How do Men cope when their DW or DP EARNS MORE than them???

[drosophila]

Just wondering. I know some people in this situation and I think it is having an effect.

How much of a man's self esteem is tied up in being the main or sole breadwinner?

The Germans are currently trying to introduce Sweden-style policies- there are 2 extra paid months of leave for the 'partner', in practice the father - but the family minister (politician with seven children - for which she also gets a lot of stick) has faced a lot of derision over it. Germany is pretty institutionally sexist. I got back from mat and annual leave with ds to discover I hadn't been paid for over a month because the office dealing with my pay (public sector, so not at immediate place of work) assumed I had left . When rang and explained I was entitled to and actually needed the money, the woman on the phone said 'you're married, aren't you?' me: ??? Woman: 'You've got a husband, haven't you? You're not going to starve' WTF???

WWW - I've had that experience too. dh is practically sainted by some people. I've been told many times I'm 'lucky' to have him - well, I am, but what is meant with this comment is exactly the isn't-he-good thing. And it must look to some outsiders that I'm a selfish woman off pursuing my 'career' (ha) at the expense of my poor downtrodden husband. I was teaching a language class recently discussing a certain German term which is used to mean 'selfish [working] mother' (in a lingustic context) and one student whispered audibly to another 'like her'. I have rarely been lost for words in my classes, but that was one occasion.

Bloody hell bero. Sounds like it's time for Sweden to stop all this pacifist nonsense and launch an immediate invasion of Germany! Selfish working mother - cheeky barstewards!

I do have occasional convos with my grandmother along the lines of "I don't know how you [i.e. me] manage" - this is juggling work, baby and ill dh of course. To which I reply "but Nana when you had young children, Grandad was out of work every winter [he was a brickie] and you had to struggle to feed everyone". "Oh yes but that was different" - er, yes, it was worse!

Men should not be praised more than women for doing the same thing.

From 1st April men can take 6 months paternity leave in the UK. As women breastfeed (although nothing like as many as should and most give up terribly early in the UK) I am sure those who want the first year at home with ap arent would have mother first six months, father second where they can afford to lose so much pay (assuming they earn more than the £112 or whatever it is a week that maternity and paternity pay is) after the first 6 weeks at 90% pay.

Someone asked me about breastfeeding. Yes I did. I will paste something I wrote about that sometime but in terms of recovery sitting at a desk if that is your job after a baby is much much easier than looking after a 1 and 3 year old which is how things at home would have been for me if I hadn't escaped quickly back to work. I expressed with the first 3 and with the twins was mostly working at home so the nanny just brought them in when they wanted a breastfeed. Sadly most women in the uK do particularly badly over extended breastfeeding so it is a bit of a red herring in this area. There are also legal rights about breastfeeding and plenty of bigger employers have workplace creches and the ability to feed a baby on site or babies are brought in or milk expressed.

There's another interesting point actually, as I discovered when 'pondering' in the small hours!! As you say, BK, MN is great for pondering...

Other women's reactions to us being the breadwinners. I found that apart from close friends and family, most mums at school had no idea of what I did and frankly, looked down on me for not being 'there' for my children. As someone earlier said, DH got lots of 'oh, isn't he wonderful, isn't he good, what a fantastic father' but the flipside of that is 'what a crap mother' to want to work! I found it utterly bizarre also that I had more in common with most women's husbands than I did with them. Like Xenia mentioned in a thread some weeks/months ago, I had no desire to sit around discussing washing powder, but I had absolutely no subject that I felt able to communicate on. I felt like I was a different species, and was treated as such.

Right, am now off to ponder on horseback...

Yes, I have more in common with people who work whatever their gender because my concerns are theirs. I think it helps just not to be with people who do you down. That's how I've always been. It doesn't really matter what other people think. Avoid those who criticise your life choices. More and more couples just share things and over a long marriage there are times when one works and one doesn't and vice versa. My ex husband was once told by his headmaster he couldn't have a pay rise as his wife (me) earned too much. It might well have been a joke but I suspect there was some jealousy of his financial positoin when other teachers were supporting a whole family and a non working wife on their salary and his salary might pay for our holidays or whatever. Another time he found female teachers with small children rushing home to the child minder found it easier to leave early whereas he who at that stage got home by 6 to let our nanny go home wasn't in the same position because of his sex.

Xenia - in your 6 months maternity/six months paternity leave plan, how does it work for mothers wanting to breastfeed for at least two years (in accordance with WHO recommendations, also supported by UK govt)?

Well hardly any do in England. We have pathetic breastfeeding rates. But assuming we didn't, I fed babies to over a year (but not quite to 2 years - they stopped not me) and by 6 months they were eating bits of solids and drinking water and I could breastfeed just before I left for work and as soon as I got home. With the twins I could organise work so I was mostly working based at home so they could therefore feed when they could, many children are in workplace creches so can be breastfed in coffee breaks and lunch times and other mothers work from home or just in months 6 onwards manage feeding fine before and after work. My children woke at night a lot so there certainly seemed to be endless breastfeeding for me (although I did enjoy it but not the sleepless nights).

My daughter is 2.4 and still going strong, my sister's daughter is 2.10 and ditto and her two sons both fed until after 3 (second son kept on feeding even when his little sister was born when he was 2.6)...

Good for her. Mine stopped. I think the first three by about a year or 15 months and the twins about 18 months. May be if I hadn't been working they might have gone beyond 2. I certainly never actively stopped a child breastfeeding but felt quite happy with when they appeared to choose to stop. I can't remember the UK statistics but not that many women even get to 6 months.

Sure, I think that not working and travelling a lot are great incentives to carry on breastfeeding which is super convenient if you have a very mobile life. The incentives are different if life is more sedentary and baby isn't with mother all the time.

Surely it's notjust about how men cope if the woman earns more than them...? Don't women struggle with the same concept if for eg they once had a well paid job and now DH is the sole breadwinner. I am SAHM, and yet still refer to my occupation as what I did before having DS1 & DS2. I find it incredibly hard to 'admit' to being a SAHM, as I think that others will have less regard for me (previous job was a well paid professional one) and yes I still struggle to accept DH is the sole earner. This is my own personal battle with how I view myself and also because I think people are surprised I didn't go back to work and keep asking me when will I go back and do I miss it etc, as if there is nothing to define me by anymore, iyswim?

Why don't you just go back then, tb? Then you wouldn't have that issue.

I really identify with so many posts on this thread.
Sunchowder your situation sounds a bit like where I might be in 10 years time.
Berolina at that woman in your office's attitude. She may have thought that but how rude of her to voice her opinion to you in that manner.
It's true a lot of men at work are seen as heroes for leaving early to do a school run or take junior to the dentist whereas women are treated to a (barely perceptible) roll of the eyes for the same things.
As regards enough time off for maternity leave I could not have had the 7 months I did without a mortgage payment holiday and saved up paid holiday entitlement for that year.
On the flip side I do have a certain amount of sympathy for DHs who are bemoaned for not pulling their weight at home after a day's work. It's not always easy switching from mummy/house mode to work mode and back again everyday.

teabags - I'm sure there is a lot more to you than (a) being a wife (b) being a mother (c) being a homemaker (d) your former job.

Try making room in the day (every day) for time when you can do something different and be somebody else than those four roles (which are all valuable and part of you too).

btw I am still bf-ing and expressing at work even though the baby is starting to show less interest in the boob.

Teabags I think this is a common problem and certainly one I am facing. I am sure the reason maternity leave is a (ridiculously) big issue for me is that for too long I have defined myself by what I do. My boyfriend reminds me that we (but mostly me) are about to embark on what is the most career of all - as parents, but unfortunately the world of work just does not put as high a stake as it should on "parenting" as a career and sees it as a life choice rather than a vocation! I think it goes back to the theme of last night's discussion - that we are all more than a little influenced by subconscious prejudices that affect the way we see ourselves and our partners.

I'm sorry but I am so shocked by berolina's story about the payroll clerk! That is truly appalling - and in 2007.
Mind you, my direct manager's attitude to my pregnancy is very much "oh well, your years as a career girl are behind you now" ...i.e. your promotion prospects are kaput...which entirely rests with a sexist assumption that I can stop working entirely now, or downsize from lawyer to legal assistant or librarian. Even though he knows for a fact I am the main income in my relationship (soon to be family)! I am also reliably informed that the discretionary element of our firm's maternity pay is not paid until you return to work - again a sexist assumption that you have another source of income to pay the mortgage in the meantime.

sorry - most important career of all - was what I meant

Re "On the flip side I do have a certain amount of sympathy for DHs who are bemoaned for not pulling their weight at home after a day's work" Gosh inanidealworld, do you? We BOTH come home and pull our weight, we have to, we both work. We both have children. How would it be fair otherwise?

And I'm sure it doesn't need saying (and I don't want to start a sahm/wohm war) but being a SAHM IS WORK, it's not sitting on your arse all day doing nothing. So why a sahp should be any less knackered and inclined to do household chores that a wohp I don't know, they're both tiring!

WWW - I know that feeling of coming home and BOTH having to do chores after a long day at work and I think it's horrible (though I know often completely unavoidable).

That's just one of the reasons I like being a SAHM - so that we both have the evenings free to relax and enjoy ourselves and our children. A BIG luxury, I know.

No, it's a top ten firm so not at all small. Just not very forward looking. Ironically I remember one of my colleagues telling me the ML package here is really generous. I am not sure what her comparison was but I think treating MP as a discretionary bonus for coming back to work rather ungenerous.

I agree that they are entitled to protect their investment - absolutely. I just meant the assumption that you could continue on without any income at all was sexist in that you need to either have saved a slush fund or be married to another income that will cover everything in the meantime. I am saving the slush fund.

It isn't 100 per cent by the way. I think it is ninety for the stat period during which this is legislated and then fifty per cent for the balance of six months. It is the initial maternity pay which I think is legislated that I don't think they should be entitled to hold back. I also don't think they should be entitled to hold back SMP even if the discretionary amount is a lot more.