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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

My partner is quitting his job. Does this make me a bad mum?

88 replies

Isitevapornot · 20/01/2021 19:13

I’m a working mum and make most of our income. We’ve just set up a new business, and it’s taking to a lot of time. My partner is going to be quitting his job to take on childcare (something he really wants to do as he hates his job). But I’m worried him doing the childcare makes me a crappy mum.

Thoughts?

OP posts:
BackforGood · 20/01/2021 20:44

What? Just what? This is such as awful question op, that I actually hope you're joking. How on earth would this make you a bad mother? Does that mean every father in the role reversal is a shit father then?

This ^

@JakeChambers - you can change your vote, by clicking on the one you intended to vote for - it doesn't have to stay forever Smile

Calmandmeasured1 · 20/01/2021 20:45

Who in heck voted YABU

I presume someone who thinks the OP is being unreasonable to think herself a crappy mum

Yes, I voted that OP is unreasonable to think she is a crappy mum. There is nothing wrong at all with her husband parenting their child. No-one questions it when a mother is a SAHP. Do they assume the father is a crappy parent? They might realise he has less time to spend with the children so I assume the mum will probably also have less time to spend with children. That doesn't automatically make someone a crappy parent.

Hardbackwriter · 20/01/2021 20:46

I didn't think you were criticising working mothers, @AnotherEmma - I think it's very clear you're not - but I do think that a response of 'how can you be stupid enough to think this' isn't actually very kind or helpful. OP thinks this because she's spent her whole life in a society that conditions women to think this, telling her that she should just shrug that off and that it's ridiculous to have those feelings isn't that useful.

beantrader · 20/01/2021 20:46

You need to de-internalise this frankly dumb and ridiculous idea that mothers are the better parent, or the 'correct' parent

Frazzled2207 · 20/01/2021 20:47

eh? My husband is quitting his job too. I expect to go back to work and he is going to be a SAHD. It hadn't occured me that that made me a shit mum.

AnotherEmma · 20/01/2021 20:48

@Hardbackwriter

I didn't think you were criticising working mothers, *@AnotherEmma* - I think it's very clear you're not - but I do think that a response of 'how can you be stupid enough to think this' isn't actually very kind or helpful. OP thinks this because she's spent her whole life in a society that conditions women to think this, telling her that she should just shrug that off and that it's ridiculous to have those feelings isn't that useful.
Where did I say stupid? Where?
Hardbackwriter · 20/01/2021 20:50

I remember sitting and crying at home after the entire rest of my antenatal group did sad faces at me about the fact I was going back to work while DH stayed at home, asked me how I could bear to be away from DS and said over and over how they 'just couldn't do it'. I look back and roll my eyes at them but I think sobbing me needed a hug and a gentle reminder of how ridiculous they were being, not to be told that I was stupid that it upset me and made me feel guilty.

AnotherEmma · 20/01/2021 20:50

And it is ridiculous. Women need to think about, evaluate and question the expectations that are placed on them, rather than just blindly accepting them. It makes me despair tbh. We are never going to advance the feminist cause if we keep legitimising these ridiculous arguments. It's not a conversation we should even be having but sadly we are Sad Angry

SarahAndQuack · 20/01/2021 20:50

I get why the OP has this worry.

I also think it can be affirming to have people say you shouldn't give headspace to misogynistic claptrap.

FWIW OP, my DP is the birth mum of our DD and she went back to work when DD was six months old and she has been a fantastic mother.

Labobo · 20/01/2021 20:51

YABU to think you are a bad mother.
Is it bad of you to provide a secure home? Clothes? Food? Heat and Light?
Is it bad of you to support your partner to leave a job he hates so he can care for his own child full time?
Is it bad of the millions of other parents who go out to work and support their partners so that one loving parent cares for the child instead of putting them in childcare?

One of the happiest families I know had a very successful breadwinning mum and a stay at home dad. The children adore their mother. It's clear she adores them too.

thenewduchessofhastings · 20/01/2021 20:51

Spin it the other way around.

Would anyone question your partner?

pollylocketpickedapocket · 20/01/2021 20:51

@SemperIdem

You are being unreasonable to think like that. However I do understand why.

Societal expectations around women being the main care givers are so deeply ingrained. It doesn’t bother all women but it does, or would, bother a great many, for their male partner to do more of the child rearing than them.

It’s not fair and it’s internalised misogyny that makes us feel this way. Your feelings are your feelings but look at them objectively alongside the facts.

I disagree. Each to their own but it’s not internalised misogyny that makes me want to be at home with my child, I want to be there for her. For what it’s worth I work part time, self employed, and am able to drop work at a moments notice if my dd needs me. I planned it this way, I grew up at a childminders every day and absolutely hated it.
AnotherEmma · 20/01/2021 20:52

"not to be told that I was stupid that it upset me and made me feel guilty."

Did OP say she was upset?
No
Did I tell her she was stupid for being upset?
Also no

Takemetothebar · 20/01/2021 20:53

@Hardbackwriter and @AnotherEmma

It was me who said it was stupid I think. And I do think that. It’s so illogical and daft; take a look at yourself. WHY would you think that?

And if it’s society as OP says, then how do you think we stop this relentless march, or rather, how do we stop these sterotypes? We start by not buying into them!!!

Go to work, have him stay at home, whatever you want. Just don’t play into the hands of the patriarchy by buying into the bullshit. It smacks of faux doe eyed fishing to me, I’m afraid. Surely you know that whether it’s you or your husband staying at home has nothing to do with whether your a bad mum? Surely?

Hardbackwriter · 20/01/2021 20:53

Sorry, you said stupid not ridiculous but I don't think that's a huge difference and you did explicitly say that OP was being ridiculous (the use of 'FFS' also wasn't particularly supportive or sympathetic!) - I wouldn't have reacted in the same way if you'd said she'd absorbed a ridiculous message. Also it wasn't just your post (and sorry that I singled you out as if it were) - there's a lot of incredulous posts on this thread as if OP had somehow invented this idea herself.

DenisetheMenace · 20/01/2021 20:56

He’s with his dad, what’s the problem.
You must each play to your strengths in a partnership and if yours is business acumen, makes perfect sense.
You’re brave setting up in business now, wish you all the best.

AnotherEmma · 20/01/2021 20:57

"I also think it can be affirming to have people say you shouldn't give headspace to misogynistic claptrap."

This.

OP didn't ask for emotional support. She posted in AIBU, she ended her post with "Thoughts?"

My thoughts are that the notion of a working mother being a bad one are RIDICULOUS.

But now I've got another woman telling me to "be kind" because of course it's much better for women to be kind and not opinionated, isn't it?!

(In fact I am both, sometimes more one than the other!)

Takemetothebar · 20/01/2021 20:58

You and I are in the same
Place on this @AnotherEmma I think.

@Hardbackwriter

I don’t think the OP invented this. I don’t think OP is stupid. I think this is a stupid question- like many others on AIBU. Surely the OP must know it’s bollocks? If the OP had posted in chat and said she needed reassurance about it as she felt nervous I would have posted a different reply.

SarahAndQuack · 20/01/2021 20:58

I disagree. Each to their own but it’s not internalised misogyny that makes me want to be at home with my child, I want to be there for her.

I don't think that was the point? I also like being at home with my child. Lots of people do.

Internalised misogyny is the bit that makes women think they're bad if they don't stay home, surely?

AnotherEmma · 20/01/2021 20:59

@Takemetothebar

You and I are in the same Place on this *@AnotherEmma* I think.

@Hardbackwriter

I don’t think the OP invented this. I don’t think OP is stupid. I think this is a stupid question- like many others on AIBU. Surely the OP must know it’s bollocks? If the OP had posted in chat and said she needed reassurance about it as she felt nervous I would have posted a different reply.

Exactly this
lazyarse123 · 20/01/2021 21:01

@toconclude

Who in heck voted YABU?
I voted op isbu to think that she's a crap mum.
Takemetothebar · 20/01/2021 21:02

I just think in general that if we stopped rolling over and bowing to other people’s irrelevant opinions, we would all be better off. Particularly when it’s a perceived opinion, not even something someone has said personally!
I am not for a minute saying that it’s women’s fault that society sometimes has these concepts, but it would help if we stopped perpetuating it. Same as I think it’s not women’s fault that some parts of society think they can’t be good mechanics; but I do think every woman who plays into the daffy “where’s the dipstick, how do I fuel my own car?” Claptrap makes it worse.

WishingHopingThinkingPraying · 20/01/2021 21:04

OP, you're not helping women with this opinion. It's not good.

BubblyBarbara · 20/01/2021 21:12

On the flip side, while I admire OP, I hope she is going to pull her weight when she gets home as well because being at work all day is certainly easier than raising children full time.

katy1213 · 20/01/2021 21:14

I'd be more worried that your husband isn't pulling his weight.