Would be interested to know peoples thoughts on this.
since having my baby and going to a lot of baby groups and mixing with other mothers and reading these forums In can safely say a high proportion of men (not all of course), see child rearing as women primary responsibility.
Women tend to be the default parent in the events of splits and men having EOW or even just walking away completely.
So I was thinking, if women suddenly acted like men in this regard and literally left men holding the baby, what would honestly happen to a lot of children?
If women suddenly stopped carrying the mental load so didn’t book in any kind of medical appointment or arrange play dates or buy new clothes, what would honestly happen?
One of my friends is dating a single dad (mum walked out), but his parents practically raised the kids as he worked away. So still pretty much saw them only at weekends. However if a man leaves a woman with a baby, in normal circumstances she’d just find a new job where she didn’t work away, reduce hours of needed and use paid childcare. They wouldn’t normally hand their kids over to others to raise 80% of the time because they had to work.
So I’m really interested to see what a lot of men would do if the roles were reversed. If women literally just walked out or stopped carrying any mental load type stuff relating to the kids. Would men leave their jobs if required or go part time and claim universal credit?
Would the majority step up as women do and stop their hobbies, arrange childcare and extracurricular activities and basically fully give themselves to parenthood? Would they realise their kids need new vests, socks and tshirts or need a dental check up?
Or
Would they hand over their kids to grandparents/family members to be primarily raised or if failing that, put them into care? Would they do the bare minimum so kids are literally fed, watered and taken to school but other than that left to their own devices with no activities or medical appointments arranged or assemblies attended or well fitted clothes worn and basically be kind of neglected?
Be interested to know others thoughts on what would actually happen.
YABU - as many men as women would step up and look after their kids the same way single mothers do.
YANBU - unfortunately most men would try and shirk as much responsibility of child rearing sometimes even resulting in the care system if their were no willing people to become primary cater.