To think it must be nice being the dad of a breastfed newborn

[CocoDeMoll]

Because a bit like other relatives you can always hand them back and defer back to the mum ‘because he’s rooting again’!

Dh doesn’t have to wake up at all in the night and the buck never stops with him. It seems a cushy role to me .

I agree OP!

3 Bf babies and he's never had to do a night feed

If you are on maternity leave, you can sleep during the day

Well... DD1 would only sleep if she was pushed in the pram, so quite tricky to sleep while pushing her round the streets. I maybe managed a couple of daytime sleeps a week so wasn’t all bad.
When I had DD2 I also had 19 month old DD1 at home, who didn’t nap. Probably a bit irresponsible to sleep while looking after a toddler.
Luckily DH recognised that I wouldn’t be able to function with no sleep and was more than happy to help out at nights.

In the night when DD woke, he would get up and change her, then hand her to me to feed. So he definitely didn't have a free ride.

Im planning on Breastfeeding but my DH will be doing all the housework and nappy changes etc in return so I'd say ive got the good deal not him

OneShitNight and ThunderCatShooo.

Can't believe no one else here has worked out that this is the way forward. And that all the nappies, baths, settling, and other baby related crap that can and should be delegated actually takes much longer and is (literally) the shittier job!

The upside is you can sit down and watch TV or something while DH does everything else. I have older children so DH doesn't get a moment to himself while I have an excuse (feeding baby) to sit down and relax.

Probably a bit irresponsible to sleep while looking after a toddler.
mine survived just fine, and 2 years old is a good age to start nursery!

mine survived just fine, and 2 years old is a good age to start nursery!

As I said, she was 19 months. She did start nursery at 2, at which point DD2 was no longer a newborn and I was no longer so exhausted.
Lucky you that your toddler left you alone to sleep! Mine never did. She may have given me 10 mins peace at that age, but that was it.
Anyway, my point is that maybe you were able to sleep when your baby was sleeping, but I wasn’t. I’m not lying about that, why would I?
And my second point is that my DH was happy to help at night times. He’s kind like that, and wanted to be helpful as he didn’t get chance to do much for his children during the day.

My dh is a very light sleeper so he'd wake up when ds did, while I stayed sleeping. Dh would bring ds to me to be fed (sometimes without even waking me).

My baby is EBF and I don’t see the point in us both being awake through the night so I do the feeds and nappy changes. DH supports me in this though and takes LO in the morning so I can sleep, takes LO at weekends so I can sleep. In the very early days he would watch me as I fed lying down and dozed.

He works full time and does all bedtime stuff & all weekend mornings - so in a way he’s not getting a break either, just in different ways.

I think the main thing is for everyone to feel happy with the arrangement and for everyone to get an amount of sleep that lets them manage what they need to do. I have the luxury of choosing a lazier day if sleep is very bad - DH doesn’t.

its not just about sleeping though, is it?
I had 4 kids, and not the best sleepers in the world. Even if you are not asleep, you can slob most of the day in your pyjamas, take the kids to the park and the day is done.
Being back at work shows you how different it is to have to be ready, fully awake and on the ball.

It's a million times easier to be sleep deprived at home with not much to do than at work on a busy schedule. Ideally, no one would be sleep deprived, but not everyone can afford nannies

Well like I said ikeepaforkinmypurse, DH was happy to help. If he wasn’t, I’m sure we’d have had other arrangements. I didn’t have a gun to his head . Like I said, he’s kind like that. My babies cluster fed from around 6-10pm so as he was at work until 6.30pm ish he didn’t get to help much with them during the day. Therefore he liked to help during the night. Not sure what’s so controversial about that?

I don’t think I’d swap - my dds loved bf, it made them so happy. I didnt especially love it, but I did see that they did want me more than dh and I got more cuddles. I’d say not being able to bf is the crappier end of the deal.

And I’m currently pregnant with DC3 so obviously he didn’t hate it too much!

No controversy, my own DH is pretty hand on, and we're a 50/50 couple.

My point was only that it's unreasonable to expect someone to work AND do the night shift whilst their partner is staying home. Unless you both work full time (or both part-time), it's unreasonable to split night shift.

And I think it entirely depends on individual circumstances. If a woman is on her knees with exhaustion and her partner has been enjoying uninterrupted sleep, it’s reasonable in my opinion to expect them to help out at night for a while. A few nights of interrupted sleep isn’t going to stop most people from being able to do their job (I managed to work full time in a professional job for years with severe insomnia). Whoever is at home with the baby needs some sleep as well. Luckily DH agrees with me and it worked out well for us!

Absolutely laughing at the whole 'you can nap in the day' thing. I had 3 under 5 , the eldest was at preschool 15 hours a week for the first 7 or so months and the youngest two with me 24/7...no naps in the day lol. I have bf and then ff and still did all the night feeds and tbh 95% of all feeds. I just liked doing them. When I had the youngest dh would help by taking the two older ones down in the mornings at weekends whilst I stayed in bed with baby for a couple of hours. He also does plenty nappy changes. And yes, I did think dhs sleep was more important. I couldn't laze around the house doing nothing with three young children but if I was extremely tired I could at least stay in my PJs and do the minimum (if I didn't have preschool run that day). Dh has a physical job and needed the sleep more IMO. Also, people can say what they want and I'm in no way excusing the men that don't pull their weight but women do cope better in general with the lack of sleep and night feeds. It primal and something that is just natural tbh

My ds is bf, and I'm literally feeding him now to get out of doing the washing up. Seriously though, I know my dh finds it hard sometimes not being able to take over the feeds, and he really does do literally everything else. I think for the first six weeks I definitely had the harder job, but now I have it easy compared to him!

I also want to add that now the children are 5, 3&1 its genuinely much harder. The youngest is into everything, I have school run everyday with the odd afternoon preschool run thrown in the mix. Younger two are so full of energy days in watching TV or whatever are in no way an option. I've had a baby that was a terrible sleeper and had reflux so I've not just had 'easy babies' and I will definitely say that the baby part is the easy part. It all lovely but of course.some stages are harder than others, especially when dealing with a few.of those stages all at once

My babies have both been mix fed, but DD only had the one bottle a day. I think DH would rather sit and feed her a bottle than have to deal with the toddler, and cook dinner and do washing and other stuff like that.