It is not natural for men to look after babies and possibly young children.

[TheYChromosome]

I shall start by saying I’m not asking for advice. Also before people pile in and either start bashing men or suggesting solutions this thread is not actually for that.

I have a baby 9m and DH has been looking after her since she was 8 weeks. I’m back at work.

So he is really the main care giver and spends with DC most of the time. Despite of that, she in general settles better with me and now we hit the separation anxiety it’s me that she clings to.

Really ideally there would be men on here and I would be interested to hear their take on it l. But as there aren’t many men perhaps the army of women can share their observations and experiences how there DHs find being around babies.

Really the point of this thread is to get a window into how men feel when they look after young children.

I find DH although he loves our DC he finds it difficult to look after her. As an extension of that when ever I’m not working he prefers me taking care of her as I think he finds it draining more than I do.

So again, point of this thread is to get some more insights into how easy or difficult men find it too look after babies. If there are men reading this please do comment.

I know, I know - we are a modern society and generally quite forward thinking, but…. Are there some natural biological inclinations that just will never fully change. All we can do is try to understand better and facilitate better.

It does no one any favours to treat mums and dads as though they are totally different species, with one having some superior bond.

It minimises both parents: the idea that it's all so natural and easy for mum because she's, you know, the mum! And dad should just be expected to shoulder the different pressure of working all hours, being sole earner or at the very least earning multiples of what the mum earns because, you know, he's the dad! And this attitude does no favours for the kids.

As a parent of sons and a daughter, my wish is that should they choose to become parents themselves, they don't feel pigeonholed into conforming to some stereotypical role of 'carer' or 'provider' because they're all equally capable of both.

@freyamay74
Yep. 👏👏

@TheYChromosome
My partner died in an accident when our baby was a few months old, was being breast fed and sleeping in with her.

That first night, i made some formula, snuggled in with her, feed her and she slept like a baby! she switched main carers.
It was as if something deep inside her told her mum was never coming back.

I was in shock for many weeks & it was only knowing i had to keep looking after her, one day at a time, that stopped me from going off the rails or even worse.
People say i saved her but really she saved me.

I bought my daughter up on my own ever since, now she is happy well adjusted works in the NHS, loves her job & we are extremely close.

I find the whole thing about your post deeply insulting but also funny if that makes sense? how can someone be soooo wrong.
Almost as insulting as the church minister who said to my mum at the time "i expect he will adopt or you will bring her up? its not natural for man to bring up a child"

She put him straight on that one!!!

I hope you might reassess what you & others think.

When DCs were toddlers we played the 'who touched him/her last'

I remember a colleague coming to visit when DCs were small. He was fascinated by the idea of the dad being the mum (his words). Afterwards he said he realised that DH was just being dad but he got to do more of it.

He was a very hands on parent himself but had somehow got the idea that being SAHP would be emasculating. He met DH and realised that he was still 'male'.

Looking after DCs can be physically hard work. This can be easier for men who are fit and strong. Chasing toddlers, running up and down stairs doing laundry and cleaning. Other than the brand new baby stage (which is hard for anyone) DH said it was all plain sailing.

This depends entirely on why they are crying. There is a physiological change in women's brains when they give birth it's why their crying baby to the mother always sounds the loudest to that mother. It's designed to pierce them so they care for baby. But it also means mothers generally work out quicker the different cry noises. Fathers also do but as a more learnt behaviour.

A mother would instantly know a pain cry so would respond quickly. But they also know a grumpy/fed up cry by a few months old therefore the father might be more likely to be quicker. Its too general to say who responds quicker as depends on scenario.

Exactly this! 100%!! People falling over themselves to gush over and praise the dad who managed to do the night feed or change the nappy! “He’s an amazing father!”, what, because he managed to feed his own child?!’. Or when people say “he helps you so much with looking after the baby!”. For goodness sake, he’s not helping me with anything - he’s just taking care of his own child!!

I'm sorry for your loss but am glad your child could give you solace at such a sad time. Absolutely natural to want to protect and love your child and laughable that people would think otherwise. Adoption. Wtf?!

Must be something wrong with me, I rarely had any idea why my babies were crying 😭 Hungry was usually a good guess, but it was just a guess, if that didn't work I was baffled. I did eventually learn what the pain cry sounded like but it was very much a learned behaviour.

I definitely found their cries piercing though! Any little snuffle and I was wide awake while DH snored. Nothing a gentle kick to DH couldn't fix though, when it was his turn.

Well thinking about my DH when our son was born, he was amazing, I was in high dependency hooked up to drips and oxygen with repeated seizures and DS was in special care after a bad birth.

DS did everything for us both. When home he happily did 50% of the work him and other NCT dads took the babies out at the weekends to give the mums some space - even now over a decade later the dads still do their share of the work inc taking to days out/clubs etc

Of course it’s natural. My friends wife died giving birth and he has been a great dad from the off. My brother used to go and help out.

Men are great at looking after babies and kids. I sometimes think women like to think otherwise for their own satisfaction. If a man isn’t, he’s doing the whole, be bad at something so no one asks me again so I can do my hobby. But that means he’s a wanker not someone who can’t look after babies

obviously DH. Baby DS did fuck all about from eat, fill his nappy and cry

I think yanbu to feel disappointed and I can understand that. But I think once it’s all in place you will get into the swing and eventually appreciate being able to advance your career, pension etc on a comparable rate as your DH. Also you never know how things might change (DH wants to go full time again, school starting changes both your hours again, DC hits the terrible threes and your work days are suddenly more enjoyable…, you get a huge pay rise and can drop to 3 days anyway etc etc). So I’d allow yourself a bit of sadness over it and then throw yourself into it knowing that ultimately it is better to have a DH who does genuinely do 50% than one who shirks the hard bits and pick up the fun bits.

On your latest post, OP, I think often the woman is “better” (for want of a better word!) at parenting but with the giant caveat that it is in part to do with them usually taking all the maternity/parental leave and developing a stronger bond and more experience with the baby that carries on into childhood. That is helped by a huge dose of societal conditioning.

delusions of gender by Cordelia fine is a really great book on how much societal conditioning affects men and women with lots of scientific studies mentioned. I seem to remember one about rats where if the male rat was left with some babies his actual brain or hormones would adjust to make him a better dad. I can’t remember the exact details but it was so interesting!

@Workawayxx I will have a look at that book as well. Sounds interesting.

As mentioned, the point of this post was not to state that men are not capable of being good fathers, everything on balance. It was more exploring how much nature plays a part.

Also, I myself don’t think about it as some kind of mystical bond mother might have. More of a head start due to the changes body is undergoing during pregnancy etc, etc whilst men are a bit later off the starting block.

The example with rats is also an interesting one.

@helloOP your story sound incredibly traumatic and I’m very sorry if this post was in any way a form of trigger.

Good father is actually wrong choice of words. More talking about Fathers / men possibly more likely focused on preserving their own energy (and sanity) given how exhausting babies are whilst women are more likely to tend the baby and put preservation of energy on back burner, or just end up running on adrenaline.

@TheYChromosome - or men (as a group, not individuals) might just be more selfish…

Even if you argue that some women have been through pregnancy and spend more time breast-feeding so baby settles more easily with them. It doesn’t explain why even when the baby grows into a child (able to play and interact with more people) women in general do more childcare AND also more domestic chores (unless you want to say that women find it easier by nature to cook, clean and do laundry?).

I know NAMALT. In any case, it doesn’t matter what happens in the population in general. What matters is that he is doing a fair amount in your particular partnership. even if he finds childcare harder - does he do more household chores to lighten the load on you?

if he finds childcare and chores hard - maybe the answer is he needs more practice. Just because we find reading and driving more difficult doesn’t mean we shy away from it - we try and find different strategies and practice to get better.

I think you've had plenty of good explanations and study links to show it's probably more societal than biological; evidence has been provided to show men's brains can adapt to look after DC as can women's so that's the nature side of it.

And as others have said, mat leave is likely a big factor in why women are viewed as the default care givers and the flexibility offered to mothers returning to work is probably a big factor in why women continue that.

Less sexist views toward both men and women and that being reflected practically in policy and legislation will go some way to start to resolve this imbalance - e.g. the shared parental leave rights we have these days in the UK.

I'm still not sure of your intentions or personal thoughts based on the title of your post. It's quite a loaded title.

The world is so depressing sometimes. I can’t believe there are women who chose to procreate and think men have no business looking after babies or young children.

This is a really big generalisation though.

And any time anyone provides evidence in support of men being as naturally capable as women as being parents to infants and young children, your default response seems to be politely dismissive of that information. E.g. you keep responding the likes of "no it's not about saying all men are bad fathers" even when the responses are not saying that and are looking at studies, like your recent response to Workawayxx above.

I think sweeping it into “it’s natural for women” is insulting to both men and women. It implies that men aren’t suited to looking after kids (wrong, I’ve known some great dads and also worked in childcare with some brilliant men) and also that women’s effort counts for less because it comes “naturally” to them (also very wrong- it’s a grind and women’s effort should be praised as much as men’s). And even if it was less natural, if a bloke can figure out an iPhone (not particularly natural) he can figure out a baby.

Ultimately I think weaponised incompetence has a lot to answer for. Obviously NAMALT but how often do women hear “well you’re just BETTER at it” from a partner who doesn’t respect them enough to put the effort in.

My ex ended up being on the useless end of the spectrum, but he was useless because he chose to be, not because he was a man.

I think sweeping it into “it’s natural for women” is insulting to both men and women. It implies that men aren’t suited to looking after kids (wrong, I’ve known some great dads and also worked in childcare with some brilliant men) and also that women’s effort counts for less because it comes “naturally” to them (also very wrong- it’s a grind and women’s effort should be praised as much as men’s). And even if it was less natural, if a bloke can figure out an iPhone (not particularly natural) he can figure out a baby

Absolutely. And then it stigmatises women who don't cope well even further because it's supposed to come naturally to them.

It's harder for men in that they're much less conditioned to the kind of selfless self-sacrifice parenting entails. Women are taught from early on that they need to care for others, be considerate, etc while boys hare around and only care about themselves.

I don't think anything about it is particularly innate. We don't say to a struggling mum that she's finding it hard so it must be unnatural for her to care for children.

I agree- most of this (and the studies that support it) show that the biggest factors are societal, not biological.

Incidentally (and I know this is a sample of one and purely anecdotal) but I had my first dc back when maternity leave was just 3 month so although I was with dc much more than dh during that period, I also didn't have the very long (potentially a whole year) that mums tend to take now. I actually think that made it easier for dh and I to have very equal roles as carers/ providers. Habit counts for a lot- and if I'd got into the habit of being home for a year I imagine it might have been harder to shift into more equal roles.