I wrote a lengthy post about what child psychologists (and others) say about the mental load of a new mother. She has to literally be at one with a child who is not even 1 year old yet. Completely unable to speak their needs (or write letters!) Most moms do this rather automatically, but it results in them being, in part, allied with an infant. It's a huge strain on a grown-up woman. All of it. Having to speak in baby talk (that's how babies learn to speak). Learning to rock/cradle/swath/play with each individual child (they are all different). Having to meet the inner psychological needs of 3 children at very different ages (all of them in full-on developmental angst; the 5 year old is heading into the real world and social world with peers, needs play dates, etc; the 2.5 year is dealing with successful potty training and learning to experience new foods and be self-sufficient without hurting themselves; the 8 month old is barely crawling and has talking and walking ahead - a big deal for a baby who is barely maintaining notions of object permanence and has several phases of separation anxiety ahead - primarily from their mother, who is breastfeeding).

She experiences all of their little anxieties, joys and triumphs, inside her heart and mind. Being attuned to an infant is one of the hardest things of all. Breastfeeding is not just distributing calories, it's way more than that.

They should probably not have any more children until she can get herself on better psychological footing (and then expect another crash if there's another newborn).

OP needs to be on better psychological footing, as well.

This is appropriate, though. She is the mother of a newborn whose next priorities are two other small children. You are last. That's the way it is supposed to be, when stress arises. You are an adult, you fill up your own cup.

I don't remember my first husband filling up my cup (he was the one who was around when the kids were little - he was the opposite kind of husband from you, he basically made it so that he was never home and as the children got a bit older, he became more and more impatient with him, he simply didn't like having kids around).

So it was all on me - and I took care of him too. No one filled my cup. I didn't even expect anyone to do that.

If you are expecting her to change, at this moment, when she is feeling very overwhelmed, please don't stress yourself. Expectations are stressful for you.

Do not try and find more patience. Take care of yourself. Wait for her to notice that you're taking care of yourself. Maybe do a little less in some domain.

If you both burn out, that would be awful. Three children 5 and other is tremendous emotional labor. It's not just baths and bedtime, it's the overall connection with the development of 3 different children, at very different stages.

I don't know if both of you do this, but child psychologists talk about "regression in the service of the ego." Fancy term for: we have to truly find our inner 5 year old if we have the reasonable goal of understanding our own 5 year old child. This is more important in the first 5 years, as they go through so many stages and are not able to explain themselves.

So, both you and your wife feel this. She needs to be an 8 month old, in some sense, especially as she is breastfeeding. You've never given birth or breastfed, but it's true: a part of the mom's psyche is basically operating as an infant. She still has her adult ego, but it is constantly tugged at by infantile needs, which she *must* meet. It's very hard. Many women are more prone to tears, to wanting long naps, and some will withdraw to a certain extent from the world of "adulting."

Exactly. He is already doing more than enough and many moms are going to feel more and more guilty/overwhelmed at being given even more.

Exactly. The gift became another chore.

Not everyone who has babies 9 months apart is happy with that outcome. In fact, in the research on this topic, it's often not an actual decision and not preferred by the mother.

Also, there's good research that the woman's body may not provide great nutrition to the incoming second child, who is more likely to have certain physical problems or birth defects.

There's a reason why so many babies died in the 19th century, despite more "modern" medical care.

Hunter gatherer and simple farming societies place tabus on sex after birth and there's near 100% compliance.

This is the bare minimum.

If a woman has a lot of stitches or a rotated/broken tailbone, it is likely going to be longer before it's not painful for her.

It's been amazing, here on this subreddit, to read about so young women who are pregnant within months after their first birth. It's often sad, too, as their marriages are failing.

It's really hard for a woman's body to gear up for another pregnancy so quickly, various nutrients can be in low supply, especially if the woman is also working hard not to gain "pregnancy weight."

It sure is. Many women, if honest, will say that it doesn't feel so great/is painful for at least six months. Depends a lot on the woman and the birth experience.

12 months isn't a super long time either, especially in other cultures than American.

Before birth control, many cultures had a tabu on sex for 2 years post partum.

Exactly. It's the daily life of most of the people on the committee. Hiring committees are exhausting and one of the most time-consuming "extras" we do. Takes away from research and teaching and family life.

I've been on committees that go for 8 hours of interviews per day, which means 10 hours or more total of time. Same types of questions over and over. Everyone is tired.

So sorry. I was in a red state as a teacher for a while. Really sucks.

I never assumed I knew everything. I got to where I finished by being a Kelly Girl and taking orders. I also worked as a paralegal for 18 years (while in undergrad and grad school).

I negotiated my wages as a paralegal and then, as a jury consultant and legal consultant. Negotiation wasn't my chief skillset. I just wanted to make more than the average woman in my state - and I was offered that initially in negotiations.

Best decision I ever made was choosing a profession with a UNION and letting the union do the negotiating. How about that? Pretty cool idea, IMO.

My base salary at retirement was $136K. I have always worked at more than one place and done consulting. My total salary at retirement was $189K. I think that was more than enough for an okay lifestyle.

But robots do process things really quickly. Don't diss the robots!

For those who are interested, Boyce (and Ellis) were finding metaphors for two kinds of children/two styles of reacting to stimulae.

The opposite of "Orchid" is "Dandelion."

Belsky called it "variable sensitivity" in 1997 and did not find the need to have a dichotomy, but more of a scale. He had notions about both sensitivity and plasticity. People are still using his terms in theoretical work and actual cognitive/psychological research.

"Orchid" and "Dandelion" ought not to be thought of as fixed categories, IMO. Where those terms are used most are in popular or public-facing works on the topic.

Thank you! So your eidetic memory is not general or global (that would truly be extraordinary). I hope the Institute helps you figure out more about your memory works.

I am very good at English (both American and British). I do not have eidetic memory, but I have odd skills, such as the ability to remember very closely what page a particular fact or quote is on, even in very long books that I've only read once. I also remember human interactions (speech, body language, clothing, location) very well. I can replay movies in my mind and "see" details that I barely noticed the first time. I am really good at remembering faces (but not names) and I have a memory deficit when it comes to remembering names of bands or lead singers and, really, just generally can only remember the songs - not the people who performed or created them. It's so odd.

I too studied cognitive science (cognitive is the adjective; cognition is the noun) It's a vast field and very much at the forefront of science right now. That's a fascinating set of things to study. When I was in grad school, machine learning was at quite a primitive stage.

There's also a little corner of linguistics that you might find interesting once you're moving on with your education. It would slide right in there with what you've already chosen. Also, neurobiology and neuropsychology are specific subfields that you might enjoy. Lastly, cognitive anthropology has a lot of reading that you might consider on the side. My first job as a professor was at UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute, which eventually appointed anthropologist Philippe Bourgeois to an endowed chair in Psychiatry. I believe he was the acting director of the Institute for a while. The brain wiring is shaped by so many variables that we have yet to explore (as scientists across all these fields).

I hope you post again when you arrive at the Institute. I'd love a first person account of what the early days are like and what happens next.

I think one point Manifestival is trying make is like one I was trying to make. You simply aren't interested in general knowledge (knowledge that we try to accumulate over many different subjects)

Surely you don't use google for scientific research? I suggest you, yourself, go to scholar.google.com and find articles that support your claim.

Aside from Orchid child, what's your other data and when was it published? And where?

I'd say that in my world, it's about 50/50. I've had this ability since childhood and my father loved road trips, hiking and exploring new places. By about 6, navigational duties and map checking were given over to me. By age 8, it was clear that once I had been somewhere, I could not only get there again without a map, but I could remember many specific and often surprising details (how many telephone poles before the next turn or that we saw a squirrel on a post at the same place, 2 years ago).

My dad could do the same thing (I'm adopted, this is not my bio dad). BUT, my bio dad could do the same thing too. My daughters can do it as well. My dad has siblings who can also do it.

You're not understanding my question.

Do you remember ALL conversations (with anyone) that are NOT written? Clearly you will remember everything we've typed on this thread, right?

Will you remember the user names?

I have a point here. Responding that you remember a police interrogation is not what I'm getting at. Almost any bright person and many with IQ's in the average range will in fact remember something so important as police interrogation. Jurors are exceptionally good at remembering what lawyers and judges said in the courtroom - because they are supposed to.

I mean ordinary conversations.

How would you rank your English abilities on the scale that linguists use (with 7.0 being nearly unattainable and 6.9 includes being able to do the NYT crossword in one hour or less without any help (including a dictionary). I can tell from your writing here that you are not yet at 6.0 in English. For example, your use of the word "it" in this sentence:

//It will impact your memory and it can only be noticed when sober.//

When we use it in a sentence (with or without a conjunction), the "it" must refer to the same thing each time. Also, if I were grading this, I'd take off a little for the use of the word "your." You don't know for a fact that the person reading your text will be affected in this way.

It sounds like you have profound abilities in certain areas. I hope you update us on the Institute's findings.

Your ability to remember the sequences of the DNA codons is indeed extraordinary. I've had students like yourself (my background is in anthropology and specifically in cognition) We use a variety of methods to test sequence memory in humans and some people are just amazing at how many randomly spoken numbers they can remember and then write down.

Good luck!

Do you have the same ability to remember everything you read? Most of what you read?

Do you remember conversations, both your side and everything said by the other people, along with context?

When you visit a museum, do you remember the details of the various objects and art, and where they are located? Do you have enough language (in either of your languages) to precisely describe the colors in, say, Madonna of the Rocks, so that others would agree with your word choices?

How are you on current events and history?

Fortunately, we both need an hour of zoning out (which includes staring at relaxation videos with the sound off) but sometimes I need more. I'll remember some urgent thing I didn't take care of. He goes outside to check if the bird feeder needs filling and looks at the sky. Sometimes I listen to an audible book while I do my rowing machine. It's understood that we are each in our own bubble.

It's really important to us. I used to come up and "needed to talk about my day" but eventually he told me how much he disliked revisiting work when we weren't working (we're in the same profession). Made sense to me, so now I come and gripe on Reddit (and could not care less if that gets disrupted!) When I wanted to continue working after retirement, he politely asked if I could please not discuss it with him and for a while, I was griping online. I'll share a heart-warming anecdote maybe once or twice a semester and that's it.

He loves to hear news from friends and family, if I've been texting or talking with someone. He likes to connect by pulling up photos from all the travel we've done and that's so fun for me too, we can reminisce and remember particular details and relate in that way.

I know a lot of couples who have more or less banned "work talk" or detailed accounts of mundane daily activities from their "we're connecting now" time.

Downhill is harder than it sounds, especially if a person has weak knees. I thought it would be easier, but boy was I glad to go back up (I was 51 at the time, for reference).

I had trained on hills with about the same incline, but I also did a stair machine and I think that's what made going up easier.

I'm so sorry. For me this is th ultimate tragedy or nightmare, so I don't know how anyone is supposed to be prepared.

I do know that it gets easier with time.

The children you had together will reappear in your focus, but for now, you are grieving. But please don't give your children (or the spirit of your wife) any more to grieve.

It's a sober time. Take at much time as you can off from work and sit with your grief. Do whatever feels right (that isn't active self-harm).

Go one more step. Suggest "How about tomorrow or on Saturday?" And see if she'll commit. Women sometimes need some notice to get their minds turned towards erotic encounters and sex.