To get cross every time I see a woman say her husband doesn't do any night feeds because "he works"?

[TeenTitans]

I'm in a few mum groups online and I keep seeing this and it's driving me mad. Women who's husband's never do any night feeds because they work and women who think that's perfectly okay. Erm do you not think looking after the kids all day is work? My response is always "so do you!" when I see it. My partner has always helped with the nights because they're his kids as well and it's just as much his job as mine.

I'm not complaining about couples divvying up the work as they wish but the justification. YOU ALSO WORK.

I'm.with you OP. My dh is a cardiac surgeon. So needs his wits about him obviously. He choose that career path, but he also choose to have 4 kids and I'll be dammed if I was the one doing everything. I had 4 sections and moses basket always went on his side of the bed. He would give me the baby, I would feed and go back to sleep. He would do nappy and settle baby. This was the early days. Life is lovely with 1 baby but 4 kids later and it's every man for himself.

Nothing about my dh is more special or deserving than me. When we are both home we are both 50% responsible for the care of your kids. And with 4 someone always seems to need something in the night so we need 2. I'm a nurse and when I was back at work doing 13hr shifts and expressing etc on the ward, I genuinely came home more tired than him at times. Saying that when he is on call, he can be in his nights sleep, get a phone call and be scrubbed in within the hour so he is use to broken sleep.

@TeenTitans and for that you are right, but you are BU expecting everyone to be in a position to do 50/50 night feeds. There is no one route to equality, yes I'm sure there are lots of men and women leaning on old stereotypes on this matter with little thought, but many others have made informed logical decisions based on their own circumstances that may or may not result in 50/50 night feeding. Making sweeping judgements like you are isn't encouraging healthy debate challenging the status quo, it's loaded with ignorance and judgment that gets people's backs up and won't help the cause! It just causes us all to turn on each other rather than challenging what needs to be challenged!

Dh is an air traffic controller.

If he's got a long drive then that's fair enough and i understand that. But simply working isn't enough of a justification to never do nights. We do shifts usually. I sleep from 10pm until 5am. He sleeps from 4.30am until 10am. He works evenings so this worked for us when the kids were networks, we both got good night's sleep.

Great that worked for you now let others do what works for them.

Why should mothers be expected to do 24 hour shifts back to back to back but men do say 8 hours?

they are not.
they chose to breast feed for a start (you can share bottle feeding, breast feeding you really cannot).
they could go back to work and share childcare 50/50.
You cannot compare a full time job and staying home with a baby. You can doze during the day at home.

Would you be happy to know your surgeon, pilot (male or female) has been up all night with a baby? I really wouldn't.

YANBU, I get wound up too.

Of course, if you’re married to a surgeon or HGV driver or air traffic controller, it’s pretty crucial that they get a good amount of sleep. (obviously there are other jobs where this is important too)

However, the idea that it’s more important for DH to be alert in charge of building a website than it was for me to be alert in charge of two babies is rather ludicrous.

To be fair, my experience is different from many - we had twins, one with quite severe health issues, and they’re both now diagnosed with ASD on top of the rest. I couldn’t bf and was pumping bloody constantly, day and night. There was no “sleep when baby sleeps” since I can count on one hand the number of times they slept at the same time, day or night, until they were 15 months old. Never happened.

If DH hadn’t been helping with night feeds as needed, I’d honestly have been in a hospital or committed. I was beyond exhausted, I couldn’t function, at the worst points I couldn’t look after them let alone myself, when they did sleep I had 8 million things that had to be done and I was a complete wreck.

Honestly, even now they’re 2.5, going to work(which I do very part time) is like a spa break compared to taking care of them both. DH has been on annual leave for a fortnight and I’ve been really ill with an infection in my lungs so he’s been picking up my slack - he’s looking forward to a rest when he goes back!

Very well said optimistic pessimistic! X

fed I wasn't saying that everyone who does it this way has just played into old fashioned ideas, and I'm sorry if it sounded like I was. I was questioning why it seems to be the default.

YABU. Husband is a dentist, I was EBF and both babies refused bottle. Where is the sense in him getting up in the night? Pretty sure most people would prefer that their dentist has had a good night's sleep when they are on the receiving end of a drill. How about everyone work out what is right for them?

He sleeps from 4.30am until 10am.
I can't. I am female, and no way could I function with so little sleep. I wouldn't even take my kids in my car, let alone go to work.

YABU - I used to work in an office as many hours as my husband and when it came to night feeds (we have twins) I said I would do them and I still stand by my decision. Yes being a mum is the hardest work I have ever done - especially because I have twins and my son didn't sleep through the night until he was 4.5years old...but I don't need my full wits about me to wash bottles and clean bums - however from my office working experience I did need my wits about me to drive, to talk to humans, to make decisions etc etc.

LaCasta but you do all the night feeds? So how does that make sense?

TeenTitans
I did all night feeds when I was on maternity leave.It made sense because I didn't have to function during the day. It made sense because I am the one who didn't have to go to work.

If we had been both working full time, it would have been different, but I was at home. I probably would have got a night nanny if I had had to go back to work after a couple of months!

I do all the night feeds, I’m BF but I think this would be the case if I was bottle feeding too. Because DH has to go to work.

However, if the baby is screaming and fussing DH will take a stint of a few hours too to let me sleep. Last night, 5yo DS threw up three times and DH cleared up each one, as I might be up again later with the baby. It isn’t as straight forward as saying as I do all the night feeds.

You cannot compare a full time job and staying home with a baby. You can doze during the day at home.

Are you fucking kidding me? If you have kids, you certainly have had a very different experience to me.

I can't. I am female, and no way could I function with so little sleep. I wouldn't even take my kids in my car, let alone go to work.

Are you saying you get more than 5.5 hours unbroken sleep with young kids?

I suppose it depends what you do with the kids in the day too. I can't do nothing all day

I honestly think the variables here are too great to say what should and shouldn't be done. Easy baby on their own who is a good sleeper v difficult baby who doesn't sleep when you have other kids. You can't really compare the two. I currently have the former (which I'm sure will change any day!) so we can lounge around in bed in mornings unless we have a baby class or something, we can nap during day, I get plenty of sleep overnight, etc. If I had the latter, then I would need a lot more support from DP in terms of overnight and he would need to pitch in. As it is, it's pointless at the moment and would probably just be more annoying as we have our little routine worked out now and it works well for the time being.

DD is so little though that it will change and there most likely will be a time when I will need his help overnight.

In terms of doing a fair share, I don't think that has to be 50% of each specific task. DP does all the housework pretty much, I do all the night wakings, we tend to split cooking fairly evenly, I do most of the nappy changes but he does laundry more often... overall it's pretty equal but we don't boil down every single task to 50/50.

I work and DH stays at home to look after the baby.
He does all of the night feedings.

Is this still unfair? Or would it only be unfair if it was the woman at home?

YABU. That's the very definition of maternity leave. It's a combination of being up through the night, and being able to nap in the day.

Yes, I think it’s still unfair. Do you work 7 days a week? He does all the night feeds even on weekends / your days off? Unless there’s some giant drip feed there I think that’s really unfair regardless of sex. I’d never expect my DH to do all the night stuff.

I do most of the night wakings. I (usually) get to stay in bed an hour and a half after DH gets up in the morning, and then I have an option of a nap later. DS slept through till 6 this morning (amazing), he usually only wakes up once a night, but can be up to 4 times on a bad night. On those nights, DH takes the early morning stuff...

When DS was tiny, I'd get DH to do the early morning stuff (from 5 onwards) so I could get a couple of hours of sleep, plus I'd sleep in the evening from after dinner until DH went to bed.

My job at the moment is being on mat leave. Unfortunately, that job is a 24/7 one. It's not like DH gets an uninterrupted 8 hours because he wakes every time the baby does. At the weekend, I still tend to do the night stuff, but then he gets up early and I get a lie in.

Being knackered at work is totally different to being knackered at home with a baby. Even when I couldn't nap because he'd only sleep in my arms.

If one of you works at a job where they need to perform like they're awake and fresh, and one of you doesn't have to change out of their pyjamas before 5pm if you don't want to, let alone get sacked for messing up, then yes you prioritize sleep for the breadwinner.

Obvious really, and it has nothing to do with what sex either of you is.

I don't know why you're getting so angry about this OP, in the nicest possible way, it's none of your business unless someone directly has asked you for advice.

To replicate what many have already said, I've am currently the sahm doing 99% of nighttime feeds. I've also done a similar job my dh prekids and know that if you're not on your game most of the time you just get let go, it's a well paid but ruthless industry. You can get away with the odd day here and there below par but people are let go if they're not delivering, there's no loyalty or allowances made because you've had a baby (or even seriously ill etc).

If you're in a single earning household then the one earning has to do their bit, and keep their job, get pay rises and promotions. I'm not saying they should never lift a finger but it shouldn't be at the expense of their career.

Maybe it helps that I've done dhs job so I know what it's like so I don't expect him to do it when chronically sleep deprived. I don't resent it, we are a team with our respective roles and I'd be irritated if someone like the op came along and told me that I was a door mat or oppressed because of the arrangement my family has, which happens to work perfectly well for us.

I mostly agree OP. I wouldn’t expect DH to do all of the night feeds but when I’m too tired he is more than happy to step in. Sometimes staying up from 4am and going into work. At weekends I will lie in while he gets up with the baby.

DD mostly wants me during the night as I BF and i do usually get the opportunity to nap during the day so I wouldn’t want DH up every few hours but he will help when he can. He never gets 8 hours sleep in a row.

Some of the NCT Mums talked about sleeping on the nursery floor so they don’t wake up their husbands- absolutely crazy!

I know I’ve come to this late, but wtaf?

My dh worked 50/60 hours a week when I was at home with our babies just so I wouldn’t have to work. He left 5/6am and returned late in the evening 6 days a week. Seeing as I could sleep in, not worry about having to be somewhere, and do all the household chores slowly as and when I wanted, the least I could do is let him sleep and feed the babies with my breasts.