This is what you find annoying about your partner when you have children together

‘I'm just going to bed for another hour, darling. Good luck with work!’ I'm on the bike in the howling cold, feeling as if I've just spent 24 hours on a plane and am completely living in the time zone of Australia.

That I haven't had a decent night's sleep since March 7 of this year and it's clear that I've had my eyes closed for about eight or nine hours. But that sleep deprivation also takes its toll on the relationship. We're irritable. Snappy. Grumpy to the core. ‘I'm going to take a little nap.’ ?!?!?!?!??!?!’ ‘HONEY?’ And then you complain that YOU are tired? I'm the one who's tired! I can't take that extra hour of sleep! I have to work! I got home late! I never sleep! Thoughts are going in all cheerful directions while I try to move forward in the biting wind.

This is how it is nowadays and it's anything but sweet. As new parents, you find a lot annoying about your partner:

1. That he can take power naps more often than you. That he gets home from work a bit earlier than you. Sleep = gold. And he has more of it than you. Damn.
2. That he then also snores while he should be feeding the baby at four in the morning. And you have to get up.
3. That you come back to bed after bottle number three and can't sleep because of that aforementioned snoring.
4. That you have to watch football during those scarce hours you can call ‘free time together’. Because there's always football. Or Max Verstappen.
5. That you not only have to watch football, but also automatically have ‘mom duty’ without asking when he goes to match number 921 of Ajax.

Look, honestly? I think this, he probably thinks a whole lot about me too. Something like this, I think:

1. That I don't understand why the away game of Ajax against France or England (I don't know who) is so important that you have to go there with friends for a night.
2. That I say I'm going to have a glass of wine around lunchtime with a friend and that I'll probably eat at home and then I show up at half past nine. ‘It was so much fun!’
3. That I grab a laptop to work while I should actually just have that weekend day off. And at home, you're the mom of the family. And laptops don't belong there.
4. That there's a new package in the hallway every week. And saying that it's sweaters for Bodi and Daaf doesn't work anymore. The packages are too big for that.
5. To then complain after those packages that I need to work more to earn more because suddenly I don't have that much in my savings account to fix that broken dishwasher. Do you understand the error, see points three and four?

Every couple has irritation. I towards him, he towards me. But as parents, you learn a lot along the way. You have to do it together. You're a team. You have that one task together: raising children. So you can be irritable and bicker and sulk on the bike, but it doesn't make sense. You might as well laugh together about that sleep deprivation and pour that one glass of wine too many together. Because that's how you keep the fun in your love life. And that's not easy, because you're constantly busy with your children and not with your partner. That's how it is. But I really don't forget where it all comes from, darling. Because those children who keep us awake forever, those dear Bodi and Daaf, they ultimately came into the world thanks to our love for each other. Yes, you might find it cheesy, but that's how it feels to me. They are us, they are we, they are our life and our family and our love. There's nothing more beautiful than that.

But if Ajax happens to lose and doesn't continue in the Champions League, well, I wouldn't mind that too much.