AIBU - motherhood has ruined men for me

[Bettercallsaul2024]

I expect I am being unreasonable but since becoming a mum I have gone off men.

I had always adored men but now I see an incompetence I can’t get past. My husband is an ICU consultant - can handle huge pressure and stress but can’t be trusted to pack a fucking bag for a day to the zoo. He can handle the resuscitation of a child but can’t cope when OUR child has a tantrum. (I too am a hospital doctor so feel like I can make the comparison, and I do appreciate the workload of his job). He would never cope being up all night with our ill child yet can do nightshifts in ICU - I don’t get it?!

and it’s not ‘just’ him. I now see it everywhere. All the men in my family, though lovely, have so much less expected of them. Seen as great dads when they take the kids swimming despite the women doing all the parenting the rest of the week plus having a job/career.

sometimes I say to my mum - how are men able to organise complex things like war when they can’t do the sainsburys food shop without ringing their partner at least twice. She reasons that it’s because men usually only have one task to focus on at a time and so can do it well - behind the scenes women are doing EVERYTHING else.

I find myself unattracted to my husband but also all men really. At the park I see dads standing on their phones, getting cross and stressed when their kids are upset after a grazed knee. It’s so ugly to me!

I KNOW I am being unreasonable. But do others feel this way? I know not ALL men. It just so happens it’s ALL men I’ve ever interacted with

YABU: this is a DH thing. Men are just as wonderful as women

YANBU: men wouldn’t last one day as mothers

Sorry but I can’t stop laughing at men arranging a full on war but can’t manage a Sainsbury’s shop 😂😂😂

"Their status as a male exceeds the status of both females and children" The thing is, our culture tells them this all day long.

Just think of the Bechdel test. We're background characters, there to support the central ones.

I thought it was just me that felt this way! Thank god I am not alone.

My husband and I both have equally high stress, complex jobs. But as soon as he is home, he switches off any ability to plan, multi task or complete a simple request.

I've given up mentioning these failings as it gets me no where 🤬

I've seen a theory that men see us as their 'helpers'. Their assistant human, rather than an autonomous person in their own right.

This absolutely rang true yesterday, when DP finished his lunch, leapt up from the table and said 'Right, come and help me in the garden'. He hadn't noticed I sat down to eat my lunch after him, and still had half a sandwich to go with food in my mouth.

Its not just men coping with parenthood. My step dad was here at the weekend, he is not well and I wanted to keep an eye on him. So he was settled on the sofa while I pottered around doing all the jobs I dont have time for in the week. Decided to get a takeaway lunch, but we had to have it from the place that does not deliver because he once years ago had a bad meal from the place that does deliver in our small time at that time on Sundays. So I had to stop what I was doing (cutting the grass), to drive there, go in, pay, come back. To cap it off, I had asked him to keep an eye on the time and let me know when I had to go and get it. Came in because he had not called me and found him watching tv. And last but not least, I asked him to put it on plates, while I put the tools away I had been using. Walked out to him asking where the plates were - same place as always which I have told him many many times. And then came in to him saying he did not know where the food was. In a kitchen with completely empty counters except for one brown bag with foil containers in.

When I told him later that I would not be doing that again, he was astonished. I know this is an extreme example, but the fact this may be tiring/draining or annoying for me was genuinely surprising to him.

Some of the problem is genuinely not knowing what to do. But much is an expectation of the effort that should be made by them or the women around them, and a refusal to do what they dont want to do. In the hope that a woman will compensate for that.

Menfolk are useful for carrying heavy loads and fighting wars. Women do everything else. To be fair, my OH does a heck of a lot of DIY, there are some things which physically I could not do and I'm grateful for his muscle and expertise. He does the outside bins, recycling and gardening, but I carry pretty much the whole mental load of shopping, cleaning and cooking, while we both have FT jobs. each to their own expertise I guess. It works for us as he has a DD and I don't get involved in the child rearing aspect, it might be a different story if we had DC.

My dad was incredibly disorganised and chaotic and let my mother do all the hands on parenting ( but he drove me to a place ride horses a couple of times a month and thought that was heroic). In retrospect he was probably on the autistic spectrum and dyspraxic ( my brother has just been diagnosed with those conditions and is very much like him). My DH on the other hand is extremely competent with practical matters, has the patience of a Saint and did as much of the heavy lifting when kids were small as I did. I chose him in part because he is so different from my father.

Totally agree! My DH is the same! It’s not rocket science.

I agree, OP. In my experience, men prioritise things that bring them external recognition (usually from other men), wealth or personal enjoyment or satisfaction (sports, hobbies, watching TV). Many men don't care as much as women about the happiness of others - their wives, children, friends etc. I'm not saying they don't generally want them to be happy, but often they fail to connect the dots with those little daily tasks and asks of self-sacrifice which would make them so because their focus is themselves and what they are doing and most other people are supporting cast.

I can see where you're coming from, but it's not been my experience at all. My DH is a fantastic dad, a much better and patient parent than I am! One of the things I found so attractive about him when we met was how much of a good dad he was to DSD. My BIL is also a really good dad and just as capable as my sister. My own dad has always been hands on and as capable as my mum.

We have similar in my house.

I ‘joke’ we have my jobs, and our jobs. He can sit and chill in front of the TV if I’m cooking, but if he’s got a task I must ‘help’.

He also has on occasion rung me with an instruction to run an errand for him, like I’m his secretary. ‘Can you go into town and collect X from Y’. A prolonged pause is sufficient for him to rethink if this was a good idea.

It makes me think about what my children see day-to-day now to inform their future behaviour!

Some men become useless because they are allowed to be.

^

Nothing more unappealing than having to parent a man

They know how to do all those things, they just don't want to, so they either don't do it or do it badly so they won't get asked/told to again.

Indeed. It's not really any sort of excuse/explanation.

This is not to excuse men at all but are we surprised when society is organised to place women as less deserving than? Less deserving of equal pay, less deserving of pain relief, less deserving of recognition for work in the home and in the work place, less deserving of safety, less deserving of equal access to outside space (there's a study of gender usage of playgrounds and the boys command a bigger square footage of space and the girls get the outside edges). To fight against that societal set up is pretty big. Why would men want to close the gap? And why wouldn't women feel resentment?

Also - on a bit of a tangent about language again think about how many words we have for the female counterpart relationship - his bird, ball and chain, trouble and strife, her indoors and on and on. Now try think of alternative words for the male counterpart...I find this stuff fascinating!

I think so much of it is down to expectations from a societal point and even family. For example my OH saw his dad working very hard and his mum taking care of him and his siblings a majority of the time - so he thought mums are best for their children - he is super close to his mum which is interesting. And despite us as a society preaching about how forward we are, the reality is mat leave is a year and paternity is only a few weeks.

Whilst some men will roll their sleeves up and get on with it, I think many still view this as a woman’s job and almost not wanting to over step the mark. I’m not saying this is an excuse - if it is, it’s a stupid one - but this is what I witnessed. I know some single dads - and they pick up the slack and do an amazing job when forced - but it seems some men need to be reminded that they can help out too.

None of the men in my family are heavily involved in childcare. I’m lucky that my OH has always been just as domestic as me and we both have careers, so he is great at doing the cooking etc, he actually contributed his through to what should be in a hospital bag and is good with check lists - but when the baby came it’s as if he forgot that we are both learning and kept looking to me for all of the answers. It’s like he forgot that he has the skills to be a parent.

I, as the mum, need to remember to share the load too. When the baby cries and he has just been fed, my OH would say “he needs his mum, they have a special bond with you” and I’ve had to say “no, he is used to me. He needs his dad too” - a lot of it is inbuilt beliefs.

I agree with the PPs that say to solve this you have to have an in-depth conversation and actually share the load - of you have a guy that might have embedded beliefs.

While I was still with my children's dad and he was working away (he'd work away for two weeks, come home for a weekend and then off again), he rang me to say he was being given private health care as part of a work package. He then had to ask me FOR HIS OWN CHILDREN'S BIRTH DATES so he could put them on the health care. He was fucking THERE WHEN THEY CAME OUT! But remembering that was, apparently, beyond him.

It made me, as you can probably tell, quite cross.

Totally agree op. It's weaponized incompetence and the shit way our society views mums vs dads.
I met DH in same career, in fact I was better paid and qualified but since having DD I seemed to have turned into his PA, house manager, cook and cleaner. I work PT but as I do compressed hours and have less annual leave, we work about the same over a year. The amount of comments I get about him being a hands on dad is unbelievable, being in the presence of your child is the absolute minimum of parenting ffs.
What I did was sit DH down recently and tell him I refused to have DD raised like this. And I fucking meant it. He also reflected on his own upbringing where his parents worked full time but his mum did everything. Then he got it.
Now we have weekly meetings about who does what, a weekly rota of jobs/life admin etc. I will shut down anyone who makes any comments in future. My in laws were the worst.
My friend who has married a woman says they don't have these issues, but a lot of heterosexual couples do. Funny that.

I think you are extrapolating your husband's skills as a doctor to what a nurse may do. As someone who regularly works with medical students in a maternity ward, they make it clear that they expect to do doctoring which they see as doing examinations, surgery, procedures, and making clinical decisions. Not nursing sick but stable patients. That's women's/nurse's work.

In fact the only medical students willing to hold a hand, change a nappy, or empty a catheter are always from working class backgrounds and nearly always female.

Gay male couples raise kids and manage the parenting practicalities and mental load. So it must just be laziness, low bar and selfish expectations for hetero dads.

Omg yes! I love my husband dearly but also want to strangle him most days.

I went away this weekend, worked my butt off to have the house tidy, washing basket empty everything ready to help him (and made me feel better that i wouldnt have to come back to a shit tip) my husband would never think to do anything like that for me mostly because he doesnt do any of it.

He did say he doesnt know how i do it all (a lot of lists and coffee and nervous breakdowns) but would never think to help me or take over something

You realise there are lots of gay men who can manage their life perfectly well.

This bullshit myth that men can’t is utter nonsense. They can but they don’t want to and can’t be arsed because they have a woman to do it for them. They can just abdicate responsibility.

I get sick of women going ‘oh he can’t work a washing machine blah blah’ of course the fucking can, he can drive a fucking car!!

I’m with you OP. I just find straight men so pathetic a lot of the time. My gay male friends are totally different.

Oh yes, this is a real thing. And it ruins attraction.

I've got a husband who gets external praise for "helping". He has areas he looks after 100% like kids sports clubs and his washing and I often get told I'm "lucky". But his effort and contribution is minuscule compared to what I do.

And with perimenopause the sheer bloody injustice of it winds me up. I can't tolerate or look past it anymore. Last week I went away with work for three days, came back and no washing up (or cooking) had taken place. (We have a primary school child at home so you should be feeding them twice a day!) And then expected me to cook them sausages at 8pm "because you do it so much better than me" after I'd done a five hour journey (I wasn't eating the sausages). Massive ick. I was looking forward to a hump that night as I'd been away but instantly didn't feel like it after being treated like his mummy.

My husband is objectively a great guy with many talents. Yet, he chooses passivity in the domestic sphere and his friendships/relationships. I don't even think he thinks it's my/the woman's role/duty - it's just easier to let me step up every time.

I just want an equal partner or recognition for my contribution.

The dads I know (my DH, BIL, DF etc) are more than capable of packing a bag for a day trip/nursery etc.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying lots of men don’t duck out of this stuff but there are plenty who are more than capable and willing. I think partly it’s about understanding that if you’re not the one doing it, you’re not going to have control over exactly how it’s done. What I mean is, if I ask DH to get DS bag ready, he may not pack the hat/bottle/snack that I’d have chosen and that doesn’t mean he’s done it “wrong” IYSWIM. I think sometimes the whole gatekeeper thing can do everyone a disservice.

I don’t think you’re being unreasonable at all, it’s true! Men are congratulated for doing the absolute bare minimum whilst women are doing all of the unpaid work behind the scenes. I know this is not ALL men before someone comments on this but it is the vast majority of them. I’m gay and I’m thankful everyday that I don’t have to put up with the absolute shit show that my friends and people on here have to put up with due to their incompetent husbands and partners.