To be sick of women's attitudes about their oh's competenence with their children?

[rhondajean]

My blood is boiling! Come tell me I am being totally unreasonable.

In the last week I have read countless threads all of which focused on fathers perceived inability to take care of their own children, make decisions a out parenting, basically be an adult.

I can't decide whether half on MN is married/living with idiots or whether there is such a level of arrogance among some women that they cannot accept they are not irreplaceable to their little darlings for a couple of hours, or even days.

C'mon, slap me down!

I so hear you Jingle. I don't get why my relationship with my husband makes their blood boil because he leaves me to change nappies. I'd rather change a million nappies than have to do 1 car tyre change (twice a year here). He also goes up on the roof throughout winter to clear the snow off. I'll happily do all the baths in exchange for not being a spider-monkey. :o

Chubfuddler, please don't think for a minute that mother him too do he can't learn!
But seriously - he just doesn't bloody think.
That includes tightening car straps - which I can't stand by and let him learn the hard way!!!
And when he didn't ask her preschool booster due date (because I only saw the receptionist not the GP - WTF?) - I wasn't going to let him learn by leaving her to get sick.
It does by bloody head in, it really does.
It's partly not thinking, some of it's laziness. He took her for a wee behind a bush when on a country walk with friends, and then bloody called me to take over when she said she needed a poo!!
Needless to say, I didn't jump in and cover for him.
It's hard to respect him. And it's not because I've never let him learn. Most of what he does /doesn't do isn't, as I said life threatening.
You know what though? I've taught her to tell us (both of us) if her car seat straps aren't tight though!
He is not as competent, and he isn't learning.
God, depressed myself venting that.

You don't always choose the father of your child. I got up the duff (in very unlikely circs-my fault, yes, but not expected) by a man who was a good laugh, sexy blah blah.
As a father he is well meaning, but utterly useless.
I am a feminist to my bones, and I have tried to hand him the reins. He just seems to have no instincts, or gumption at all.
We are not together, but he sees ds quite frequently, and is my childcare some of the time. I have forced myself to NOT leave lists, or remind him of things, but even the basics can elude him.
One time I came home from work, and he tld me ds had been a nightmare-tantrums, screaming etc. I asked what he had for lunch.
"Lunch? Oh, right. I didn't think of that"
"Er, maybe that's why he was upset?"
I will leave him alone with ds now ds is older and can basically help himself to bread and cornflakes, but I have zero faith in his ability to think of someone else before himself.
And he cant hold down a job, or do many of the things most adults consider normal.
I have to try not to think about it too much as I would truly despise him.
Even my mother has said that I shouldn't let ds see him too much as he is a rubbish role model!
I wouldn't do that, and i know ds has the right to see his dad, but I do despair of his ability to be a proper parent.
I also HATE how it makes me feel-like a controlling, bossy know it all. I dont want to be that woman, and I resent being put in that role. I would LOVE it if he showed some initiative, and took the reins. Doing it all alone is hard.

IfNotNow - YY! To being put in that role. Because actually I agree in principle with the OP that some mothers put fathers down for the sake of it. And I don't want to be seen like that.

1. Women-blaming is not cool.

1. It's not about women and men - it's about the person who does 95% of the job trusting someone who does it 5% of the time. Imagine a job-share where the person who works Mon-Thurs and Fri til lunchtime hands over to the person who works Fri afternoons only, alongside the full-timer - would they not be a bit concerned that things are done smoothly so they don't impact the rest of the week?!

I love my Dh dearly but don't expect him to just 'get' what needs to be done around the house and with DS as I'm a SAHM I spend the majority of the time planning, organising, caring for and learning about DS. It would be pretty stupid to think he would be as good at it as me. He is an instinctively fab parent, probably better than me, but I've had the training, and put in the hours. Therefore I'm his superior and he defers to me as his line manager ----

So YABU. All you're doing is eyerolling at those nasty nagging wives - I can go to my local boozer if I want to hear that. If someone posts on MN saying their husband is an entitled twunt who won't lift a finger despite repeated requests, I will support and sympathise.

Geez, this thread is just bursting with women who are so fantastic at predicting anybody's ability to excel at care of yet unborn children, and therefore are also perfectly capable of identifying perfect breeding partners. Same, of course, applies to housework. And if by some freak accident this perfect predictive ability fails, the ladies seem to have such a tight grip on their emotions and finances that dumping the bastards is done in a flash. I am truly in awe. I just don't know why the divorce rate is 50% in the UK.

Love the sisterhood.

Agree that they will need a few little notes to help them, as you would with any other adult that does not usually look after them.
But dads normally do some parenting during evenings and weekends.
And things dont necessarily have to run smoothly all the time do they?
When I have left mine with DH when the kids were younger and small, yes there was a bit of chaos, but they and him had had a good fun time.
They may not have eaten exactly what I would have prepared, or the kitchen may not have been in a perfect way, but they had learnt things, he had learnt things, and I had had a break.
And he managed to show me a couple of easier ways to do things too.

Djembe, your DH may be better at it all than you if he was doing it 95% of the time. Does that matter?

It makes me very sad.
I don't see what you describe, OP. I think any adult who is having to do more than their fair share of work in a household and is unhappy about it (and 99% would be, should be, if they are enlightened and living in the C21st) will have tried compromise, nagging, sacrifice their perfectionism, whatever, to try and get things where they should be.......rather than be a martyr to try and shore up points....

My dad is 100% hands on and involved and does the same amount of housework as my SAHM. Every step of the way he was there, as a mediator, as a teacher, someone who cried when I was caught in a lie because he so wanted me to be straight and truthful, someone who read me a bedtime story every night until I was 13, who told me I should always leave a place cleaner than when I found it and led by example and only ever wants the absolute best for me, strict but fair.....just the archetypal family man!
My uncles are like this too, all my relatives are very family orientated; if they're not, it's the women who take a step back! But then we are not English and I do think there's a difference.

After reading Mumsnet. It's partly why I love the US TV series 'Parenthood'. Dads who really care.

He probably would be better than me at lots of it! It's nothing to do with me being a woman and him being a man that means I'm better at it - it's literally just practice.

But, eg last weekend DH was looking after DS and let him play with my hairbrush, which I've previously said I didn't want him to do. He brought a crying DS downstairs who had fallen on the brush and had 4 horrible long scratches down his perfect 1yo face! I didn't, but I easily could have posted on here and had a rant. Wouldn't be fair to judge our relationship, my nice-wife-ness or his parenting skills on it.

My DS's dad did great. He had him from two days old for most of the first weeks of his life and managed. Then he had him every weekend from nine months old. And nowadays will often take him for weeks at a time when I am not well enough to look after him myself.

The only time I ever doubted him was when he was in a relationship with a woman who just gave me the wrong vibe. The very minute I suspected my DS was being affected negatively by her I cut contact and said it could re-start when he had sorted himself out there. Turned out he was a victim of domestic violence and she had taken to little things to show my DS that he didn't belong there. Best choice I ever made, it made it easier for EXp to leave her knowing he wanted the best for his son, and since then I've never felt the need to even wonder what he gets up to with him, he's an equal parent IMO.

Completely shite at any DIY though, I always did the flatpack stuff if I wanted it to come out right. He came from his mum with no real clue how to do anything btw, I taught him all he knows.

I think some people on this thread are conflating two separate issues.

There are men who are fucking useless. God knows how and why anyone came to reproduce with them, but useless they are.

However, there are some women, very few admittedly, who treat their partners as if they are useless. I have read a thread on MN this evening in which the op was unshakeable in her right to be a sahm because she was certain her husband was incapable of patenting their child as well as her.

Chubfuddler, I almost fully agree with you. However, in the case of the thread you mention (I did not read it myself) - can the woman be right? Is it more acceptable to say that her husband is better at earning money than her? If yes, then why can't she be better than him at childcare? Childcare is skilled work, just the same as earning lots of money.

It is NOT. Repeat NOT. Unsupportive of women to feel VERY strongly that there is not some weird biological reason why men (as a gender) cannot care for children and do housework. It is not unsupportive of women to say do not fall for that crap. It is not unsupportive of women to say that if you happen across a man who actually CANNOT (as opposed to will not) do these things - this will be obvious from the fact they can't carry out other very simple functions. It is not unsupportive of women to say that it is social conditioning that has contributed to this idea that you can do sooooo much better with babies and houses if you have a womb. Or that some people are idiots and some people are control freaks. it is not unsupportive of women to say that an equal partnership is every person's right and if you don't have it - demand it! It is not unsupportive of women to acknowledge that there are some who do treat their male partners like they're idiots, after all, it is not unsupportive of men as a gender to acknowledge that there are some men who are abusive control freaks.

The difference that strikes me very clearly is that if a woman complains that her husband is incapable there is an attitude that she could well be right and that women with competent partners don't know how lucky they are.

But if a husband complains about his wife's standards of parenting or housekeeping, then the automatic reaction is sympathy with the woman- how bloody dare he impose his finicky standards on her, it's emotional abuse!

There are very few people (in RL or on MN) who suggest that women who are incompetent should leave parenting to the other half: the overall assumption seems to be that every woman will know what needs to be done and that her standards will be the right ones.

My DH could not look after DC alone when they were 3 and 1, as youngest DC was still breastfed. Very simple reason for babies to prefer mummies when they are small.

Once they are off the boob, it obviously becomes easier for the dad to become just as important a parent as the mum. But by then the baby has a preference for mum. And it takes time to get to a level of equality.

It did happen, but it took time.

I find this thread very unsuportive and hardline for women who are in a transition period. Also, it does not acknowledge the biological difference of women giving birth, breastfeeding etc which creates a temporary inequality. Which can be addressed later. Sure.

I find interesting and sad to read a thread by women, for women, bashing other women, who do not adhere to the strict 50-50 rule.

As I always say on threads like this, the answer is simple.

Only form adult relationships with other grown ups.

Sorted.

I agree with Chandon and find this thread incredibly unsupportive. Everything, as usual, is the woman's fault. It is her fault for not having the skills to choose the correct partner and perfectly predict the future, it is her fault for having exact standards and nagging too much, it is her fault for not nagging or "demanding" enough to single-handedly win the battle against sexism and social conditioning. And dare she complain. The battle against sexism has to be won in silence! How dare she criticise men in public. And god forbid she does not have enough education/experience to frame her critique/frustration in acceptable terms. Social conditioning is seen as all-pervasive, but this mantra does not seem to apply to the woman's brain. Whatever her background, she must always be immune to it to see it and topple it.

The attitudes on this thread are so perfectly described in "Wifework", it's uncanny.

It's not all the woman's fault. But I think it infantilises women to suggest they have no power at all over how the dynamic between then and their partners is played out.

The reason for not leaving a man in charge is often that he doesn't know the routine, he doesn't know the baby as well and he doesn't feel confident. But how many of us feel confident and have an established routine when we take our new baby home from hospital? Does anyone? And who would regard that as a reason not to expect the new mother get on with the job? I think we infantilise men by not letting them get on and learn from their own mistakes the way women have always been allowed to do.

If you read my post above, it is not that simple.

Rearing children is like a job (especially small ones). It is easy if you do it all the time. Maybe in an ideal world people could do 50/50 but in the real world most people cannot so they have to specialise. It is really hard to look after children a little bit, in the same sense as most people could not do their partner's job for a few hours a week without really struggling. It is easy for women to condemn their husband's incompetence when they ask them to look after the children a few hours a week and their husband forgets basic things like nappy sacks, reminding them to go for a wee, favourite cuddlies etc etc but I imagine that if they tried to do their husband's job for a few hours each week, they may forget what seems to him a really basic part of the job.

Leaving aside tiny babies where I do think mothers have an edge due to BF and having already established a relationship in the womb, i do believe that men and women can bring up children entirely equally (and I am actually lucky enough to be in close to that postion). However, due to the fact that most SAHP are women, the support networks for women are far better. I am almost never invited back to other women's houses when I have been out at soft play (for instance) with my children or drop them off at nursery. I have nice chats etc but it stops there and the few fathers normally end up together. I am not sure of the solution to this but it should at least be acknowledged.

Chubfuddler, I am not suggesting that the woman does not have any power. But there is nothing more disempowering that suggesting that somebody has ALL the power to make things exactly as they want them to be.

"The difference that strikes me very clearly is that if a woman complains that her husband is incapable there is an attitude that she could well be right and that women with competent partners don't know how lucky they are. "

oohhh not sure how much luck has to do with it? I knew my DH was going to be an excellent father well before we were married....if women want help with children - they should factor this in before having children with useless men.

FWIW i was totally useless with our DD when born it was DH who was utterly amazing...i dont get where women suddenly turn into mothers who know how to do everything the min baby is born - utter tosh...i also feel sorry for men, so much casual sexism about them being useless from the get goo......

You're right Larry. I suppose the difference with me and many women on MN is that I never have been a sahm (save for two periods of maternity leave). I've always worked and so my husband has always been hands on - not a hands on as me admittedly (he works much longer hours and is often away) - but definitely capable of caring for our children properly.