to think a lot of men don’t actually want children as much as they say they do?

Well obviously. Men and women are fundamentally biologically different. Something many on here often want to overlook, and those differences underlie a significant proportion of the issues posted on MN. Simply put, biologically speaking men are here to have the sex and women are here to have the babies and be the primary care giver. All the rest is societal conditioning. Does that mean men don’t want babies? No. But men’s ideas about child raising are very different to women’s. They look forward to different things such as teaching their children how to kick a football or passing on practical skills which is why many have little interest in the baby years but often get more engaged as the child gets older.

I think a lot of men either don't want children at all because of the financial cost, and will beg or pressure their wife/girlfriend to terminate a pregnancy, or they think that having a baby ensures that their wife will become a 24 hour a day unpaid cook/housekeeper/nanny/secretary and they are shocked to discover they are expected to actually do some parenting too.

My ex morphed before ds and I had left the maternity unit. He changed from being loving, attentive and caring to being dismissive and rude to the point the midwife asked if there was "anything I wanted to tell her".

I spent the next two years trying to get him to behave normally and then I took ds and left, moved to my home town, rented a flat and went back to work. Ex was outraged. That I might not put up with his rudeness, laziness and contempt had not occurred to him. He thought having a baby made me dependent on him and in his control. He is still angry, 15 years later.

I am an older mum. Perhaps it is a generational thing.

Yes, and I'd distinguish this sort of man from one who really doesn't want DC at all. Because it's very much a thing for some of them to want kids but just expect not to do 50% of the work.

While DH and I agreed to start a family, I definitely took the brunt of the entire decision for a long time. No family support either just for a break even half a day for someone to help. It was rough and DH and I fought so much I would be feeling like absolute rubbish and still have to press on with being a good mum.

It’s only lately that DH has really stepped up compared to the first few years. I truly was going to separate and divorce a few times.

While this is great for DC now to have both of us, it’s left a few scars we are still working on.

I don't think men in developing countries are bothered about whether they have kids or not, they just go along with it because thats what the woman wants.

In third world countries, children are important, bring in income and support you during your old age so children then are essential and very much wanted but here in the UK not so much.

This has been my experience too.

The only family I know where it isn't the case have very odd and rigid ideas about sex based stereotypes in general and have raised their children (one of each) completely differently.

But the others? Nope, all have fairly equal and normal set ups/lives.

What’s the saying - men want children the same way children want a pet. They want to do all the fun bits but know deep down that their partner will take care of the shit parts if they don’t want to. And if they really can’t cope, they can just leave with very few repercussions.

My kids are in their 20s, once I returned to work full time then I had to hand over 50:50 to DH and it took a few years until it was truly shared. There were plenty of other couples where the Dad did an awful lot but when you got to know the family better it wasn’t shared 50:50. There were plenty where the Dad did next to nothing of the parenting/mental load.

I don’t think a lot of women realise the reality of it either!

Wonens jobs aren’t paid less - some women just work in traditionally lower paid jobs. There is no reason why women can’t achieve higher paid careers.

One of the advantages of having a higher paying job was the ability to outsource a lot of tasks which made having a family easier when both parents are working full time

Same. And tbf although the school was MC, the very WC area we live in had similar ratios.

It’s partially biological. We carry the child, feed the child if breastfeeding, they generally want us above anyone else certainly for the first year but beyond that too (it’s fair to say children find mum the most comforting). I reckon men feel a bit useless, they don’t and can’t bond in the same way we do. I’ve heard they bond more through play and being silly with them which obviously generally happens as they get older.

Having said that, I’d be interested in how women bond with adopted or surrogate children and whether they struggle in the way men do. I don’t interact well with other people’s young children. I’m fine with teenagers but I find young children kind of awkward to be around, even though I’m fine with my own.

DH is great and very hands on and present but I do think he was certain much more ambivalent about having kids and would have been happy not to have them. Having them was important to me, not him.

Now they’re here he’s a great dad, although the mental load is definitely mine (partly out of my own need to be in control of everything), but I think if we hadn’t met or had decided not to have kids or whatever then that wouldn’t have bothered him, he would have carried on with life quite happily. He didn’t feel the ‘need’ I suppose for kids in the same way I did.

Nine children 😲

Will you have paid enough NI by the time you are of pensionable age to get a full state pension?

A lot of men do seem to want to father children, but not actually be fathers. I know far too many of these at work, sadly, working in a male dominated senior leadership team. Lots of divorces!

Among the middle and upper middle management, there does seem to be a difference though. More shared parental leave, definitely. 2 weeks for paternity doesn't seem to cut it for the younger generation. More fathers seem to feel able to ask for things like flexible working for childcare, leaving early for parents evenings, etc. But it is a terribly middle class workplace and the rank and file workforce is mostly clinical and allied health - nurses, psychotherapists, physios, OTs. I'm not sure therefore it's very representative, as at that level the workforce is only 30% male. Men in their 20s and 30s who enter the caring professions in my experience tend to want to be more hands on with their kids, though how much of that is more a sense of duty/fairness and responsibility than active enjoyment and fulfilment in fatherhood, I'm not sure. I'm not sure that's representative of other workforces/population groups either.

Conversely, there are still a lot of very sexist beliefs about what fathering is or should be. Both DH and DBIL got stick from their own parents about doing things like taking the bairns out in the carrier when they were babies, changing nappies, pushing the pram, going out on the bike with the trailer. Both say they wish shared parental leave had been an option for them back then and thet missed too much during the early years. They were unusual among their peers, who all seemed to want to spend as little time with their young families as possible and only really seemed to enjoy their kids when they got to around age 8-11.

I had two kids when I met dh, I was ambivalent about having more but dh wanted 1 or 2 . We had DS and dh was terrible in those early years if he had baby and I was having a rest he would come find me and be like ‘aww DS missed mummy’ He got very good at finding jobs to do at busy times (like witching hour)if I called him out he would deny it. And when DS got toddler he was completely overwhelmed by tantrums (DS was particularly bad later found out to be ASD) So i carried a lot of the parenting weight. Because of this I only went back to work part time and said no to another child.
I had no idea dh would be like that as he had always been hands on with my girls (7 and 9 when we met) But they were quite easy going and on reflection really he had been good at the fun stuff and I had still carried the mental load (which was fair as they were my kids)
I think some men like the idea of kids but are less fussed for the reality.

I think if the man was a little bit selfish before having kids then it's really going to show when kids arrive. I remember my MIL telling my SIL that her future DH would change when the kids arrive and be a great dad. Nope, he is exactly how he always was. Selfish men like the idea of kids, but still aren't going to put themselves out for them by doing the work.
My DH is probably a better parent than me.

I'll be honest- I wanted children, myDH wasn't too bothered. We had 3. He's a great dad and he loves our kids. But I think i love them more! Maybe that is just a mum thing, but they are my life. Dont get me wrong, DH will do anything for them (practically) but I deal with all the emotional stuff
I do know that he would have preferred us to have longer before having kids,but I was twitchy.

Me and dh always wanted a big family and have 9 and I gave up a career to sah and absolutely love it. Was always happy to do nights aswell because dh started work at 5am - 3pm but I always knew and still know the minute he gets in and his work clothes off he will be diving in making tea, doing housework or mostly playing with our tribe etc and putting them all to bed. So happy to do more kids things but have an extremely supportive dh in many other things that balances it for me

An interesting discussion, I think for most people the ‘idea’ of children and babies is based on their own experiences of being a child, sibling etc and not being a parent. It’s primarily understood through their experience of childhood and the experiences of how they were parented. All the research can be done beforehand, but nothing can teach more than the lived experience of having a child. So I think you are being unreasonable because the experience of becoming a parent and the individual feelings and reactions and behaviours once a parent are going to vary hugely between men and women.

A lot of me go along with what the woman wants,or they like the idea of proving their manhood by fathering a child, but they don’t want to actually parent.

Does one partner hear what other is saying or only what they thinl they here?

Going along with something or doing it because the other wants it is not the same as wanting it themselves

But maybe couples should have planning discussions on once the first child is born who will be doing what?

They want kids the same way kids want dogs.

I see it in different ways from both men and women tbh. Yes some fathers definitely should be more involved, but others are having to take on the pressure of being the only one providing financially when one parent (usually the mother) wants to become a SAHP. This of course often means more working hours which can impact upon time available to parent.