Husband says motherhood is easy & every mother has risen a child so it can’t be hard, crack on

[Jobutr]

Recently during a fight, DH said that motherhood is easy, that our boy is chilled and calm, that he sees what we do all that, and that it’s easy and I make it sound harder than it is. He says all mothers do it so crack on with it.
for context, our boy is 5 months and fully breastfed, i do all the nights (baby wakes every 2 h max), put down boy for all his 3 naps (one in pram and 2 in carrier so no sleep for me) and take care of him day to day, make sure he exercises, is played with, changed, talked to, well taken care of. Both families live abroad so no family help.
He’s chilled and calm because he gets all his naps and has a lot of face to face play and contact.
I love taking care of our boy, I don’t complain. I just want to be valued for all the work sometimes. It feels a bit hurtful to feel like motherhood isn’t valued and that it’s so easy to raise a baby, by someone who doesn’t do much alone time with the baby.
Am I exaggerating? Is it so easy? Would you want your partner to be supportive?

Book a weekend away without your boy. I'm sure he won't find it so easy when he does it all.

(If you were to go away and he paid someone to do it, he'd have to pay a full wage - so it is quite literally work...)

You husband said something mean. And untrue. Mothering is hard. Mothering as a careful and engaged person is fucking hard.

I hope that he said it to upset you in the heat of an argument.
but ultimately recognises how fully absorbing and exhausting mothering is.

How much does your DH do for your son? I suspect he just sees the best bits. Perhaps expressing and giving him his chilled baby for a weekend with no other help might give him some perspective?

What an absolute prick. He sounds clueless like my ex husband whom I dumped.

Let him experience it. I went back to work happily because paid work with breaks is so much easier and less frustrating than taking care of babies/ toddlers. My DH told me all the stuff he was going to get done in his time 'off' looking after our 13mo -- he didn't get 1/2 the stuff done.

How does he not know by now?? Idiot

I didn't find it difficult but DH wouldn't have dreamed of acting like parenting is my responsibility alone.

He needs to start spending more time with baby.

I think I'm experiencing rage by proxy. I currently have a massive hole in my garden that's waiting for a new patio. You're welcome to use it if needed.

Let me guess, despite it apparently being 'easy' Daddy Fucknugget doesn't actually do much or any parenting himself because he works and therefore needs 'downtime'. Which is odd because if looking after a baby isn't work for you why is it work for him?

Did he find it easy when he looked after your baby all day and night by himself...?

I've got an 8 year old and a 15month old and I've found both to be very hard work as babies. Both mine were 'high needs' and a nightmare sleep wise, hated the car, hated the pram, don't like being put down etc. I love babies and I love kids, and I'm not an easily stressed or anxious person, but I've found these babies really hard work. I also don't have family help nearby.

It depends on the baby, sometimes the mother, the support network (partner and grandparents), finances (I didn't have spare money to pop to cafes or join baby groups this time round, so felt a bit stuck at home in the winter).

I agree with others. If it's so easy leave him some expressed milk and go out for the day.

How disrespectful to you, his partner and mother of his child.

Your dh is a twat.

Having said that, motherhood is an experience that varies a lot from one woman to the next. It’s also not something you judge on the first 5 months of the baby’s life!

My 2 are young adults now.
The baby stage was very hard. Not something easy at all for me. And dc1 was the dream baby that slept through very quickly etc…..
Teenage years were easy imo. I much prefer that time.
A lot of people have the opposite experience though.

What IS a fact is that it’s time consuming. It’s putting your life upside down (I dint think your dh life changed much). The mental load is huge (whether you enjoy it or not). Lack of sleep is an issue. And you never have 2 minutes for yourself.

If he thinks that’s easy… maybe he should get up with you during the night to support you agd take over completely at the weekend? Not going to be a problem right as it’s so easy.
Unless he means it’s easy FOR WOMEN….

Your baby will be going onto solids soon so will be able to go longer without breastfeeding, highly suggest getting DH involved more! Is he doing nappies or anything now, pram walks, soothing in any way? Or just doing the typical man thing (to clarify its only typical of a certain type of man) where they parade the baby around at family events like they are Dad of the year, then baby goes back to Mum for 99% of the rest of the time.....

What a clueless, fucking idiot.
And no, I haven't brought up a child, for many reasons.
Dickhead.

This!

I had a baby, a one year old and a two year old. It was easy looking after them.
I know all mothers won't feel like this though, thankfully we all find different things easy or hard.

My head would explode if my DH said this to me. Is your husband always such an asshole?

This has nothing to do with motherhood and everything to do with your H being a dickhead.

Asshole man.

It's fine for you to feel that, but it's not fine for someone to tell you you should find it easy.

I don't think anyone can pronounce anyone's parenting difficult, easy, good or bad until the youngest kid is at least 25 years old. The idea of knowing at 5 months whether motherhood was a breeze or not! Wait til they're a teenager at least and then come back.

ETA - your husband is a dick btw

Oh, and we had zero family help before someone comes along and suggests somebody else was doing it.
What did you do for a job OP? Your job might have been impossibly hard for me to do be easy for you.

Same as I’d say to anyone else in this situation- make plans and go out for the day, let him see how easy it is first hand.

We have a nearly 10 month old and my husband is thankfully a brilliant dad, really involved, I couldn’t ask for more from him, and that has meant that he has always appreciated how hard taking care of a baby really is! While it also amazing, the best job I’ve ever had, and I wouldn’t change a single second of it for the world, that doesn’t make it easy.

What does your dh actually do with your son?

'Risen' a child?

I'd divorce him on that basis alone. What does he think children are - bread?