show or something. And then it's like, okay, well, how do we we have really different ideas of dinner. What? What do we do about that? We make those merge. And so, like, those are the kinds of conversations you want parents to have early, early in the game. And we have that set up as activities as well. We have a really lengthy activity on that, because we tend to see issues around meal time, around free time, or vacations, around how to celebrate holidays, like all of these things that in our family of origin, we really had our own. This is how you do whatever Thanksgiving and then, okay, well, how are we going to do it? What does it look like for us? What's important for you, what's important for me, and that's the building the meaning together, piece of things, right? And then I think all of your like visions and expectations of your kids come out of that stuff.

Rebecca Gleed: 55:57

It sounds like a fun creative process. Now, I mean, sometimes there's gridlock or some disagreement, but I'm guessing, generally speaking, this can look pretty fun. Of, well, let's do Jeopardy on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and let's, you know, have a gratitude practice where we're all talking at dinner on Mondays and Wednesdays and Friday night pizza sounds creative and fun, and I'm not sure if that's what you see with couples, but what a cool process to create something as two

Unknown: 56:28

people, right? And then having family meetings, once your kids start to get a little bit older, and reassessing, like is Friday night movie night working for all of us anymore, or like plans, right? It's nothing set in stone, so you just kind of adjust as as you go. If you celebrated something a certain way, like my husband and I are completely different backgrounds and celebrate completely different holidays, and had to do a lot of work around a kid. Well, what like? What does that look like? And then what does it look like for our kids, and what are our compromises? And we, we ultimately, in the winter, compromised with celebrating Winter Solstice. Neither of us had celebrated it, so we wanted to kind of make a new thing, and now it's like a very big holiday that our kids celebrate and bring all their friends and girlfriends and boyfriends to, and we just kind of made up all the all the rituals, right? So, yeah, all of this is just, it's just ongoing. It's reassessing and being comfortable enough in the family to sit down and have a conversation and be like, is this working? And what do what do we need to change? And what do we like?

Rebecca Gleed: 57:36

Yeah, cool. Well, where can folks find you, if someone's not in Seattle and can't see Beth, where do they go to find someone who is a facilitator or educator on bringing baby home,

Unknown: 57:52

right? Well, they can, I mean, they can go to me, I'm Beth, goss.com that's easy. And then they can go to the Gottman website, and I think it's got gottman.net I'm not positive we'll have to check it. Yeah, yeah. But on their website, they have listings of bring baby home classes all over, probably the world. I mean, I think the focus is in the United States, because most are there, but facilitators who are doing this, whether it's in person or on Zoom, and I've done it both ways, are able to list on their website, so you can find it that way. And I'm sure googling always works, right? Yes, yes.

Rebecca Gleed: 58:35

I'll put some of that in the show notes your website, the Gottman website, but I you can see folks anywhere, virtually. Is that fair, right?

Unknown: 58:46

And again, I'm not a therapist, I'm an educator. So what, what I tend to do is more parent coaching, and sometimes the parent coaching and consulting is around parent conflict. Parenting styles, different ideas of what parents think, you know, guidance and discipline should be, etc. So that's kind of how that's how it works with with me, if I'm not teaching a class,

Rebecca Gleed: 59:12

yeah, I've had so many couples that I've recommended new parents go and do bring your baby home. So I can really speak to kind of this before and after, and people are just sharing how helpful it was and how wonderful it was in terms of preparing them for this next major life transition. So thank you for the work that you're doing and for explaining a little bit more about bringing a baby home, anything else you want to share, or any last gems to expectant or new parents, right?

Unknown: 59:52

It doesn't necessarily come naturally when it takes work, and I'm talking about both parenting. Right? And being part of a couple, that's parenting, you're going to have instincts, but there's, there's a lot of intentionality here, and so you can't just expect things to to go smoothly without a little bit of, a little bit of intention, a little bit of work, and that's on your own, together with your partner, continual conversations, right? You have to work at it to make it

Rebecca Gleed: 1:00:23

good. Yeah, it takes work, both individually and the relationship. Thank you so much for coming on the show. It's lovely to have you bringing baby home through the Gottman Institute. Everyone. Check it out, especially if you're an expectant or new parent or you know someone who is Thank you, Beth.

Unknown: 1:00:43

Great. Thank you so much for having me. If you would like to learn more about how we can help, visit our website at perinatal reproductive wellness.com, and while you're there, check out the latest edition of our book, employed motherhood. We also invite you to follow us on social media at employed motherhood. Finally, if you enjoyed listening to the show, please subscribe and rate it. Thank you. You.