The first six months with a baby
Nothing has gone wrong with your relationship. The conditions it ran on have been removed, all at once.
Sleep is gone. Every evening is accounted for. The low-stakes moments where couples actually connect — the walk to the shop, the ten minutes before bed, the drive somewhere — have been replaced by handovers. Two people who used to talk now exchange status updates about a third person.
That is not drift. It is a temporary structural change, and treating it as evidence about the relationship is the most common mistake new parents make.
The other one is waiting for a window. A date night is months away; five minutes is available today, and five minutes of non-logistical conversation does more than most people expect. These are sized for that.
If either of you is struggling in a way that is not shifting, that is a matter for a professional rather than a question set, and asking early is the right call.
Five-minute questions (1–8)
For when five minutes is genuinely what you have. One at a time, not as a list.
- What was the best ten seconds of your day?
- What is one thing you need from me tomorrow?
- What are you finding hardest right now that you have not said?
- Is there anything you are dreading this week?
- What do you miss most?
- What is something about the baby that only you have noticed?
- Are you okay? Actually.
- What would help in the next hour?
Question 8 is the most useful thing on this page. It is answerable, immediate, and it produces action rather than a conversation about feelings when neither of you has the capacity for one.
Sleep and load (9–16)
The two subjects that cause the most damage when they go unspoken.
- Who is more tired right now, honestly?
- Is the night split fair, and is it working?
- What could we change about nights that we have not tried?
- Who is carrying the tracking — feeds, nappies, appointments, what the health visitor said?
- What is on your mental list that I do not know about?
- What do you do that I have not noticed?
- Is either of us keeping score? Say it if so.
- If you could hand me one thing permanently, what would it be?
Question 12 is the one that surfaces the invisible half. The tracking is a job — remembering the last feed, noticing the nappies are low, holding the appointment in your head — and it produces no visible activity, which is exactly why it goes unrecognised by whoever is not doing it.
Decide: one thing to move, this week. Not a whole system. One thing.
The things nobody says (17–22)
- Is there anything you feel guilty about that you have not told me?
- Do you ever feel like you have disappeared?
- Do you feel like a worse partner than you were?
- Is there anything about how I am parenting that worries you?
- Do you feel judged by me?
- What do you need to hear from me that I am not saying?
These are best asked one at a time, on a good day, and the honest answers frequently do not arrive on the first attempt. Asking again in a month is not repeating yourself; it is how these get answered.
Coming back to each other (23–28)
- What is one thing we used to do that we could do a small version of?
- What would fifteen minutes of just us look like this week?
- What do you want to be true of us in six months?
- What are you looking forward to?
- Is there anything you need me to take off you so you can have an hour?
- When are we doing this again?
Question 27 is the practical one. Time for the relationship comes out of somebody's load, and naming what to take is more useful than agreeing that you should both make more time.
Question 28 is the mechanism. Without it, the answer is never.
Three things worth knowing
Do not save it all for a window. The window is months away. Five minutes now beats two hours later, and there is good reason to think small repeated connection matters more than occasional large gestures. Fifty examples of bids for connection.
Resentment is normal and it is about fairness. It is usually about sleep or load rather than about the person, and saying it early and specifically stops it becoming the frame through which everything else is read.
Get help early if it is needed. Postnatal mental health problems are common and treatable, and either parent can experience them. Thoughts of harming yourself or the baby are an immediate reason to contact a professional. A conversation app is not the right tool for that, and neither is a partner trying their best on no sleep.
How to use these
One question, not a group. This is the one page here where the usual advice inverts: everywhere else it is one group per sitting, and here it is one question, whenever there is a gap.
Ask again later. The honest answers to the middle groups often arrive on the second or third attempt, weeks apart.
That daily, single-question shape is what Nearvo is built on: one question a day, answered separately then revealed to each other, with shared streaks that only advance when both of you show up. Planned at $49.99/year, $9.99/month or $129.99 once, one partner subscribing and both unlocking. In development, not released.
Reconnecting after a baby · More question sets · Why couples drift apart
Nearvo is not therapy. These are conversation prompts. They are not a substitute for working with a licensed couples therapist, a health visitor, a midwife or a doctor, and they are not a treatment for postnatal depression or anxiety.
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About Nearvo
Nearvo is an iOS app from Baker Ventures LLC built around a daily question for couples: one prompt, both partners answer, and you see each other's answer only after you have both replied. One partner subscribes and both unlock, because a paywall that asks two people to buy separately is how most couples apps quietly fail. The app is in development.
It is designed for the ordinary version of the problem, which is not a crisis: two people who live together, like each other, and have stopped asking anything that is not logistics. Nearvo is not therapy and does not diagnose a relationship. The question sets on this site are free, need no account, and the research pages cite the studies directly, including where the evidence is weaker than the popular version of it suggests.
Questions and answers
Why do relationships get harder after a baby?
Sleep deprivation, a sudden and usually uneven division of new labour, and the loss of every low-stakes moment where couples used to connect. Nothing has gone wrong with the relationship; the conditions it ran on have been removed all at once.
How do new parents stay connected with no time?
In smaller units than before. Five minutes of non-logistical conversation is achievable where a date night is not, and it works better than waiting for a window that will not arrive for months.
What is the invisible load with a new baby?
The tracking. Remembering the last feed, the nappy stock, the appointment, the sleep pattern, what the health visitor said. It is exhausting, it is usually carried by one person, and it is invisible to whoever is not carrying it because it produces no visible activity.
Is it normal to feel resentful of your partner after a baby?
Very, and it is usually about perceived unfairness in sleep or load rather than about the person. Saying it early and specifically is what stops it becoming the frame through which everything else is read.
When should new parents get help?
Any time either of you is struggling in a way that is not shifting, and immediately for thoughts of harming yourself or the baby. Postnatal mental health problems are common and treatable, and a conversation prompt is not the right tool for them.
Nearvo. “The first six months with a baby.” Baker Ventures LLC, September 7, 2026. https://nearvo.bakerventuresstudio.com/questions/the-first-six-months-with-a-baby/