Pandemic dad having eyes opened

[AwakeAwake]

Men get paternity leave for first 2 weeks or month if lucky.
Babies usually just sleep and feed that first week or two.
Therefore men are getting a false sense of what it is to parent small baby.

My husband has never spent much time with tiny child until now working from home and new arrival in the house.
Previous children he's just been off a week, held a sleepy newborn and back to work when the real excitement kicks off.

Aibu to think that pandemic parents are getting a taste finally of how bloody challenging a baby is?
No longer can they escape to work for 12hrs and come home asking what you did all day. No longer can they pretend they don't see how hard a toddler is running riot I'm the house.

The washing, cleaning, nappies, activities, screaming, tantrums etc. All laid bare at last.

My husband genuinely looked surprised that a toddler has tantrums as he didn't see it with first, potty training doesn't just magically occur, food splatters everywhere and must be cleaned up. These are all new to him.

Paternity leave should be month 2.

I agree with you @AwakeAwake.

I think this coming from the fact they rarely are fully responsible of said baby or toddler ON THEIR OWN.
And by that, I don’t mean a couple of hours. But more like a full day or two when they need to look after the child but ALSO look after the house etc…
Usually when they ‘step up’ and get involved, they do one or the one. Thé do hw or look after thé child. But they don’t do BOTH.
They certainly don’t do the thinking about strategies, the planning ahead etc…

That’s the reason why I like what they do in Scandinavian countries. Mum takes a year off and THEN dad takes a year off looking after the toddler. It’s forcing them into a position where they have to take full responsibilty rather than paying lip service to it ‘because they are working you know’ (let’s forget that mother’s still do all that even when they are working full time too…)

@Ritasueandbobtoo9

I think some men just don’t see stuff. My husband has been vaguely treating my job like some easy life job for many years - because I am quite good about knocking off work at the end of the day. I manage a health service team now and he has totally changed his tune since I have worked from home. It’s all “you don’t get paid enough for what you do..,”

I like my job so it's seen as easier as I don't stamp around talking loudly and declaring "I need a meeting...so much to do.... busy busy". I just fucking do it.

@karmakameleon

People saying ‘surely he say how hard it is at weekends?’

Posted too soon. Weekends are only a few hours. It’s nothing compared to the drudgery of 24/7 that many mums do. And it’s shared. During the week dads just disappear to work. Very few mums disappear for 12 hours a day in a weekend.

Mums and dads can take shared parental leave and split it however they like. There are obviously lots of problems in the system i.e. men generally being in the higher paid jobs, that make it impractical for some people to take full advantage of this.

But if you have a father who actually wants to parent (and why would you have a child with someone who doesn't?), and you prioritise that, then you can work it so that they have more time at home.

It sounds like you/ your husband didn't take advantage of that for some reason but it's not the case that men can't have any time off.

You sound stressed @AwakeAwake, maybe you're finding parenting harder than others do? Some of the things you're moaning about not all of us will be able to relate to - not all babies feed all day, not all toddlers charge around all the time, not all dads pretend they don't know what's going on...

@karmakameleon

I think that posters who are saying you have a DH problem are being a bit naive. It’s well researched that men do not share responsibility for their children 50:50 even when both parents are working. If they genuinely saw how difficult it is, surely they’d step up and do more? Either that or the vast majority are just lazy misogynists, but I’d rather hope that’s not the case as it’s too depressing.

For us, DH took a year out when I was on maternity leave with DC2 and it really opened his eyes. I think on a logical level he understood sleepless nights and tiredness, and babies are full on all day. But it’s different seeing it in action.

Also before children, we both held senior professional jobs and they were very stressful with long hours, a lot of responsibility and difficult decisions to be made. He couldn’t imagine how looking after one small child could be more difficult or all consuming than work. But at the end of that year off he knew that he definitely didn’t want me to go back to work first and leave him with a baby and a toddler. Before that year, he thought (like many men) that he’d make a great SAHD and he’d really enjoy it.

Yes mine declared how lovely it must be for me pottering about the house and going to lovely places when I had just one. Weird he never took them places to leisurely potter.

But if you have a father who actually wants to parent (and why would you have a child with someone who doesn't?), and you prioritise that, then you can work it so that they have more time at home.

The vast majority of UK fathers must be completely disinterested in parenting then as a tiny minority actually share parental leave.

I think what people are not grasping is that these DH's might get some of it - but they don't understand (until they are at home for long periods rather than just weekends) is the unrelenting nature of it all.

It is not just a Saturday and Sunday (generally with 2 of you) juggling everything. It is Every. Hour. of Every. Day.

And OP - it does get easier.

I went back at two weeks (am female) - yes weeks not months - so we had it pretty equally and in school holidays ( he not I is the teacher) although we had a full time daily nanny he was certainly around and about at home and doing lots of child stuff so in our case the issues on the thread did not apply. However that does not mean it is not a good topic.

@Brefugee

I'm in Germany. We can split parental leave how it best suits us. In my case it was 3 years and DH took the last 18 months. With a 3 and a 1.5 year old.

That is what the UK needs. Proper parental leave.

You can split parental leave in the UK.

I did it because I was on SMP and my DP got enhanced parental leave pay from his employer so it made financial sense. A few other men working for DP's employer have done it for the same reason.

However in most cases it doesn't make financial sense but many employers allow you to work with flexibility which is more and more common.

One of my own brothers arranged his working hours so his wife could work nights. Their kids are in their 20s and his wife had 3 months maternity leave with each. My brother had to be back by 4pm so he could take over.

A friend of mine did shared parental leave 9 years ago with his eldest daughter for the same reason. He changed employers by the time his second child was born but had flexible working so arranged his work around looking after his child.

Another friend of mine couldn't do shared parental leave as he has a US employer. However as he works remotely anyway he arranged his work to fit around his children. He was recently the one potty training his youngest.

The crux of the matter is the men not caring for their young children on their own just don't want to.

huh?

all that you describe as total surprise is well-known to hands-on fathers because kids don't contain their behaviour to 9-5 on weekdays.

YABVU to think most men have no clue.

Ti be fair @karmakameleon, I think it’s not helped by WOMEN who buy into the ‘he is working so hard, he needs his full night of sleep’ or ‘I’m at home so it’s my job to look after the bay, get up at night and do all the he because I’m at home all day’.

How many women on MN would never contemplate asking their DH to do half of the night waking? Women who say they go out for the afternoon but not befire they’ve prepared everything for their DH to make it easier ‘because they know where everything is’. Women who always take the dcs to all their GP/HV/consultant appointment?
Who have read books on potty training, ask other parent us etc… whilst never expecting the dad to do any of that.

I know that I left my two dcs every other weekend with DH from when Dc2 was 2yo. I was training and this is when training happened. He found it extremely hard. Yes it taught him to respect all the work that comes with loking after two young children. But he was also resentful of the energy and the space and the stress associated with it. As if, somehow, he had never signed up for that…. If you had asked him, he would have said that it’s normal for a afther to be involved like this. And from the outside, he looked like the perfect father taking his dcs out all on his own for the day, cleaning the house etc….
In reality he still did nowhere near half of the work involved with raising a child.

All the women complaining about their 'useless, haha' DH's on this thread, why an earth have multiple children with them? Not being goady I just genuinely dont understand.

I'm not saying my DH is an equal in parenting to be smug, it is to explain that it truly isnt all men and you dont need to put up with it.

DH gets 3 months paid paternity leave - more & more companies offering similar so no escape! 🤣

OP I get you! I don't think you needed half the dh bashing as you got. I've not read the full thread. My dh has been off sick for months while ive worked but I am so glad he has felt and seen ehat it actually takes to run a house and not just go off to work, the washing up never ends etc and yes I do think they miss the true extent of looking after a baby 24/7

"My husband doesn't know how babies work. I think I'll have 3 of them with him"

Yes exactly, how weird. Also pretty sure women can usually manage to find some sort of work/life balance, it's always the men that have the super important jobs and projects that can't. It's sad it took him being around his children and not listening to you to see that, how sad.

@karmakameleon unfortunately I think they are lazy misogynists if they refuse to care for their young children on their own at all and arrange their working lives so they can.

My own self-employed plumber has a paperwork day where he looks after his toddler on his own. To be fair he has an administrator (male) who does most of the work.

@FilthyforFirth

All the women complaining about their 'useless, haha' DH's on this thread, why an earth have multiple children with them? Not being goady I just genuinely dont understand.

I'm not saying my DH is an equal in parenting to be smug, it is to explain that it truly isnt all men and you dont need to put up with it.

@FilthyforFirth

I wonder too.
I knew DH would be a great, involved dad on our 4th date.
I never would've had any kids with anyone who wasn't willing to be a proper parent

@karmakameleon

But if you have a father who actually wants to parent (and why would you have a child with someone who doesn't?), and you prioritise that, then you can work it so that they have more time at home.

The vast majority of UK fathers must be completely disinterested in parenting then as a tiny minority actually share parental leave.

It's a cultural/ systemic problem that it is on offer but not actually made very practical for people to take it.

It needs to become more normalised and better facilitated by employers.

@FilthyforFirth

All the women complaining about their 'useless, haha' DH's on this thread, why an earth have multiple children with them? Not being goady I just genuinely dont understand.

I'm not saying my DH is an equal in parenting to be smug, it is to explain that it truly isnt all men and you dont need to put up with it.

See I disagree.

I now believe that even men who are involved and certainly look totally involved with their dcs still never do half of the parenting and have little clue. Yes they know ‘more’ than those who think that being a SAHM = leisurely lunches. But they still don’t.

I would even go further and say that the couple of fathers I know who are raising their children in their own (both widows) still don’t put the effort and involvement that most mothers put in.

My take on it is that

• society is still telling them it’s not their role so they don’t have that social pressure to be ‘perfect parent’ in the way women are
• they’ve never learnt or have role model to show them how to actually parent a child as a man. Both from how much involvement it takes, the selflessness of the task and simply how to square the ‘authority figure’ a father is often portrayed as with the softness needed when comforting a child/looking after their best interest (aka it’s not all about problem solving!)

@MrsJBaptiste

You sound stressed *@AwakeAwake*, maybe you're finding parenting harder than others do? Some of the things you're moaning about not all of us will be able to relate to - not all babies feed all day, not all toddlers charge around all the time, not all dads pretend they don't know what's going on...

🤣🤣🤣 Guess I'm just useless and have weird kids then.

Lots of toddlers are active, newborns need to feed a lot generally and school kids have activities and homework etc.

I'm not finding anything perplexing or particularly difficult, that's just 3 children at 3 different stages. And I'm recovering from c section so can't drive, scar hurts and bleeding.

But yeah. Guess it's me.

@Noterook

"My husband doesn't know how babies work. I think I'll have 3 of them with him"

Yes exactly, how weird. Also pretty sure women can usually manage to find some sort of work/life balance, it's always the men that have the super important jobs and projects that can't. It's sad it took him being around his children and not listening to you to see that, how sad.

Because you know how babies work before having children??

I certainly didn’t. No young babies around me in my family and I was the first one to have children within my friends.
DH was the same.
I think we started from the same point really.

@MyriadeOfThings

Ti be fair *@karmakameleon*, I think it’s not helped by WOMEN who buy into the ‘he is working so hard, he needs his full night of sleep’ or ‘I’m at home so it’s my job to look after the bay, get up at night and do all the he because I’m at home all day’.

How many women on MN would never contemplate asking their DH to do half of the night waking? Women who say they go out for the afternoon but not befire they’ve prepared everything for their DH to make it easier ‘because they know where everything is’. Women who always take the dcs to all their GP/HV/consultant appointment?
Who have read books on potty training, ask other parent us etc… whilst never expecting the dad to do any of that.

I know that I left my two dcs every other weekend with DH from when Dc2 was 2yo. I was training and this is when training happened. He found it extremely hard. Yes it taught him to respect all the work that comes with loking after two young children. But he was also resentful of the energy and the space and the stress associated with it. As if, somehow, he had never signed up for that…. If you had asked him, he would have said that it’s normal for a afther to be involved like this. And from the outside, he looked like the perfect father taking his dcs out all on his own for the day, cleaning the house etc….
In reality he still did nowhere near half of the work involved with raising a child.

I think it’s very easy to blame women in all of this. Either women generally like you have, or the OP specifically for having children with such a man, like many posters.

The reality is, there is a societal problem with men not pulling their weight in looking after their children. Surely men should be doing more to step up. Why don’t they volunteer to do the night shift? Why, when they see their partners go to pack a change bag, say “don’t worry, I’ve got that”? Why don’t they make time in their diaries for doctors appointments? Maybe they all are lazy misogynists? I doubt many women are forcibly stopping them?

@FilthyforFirth

All the women complaining about their 'useless, haha' DH's on this thread, why an earth have multiple children with them? Not being goady I just genuinely dont understand.

I'm not saying my DH is an equal in parenting to be smug, it is to explain that it truly isnt all men and you dont need to put up with it.

Yes... I don't understand this either.

If you've had one child with a man who didn't seem that fussed about actually being involved, why would you continue to have more, knowing that you will get more of the same?

You're making your own bed in that scenario.

I think DH also needs to have a quiet word with line manager re newborn so he can leave at a reasonable time. Any decent manager would give flexibility. I know mine do (one male/one female)