I wanted to be a full-time mother . . .

Thirst now raging. Start to feel claustrophobic and desperate. Shout at top of voice for husband, who rushes into the room as if the sofa has just caught fire.

Meekly: Could I have some tea? Jamie, who never, ever shouts, bellows at me until the veins in his neck pop up. I never expected to feel so lonely when I was married with a baby.

I had friends who had dropped me because my new life seemed so whole compared with theirs. Tears rolled down my cheeks as Oscar s hand clutched at my breast, his face puckered in concentration. Had he heard us?

Did he understand that something was dreadfully wrong? Of course, we wouldn t divorce, I told myself, but the marriage was clearly over. If I articulated this extraordinary fact to myself often enough, it made me feel better.

That s it, the worst acknowledged. Better that than trying to ignore the sick, sneaking fear that we no longer loved each other. We would stay together for the sake of Oscar.

I would probably have an affair in time; Jamie would keep paying the mortgage. We would become one of those couples who sit silently in restaurants. Having a baby made me suddenly understand, with acid-sharp clarity, why the divorce rate is so high.

I had always blamed poor staying power and selfishness. Having children drives an enormous, invisible wedge between the sexes. What it does unless you have a full-time nanny, cleaner and personal shopper is propel you backwards into the gender stereotypes of the 1950s.

Jamie and I went from absolute equality to living on different planets. He went to work: he schmoozed important people, he ate out, he bought new suits. I stayed at home: I cleaned, I washed, I cooked, I shopped, I washed again and I thought about our Oxford degrees a lot.

I was profoundly shocked to discover that this was the deal; that there was no other way of continuing the human race. I mean, I wanted to be a full-time mother, but I hadn t reckoned on falling out of love with my husband as a result. Little chores that used to be acts of love (pairing his socks, preparing him a nice supper) became venom-loaded.

As for the physical act of love, it just didn t happen. Aside from the exhaustion, neither of us felt loving enough. All the kissing was for chunky-thighed, gap-toothed Oscar.

I remember a friend telling me that she and her husband didn t make love for a year after having their first baby. I was incredulous at the time and thought she was hinting that their marriage was on the rocks. But now, there they are, robustly happy, having just had their third (another year of no sex is looming, poor Andy).

Another friend tells me that she loves her husband, Mark, but hasn t been able to show him love since she had their two children. She feels too angry and yet I believe she is also profoundly happy as a mother. I kept thinking about murdering him in the first three months, said another friend, of her other half.

I couldn t stand his presence in the house. They went on to get married and have baby number two. What happens to a relationship once a baby comes along?

Do people just give up on the past? Resign themselves to the present? Does the present get better?

When Oscar was six months old, an aunt came to stay for the weekend. I want you two to go out, she said. I m going to baby-sit.

Go out? But I was breast-feeding, Oscar was still waking up and screaming, it was a Saturday night and we hadn t booked anywhere, and ..

. I realised my greatest fear was that we wouldn t have anything to say to each other, that we would have to confront the elephant in the room and acknowledge that we didn t love each other any more and stare bleakly at the future. In a pizza-chain restaurant full of out-of-towners, we faced each other over a withered pink carnation.

We giggled as the second Croatian waiter in five minutes asked if everything was all right. He touched my hand. We drank a bottle of wine and walked back like teenage lovers.

I felt very raw, very vulnerable, as if I had just cried for three hours. It was going to be okay. We were still the same people.

I would say that the period of mourning for my marriage lasted about a year. But as the months went by, it seemed less tragic and less relevant somehow. Our old, self-absorbed, navel-gazing selves were like insect skins that we gradually shed.

We had always lain in bed and talked in the mornings: now we played in bed with Oscar. We gradually endeared ourselves to each other as parents as opposed to lovers, and found, among all the blame and exhaustion, the kernel of what we once had to build on again. What about me?

What about me? I cry, when Jamie kisses Oscar all over his tummy. I m joking, but sometimes it cuts me up.

And Jamie might well say the same to me, when I pull my gorgeous little boy to me and bury my nose in his spun-gold hair. He is the love of my life. The author wishes to remain anonymous Have your say Please note the maximum number of characters is 1000.

Thirst now raging.