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Original poster

Women/ girls taking full responsibility children

265 replies

thereisalightanditnevergoes · 09/01/2018 00:00

Just lying here and suddenly feeling very cross so need to vent sorry guys. Wondering if anyone else feels the same.

I got pregnant at 17 with my first child. I finished my first year of college then missed a year to look after the baby until he went to nursery and I then completed my second year of College (sixth form) The father of my child, on the other hand who was the year above me so had finished his college education as our son was born, moved 100 miles away to his first choice uni.

He'd come back every other weekend to "help out" but eventually this got less and less as he met a new bird at uni and sacked me and DC off (until a few years later this all got resolved and he now has a good relationship with DC but that's not the point atm)

My point being how Fucking unfair. I can't believe I didn't make more of a fuss at the time. How dare he move that far away when I had to sacrifice so much and it was simply expected. Surely we should of both took a year out and both looked after the baby for the first year?? I know a few other girls who have had similar situations and I just think it's disgraceful most boys/ men take no responsibility and they aren't expected to. sorry. Rant over. I don't think I'm actually being unreasonable but would like other people's opinions on this.

OP posts:
Duchy0fGrandFenwick · 09/01/2018 00:05

YANBU but you couldn’t have made him stayFlowers

MrsMaxwell · 09/01/2018 00:09

Yeah sometimes I feel resentful that I bought up 3 children by two guys who built new lives and careers while I struggled to build my own and be the only parent to my three children.

BUT my kids are all nearly grown up now and I have the most amazing relationship with them because they know I have always put them first over men, jobs and anything else and I have always been there and nothing else is worth more to me than that, because I have succeeded in bringing up 3 amazing people Flowers

digitalDividend · 09/01/2018 01:09

I just think it's disgraceful most boys/ men take no responsibility and they aren't expected to.

Is that true? It seems like an entirely false premise ot me. Then again, I didn't know "a few other girls" who got pregnant at 17 with the fathers disappearing.

Original poster
thereisalightanditnevergoes · 09/01/2018 08:46

Oh digital pack it in. I didnt mean exclusively 17 year old girls who's partners up and leave. I was more referencing the amount of men who put no effort into raising their child whether they're 35 and married or 16 and only been together a couple of weeks. So many men don't help out, or aren't around at all.

OP posts:
BangPippleGo · 09/01/2018 09:57

I agree OP - hasn't happened to me because I haven't had a child, but I've seen it happen to most young women around me. In almost all unplanned pregnancies in my close circle, the mother has sacrificed a lot more than the father whose life tends to carry on as normal. Happens significantly less if it's a stable relationship and/or a planned pregnancy.

DHs friend and my friend had a baby together when they were teenagers (long before DH and I ever met). She had a very promising career ahead of her but she sacrificed it all for their daughter. He buggered off a month after the child was born and hasn't seen her since (he does pay maintenance but that's beside the point). They're now in their 30s and my friend has a great life, a big family and has just finished training in her chosen career field. DHs friend is a much nicer person than he was 15 years ago but is single and alone and has no career to speak of, still acting like a teenager, with hardly anyone having any respect for him over the way he treated the mother of his child.

TheDailyMailIsADisgustingRag · 09/01/2018 10:06

It is horribly unfair. And no, it isn’t just young mothers either. In all the divorces / separations, (between men and women), I’ve seen ‘close up’, so to speak, where there are dcs involved the mother always does more than half the childcare while the father gets to move on with his life, to a point.

Is your ex paying you child support now? That, he is required to do by law and he doesn’t get to opt out.

I think some fathers forget that they are still financially responsible. I know a couple where he father has just moved in with an OW. I wonder if the OW realises that he is still responsible for his dcs. It will be a huge drain on their finances, as obviously he will be contributing to two households now. If she ever wants dcs with him, he will have less time, (he is actively involved with his dcs, but does nowhere near as much as his stbxw), and money to support them.

TheDailyMailIsADisgustingRag · 09/01/2018 10:06

*the father

DrMarthaJones · 09/01/2018 10:09

It's partly biology. You were the one who was pregnant, and you were the one who chose to go ahead with the pregnancy. He couldn't do anything about it, and was never likely to give up university to stick around to change nappies. And its partly that you chose him as a father to your child, same as those older men you are talking about, and you chose badly.

It's not that they aren't expected to, at all. Its that biology means the entire thing is skewed and biased from the start. And you can't make them,

HonkyWonkWoman · 09/01/2018 10:15

I have heard this same scenario many times. Girl gets pregnant and has to give up education to care for baby! Boy, free as a bird! It's how it is!
Not a lot you can do about it really as long as he financially helps.
Women are always left holding the baby.

undertheradarplease · 09/01/2018 10:16

It happened to me OP. The only difference is that he never came back and hasn't paid a penny towards the cost of raising her. I don't care about the money, I don't want anything from him.

I do, however, sometimes get a little bitter about the fact that my careeer still hasn't gotten off the ground. I've sacrificed a lot for motherhood and although I love my child dearly, it pains me that I'm yet to reach my potential on a professional level.

You are not alone Flowers

toomuchtooold · 09/01/2018 10:29

This is why I've always kind of (naively) wondered why people seem more focused on the implications of unplanned pregnancy for the woman rather than the man, particularly if they're young. Always seemed to me that as a girl you at least have the choice about whether to continue with the pregnancy or not, whereas the boy has basically no say (beyond having consented to sex) in whether or not they become a father. And yet my impression is that girls take more care about contraception. It only makes sense if people are basically carrying around the assumption that if a boy gets a girl pregnant unintentionally, he can always walk away.

Voiceforreason · 09/01/2018 10:31

This is exactly why mothers of an older generation warned their daughters off sex before marriage. Also families wanted to vet perspective sons-in-law. They knew if things go wrong it is the woman who is almost certainly left holding the baby. I think fathers are far more involved with their children than ever they were.

Starlighter · 09/01/2018 10:34

What DrMartha said ^^

The implications are always greater for the woman. If men were the ones who carried the baby, it would be the other way around. Simple biology.

I’m glad to hear he’s around now. Hopefully he’ll make up for the time he’s missed and you can move forward.

WaggyMama · 09/01/2018 10:35

I had to sacrifice so much

You didn't have to you. You made the choice. You chose him as a partner/ to enter into a sexual relationship with him/ not sort your contraception out properly/ keep the child.

He actually made the right choices: to make education his priority.

And I know it's wrong, and everyone will shout that he made his choice when he had sex, and yes I agree, but it doesn't work like that so that is the situation.

motherfiver · 09/01/2018 10:37

Did he promise from pregnancy that he was going to be actively involved and wanted the baby? Or did he make it clear he didn't want that responsibility so young?
If he messed you and your child around you are right to be annoyed but if he didn't want the child then he has no real responsibility just as women have the right to have a termination

Pollylockets · 09/01/2018 10:47

Did he promise from pregnancy that he was going to be actively involved and wanted the baby? Or did he make it clear he didn't want that responsibility so young?
If he messed you and your child around you are right to be annoyed but if he didn't want the child then he has no real responsibility just as women have the right to have a termination

I have to agree with Polly here. He would have had 0 say in any termination plans, women get to call all the shots here. You decided to go ahead with the pregnancy so naturally, if you knew who wasn't going to step up/support you, it's on your head

Although, if he did talk bollocks about supporting you both from the word go and encouraged you to go ahead/said he'd be there, then morally he's extremely in the wrong there and that isn't fair

Pollylockets · 09/01/2018 10:48

Sorry, motherfiver, not Polly Blush

FluffyWuffy100 · 09/01/2018 10:49

I think unfortunately - because women (rightly) have the 'final say so' on keeping the baby or not... and they carry it and give birth to it.... men will always be able to fuck off and abdicate their responsibilities (in money and time).

Lovemusic33 · 09/01/2018 10:49

Mixed feelings about this one.

In a way I think he made a the right choice to carry on with his education, yes he should have made more effort to help out at the weekends but going to uni is going to beniffit him and your child in the long run, chances are your child wouldn’t have missed having a father for the first couple years, although I agree that it’s unfair that you were left to deal with raising a child alone. Hopefully now he has finished uni he can support his child more and help out more, he’s probably grown up a lot since the child was born and is ready to take more responsibility?

17/18 is very young to have a baby and to chuck away your education could be really damaging in the long run.

Yes, lots of people are in a similar situation, in 36 and my dc’s father doesn’t have much input in their lives, he sees them for a few hours a week, takes them for a Mcdonals and brings them home, he doesn’t get involved with school stuff, hospital appointments (both dc’s have ASD) or any of the boring stuff I have to deal with, I feel like I parent alone and he just baby sits for a few hours a week. It is unfair but I have excepted that this is the way things are.

LushBlitzer · 09/01/2018 10:55

If it helps to cheer you up, I know a couple that did the opposite. Girl got pregnant at 17. She has aspirations to become a professional, so the guy dropped out of college and got a job to support them, whilst she went on to finish college and now has a great carer. Still together 10+ years later.
Most of the time at that age, at least one of the parent has to make some kind of sacrifice to look after the new baby. I don't see how it's helpful to put two people's education/careers on hold just to be 'fair'. Up to the couple to decide who takes the step back - but surely it makes more financial sense to for it to be the lower income of the two?

PeacefulBlessing · 09/01/2018 10:56

Society allows it.

Having been 'abandoned' by two men I was in committed relationships with and becoming a single parent twice. And with one of them never having even laid eyes on his child or contributed a penny and the other telling me how he can't have his daughter more often then two nights a month because he has a stressful job; a 45 min each way commute; a cold; a social life to think of and being held entirely resposible for the situation by society...

I sincerely hope that my children never have children.

But, if I'm honest, had I become pregnant at 17, I wouldn't have continued with it. I'd also have prioritised my education.

user1466690252 · 09/01/2018 10:57

my ex husband got up and left when ds was 2 weeks old. he had an affair and movee away with her. ds is 7, he has had no contact since. I am remarried, more children, and dh is an incredible father to all the children ds included.
It is hugely unfair that exh can stroll back into ds life if he wants to, and drop a bomb in our lovely, stable life we have created. but what can I do, we have always been honest with ds in an age appropriate way. bur yes, it is so so unfair

CuriousaboutSamphire · 09/01/2018 10:58

It is one of those thing that biology makes imperative and society doesn't see as repugnant enough to act more strongly (yet)!

But women do have choices and no 17 year old MUST have a baby. We all make choices and every woman has the utmost right to make the choice that is right for her.

Just as every man has the right to react to that choice as he will... whether that makes him a twat or not!

So, it may be unfair, but lots of other things are too!

For every woman left holding the baby there is a man left responsible, having (rightly) had no final choice about a possible abortion (obviously not speaking strictly accurately, numerically!).

thecatsthecats · 09/01/2018 11:01

Both taking a year out to look after the baby seems like almost a pipe-dream. I mean, most people couldn't dream of both affording a year out to look after their child.

Could you not have gone with him, and done your year out in his university town? That would seem more logical than him constantly interrupting his studies.

I'm not saying his needs were greater than yours, but ultimately you both made choices that determined the outcome - keeping the baby, contraception, education, what could be afforded, career choices. And both of you had to live with the outcome of the other's choices too. It's not fair, but it is what it is as a situation two people fairly naively got themselves into.

I would lay a heavy bet on his parents saying he HAD to go to university.

dadshere · 09/01/2018 11:05

It is unfair. Life is unfair. In the end we have to take responsibility because it happens to OUR bodies. If men could conceive it would be different, but they can't so it is not. You made the decision to have a baby- you have to live with that decision.

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