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Original poster

Not ready to part from baby - am I being unreasonable??

223 replies

Mbarts89 · 03/12/2021 17:42

My baby is 16 days old and although my partner wants to take him out without me, I don’t feel ready to be separated from him yet. It’s causing a lot of friction. I feel forced to part from baby, partner feels like I’m criticising his parenting skills. Am I being unreasonable? How long did it take you to part from baby?

OP posts:
SugarlumpsesBumpses · 05/12/2021 15:05

I see what you're saying and I'm sure it will all work out, but I'm very much of the view that older children need to be helped to understand that the smallest ones need lots of attention up to a certain age, and of course DH will be on hand to give DD lots of attention. It would be infinitely harder though if I was a single parent I imagine

SugarlumpsesBumpses · 05/12/2021 15:07

Also @OnceuponaRainbow18 I've got DH doing quite a lot with DD currently (15 months) so she gets used to lots of time with him and him doing just as much as me. I'm also very lucky to have very involved parents so I accept I'm basing my view here from a place of good luck and childcare/partner privelege !

WaitingForSanity · 05/12/2021 15:13

If you don't feel comfortable with it, he shouldn't be pressuring you to do it.
Why can't you both go out with the baby to 'show the baby off'. How come he feels he has to do it on his own?

FannyCann · 05/12/2021 15:17

I find these posts (and there are a few every week) bizarre and incredibly controlling.
What right has a mum to 'allow' her partner to take his baby for a walk

It's not about OP "allowing" him to take his baby for a walk. She's not the one being controlling.

She is a New Mum still feeling very emotional and tied to her baby. She isn't ready to be separated yet.

HE is piling pressure on her and upsetting her. What living partner does that?

If he wants to go out and show off the baby why doesn't he want his partner to come too? Why isn't he incredibly proud of her and what she has done going through pregnancy and childbirth to produce this baby? Why doesn't he want to show them both off and advertise his lovely new family like this?

I see these threads from time to time and think there is some rather unpleasant patriarchal ownership and control going on with these fathers who are so desperate to remove babies from their mothers so they can go off wherever it is they go, to the in laws or to friends or down the street or wherever, showing off the baby and excluding the mother. Frankly I think it's a red flag for the future.

FannyCann · 05/12/2021 15:17

*loving not living

ironorchids · 05/12/2021 15:56

This is crazy.

Ignore all the previous posters saying they were down the pub with baby being passed around at 5 days. It's completely irrelevant.

You don't want to be parted from your baby at 16 days post partum, so it doesn't matter a bit what any other mum on the planet felt with their baby.

Your husband is a being a ridiculous selfish ---.

For nine months your hormones have ramped up and up and up - multiple different hormones - and now after birth yet more hormones are coming into play and one of their roles is actually to make you feel like this.

What kind of a husband wants to make his wife feel this way? For what exactly? To show off the baby? Is showing off more important than the mental health of the mother of his child at 16 days post partum?

Does he appreciate that even just thinking the baby might be hungry can make milk leak out of your body uncontrollably because guess what, you're full of hormones designed to make you feel this way.

You don't even get signed off by the doctor til several weeks and are still bleeding from the major life event you've just gone through.

This is absolutely nuts and completely selfish of him. You should absolutely not be separated from your child at two weeks pp unless you want to be, or there is some kind of medical need.

Tell him to F off. If I was treated this way after birth I'd probably be threatening divorce.

SunflowerTed · 05/12/2021 16:01

I can understand why he wants some bonding time with his baby

ChateauxNeufDePoop · 05/12/2021 16:35

@Mbarts89

Thanks for the comments. So DH has looked after DS at home when I nap/shower etc, but now he’s piling on the pressure asking me a couple times a day to take the baby out for a walk alone and show him off to people. I totally get that he wants to bond alone with the baby but that feels like a very separate issue to my need to stay near DS. I told him I’m not ready to be parted yet, we’ve argued about it and now I just feel broken and that I’ll just let DH take baby to stop the constant pressure, despite not feeling ready yet…

I was hoping to find some information online about mother’s need to stay near baby so I could share with DH , has anyone read anything about it?

No because it's not true. YABU.
OnceuponaRainbow18 · 05/12/2021 17:43

@SugarlumpsesBumpses

but I'm very much of the view that older children need to be helped to understand that the smallest ones need lots of attention up to a certain age

Yes ideally but in reality this often isn’t the case. Often the older one regresses, plays up and is totally shocked by the arrival of a new baby and wants mums attention the whole time… so much easier to pass the baby to someone else to hold than the toddler regardless of how well the get on with dad

RaginaPhalange · 05/12/2021 17:58

Yabu, you let him watch baby so you can wash and take a nap. Could he really not take baby out while you napped or showered.

Dreamstate · 05/12/2021 18:26

@RaginaPhalange

Yabu, you let him watch baby so you can wash and take a nap. Could he really not take baby out while you napped or showered.
Exactly what I've said. Why can't that be the compromise rather than no.
SarahDarah · 05/12/2021 23:00

@Gotaearnabuck

Agree that he needs to respect what OP wants - the baby only 16 days and there plenty of time walks and rest but what i dont get is the posters saying "this is a red flag" and "whats he up to" - sounds like he just wants to take the baby round to the shop not for a night on the tiles
It's because A lot of posters project their own bad experiences onto other men.

I can understand both the OP and her husband. He sounds genuinely bewildered why he can't take their baby out on his own when the baby is just as much his baby as hers and feels unfair to him as he wouldn't stop her from taking the baby out without him.

It's not his fault he doesn't understand how OP feels - the biological reality of the unique mother-baby bond is often deliberately not talked about because certain quarters of our society are obsessed with trying to force the lie that "women and men are the same" down everyone else's throats. Biologically theyre simply not ,especially when it comes to areas like this. Men and women are equal but they're not the same. There have always been and always will be, important biological differences.

This sort of thing can easily build resentment where the husband just lets OP get on with taking charge of the baby, then OP down the line starts complaining he's not supporting her enough by looking after the baby on his own!

@Mbarts89 I think the best thing to do is show him articles/research which explain the biological mother baby attachment. For example oxytocin, the binding hormone, is released when women give birth and attaches you strongly to your baby. It's one of, if not the biggest attachment found in nature.

ImustLearn2Cook · 06/12/2021 00:28

@ironorchids Well said! @Mbarts89 100% everything that ironorchids said.

ImustLearn2Cook · 06/12/2021 00:46

My ex bonded with our baby while at the same time supporting me and I supported him. We went out together to explore the world with our baby. He didn’t try to make me be apart from our newborn before I was ready just to make a point that it’s his baby too. He wasn’t a first time dad though so maybe he understood. Our dd loves us both and her bond with her dad is unique, it’s their special bond, it’s different from our bond as mum and daughter. Ours is special too.

Right from newborn her bond with her dad was special and unique just between them. They formed that bond without having to be away from me. We bonded with our daughter as a family.

@Mbarts89

The newborn phase is hard, there is sleep deprivation, recovery from birth, adjusting to all the changes and your relationship with your partner becomes a parenting relationship. So many changes. There were times when I just burst into tears and we were both so tired. We didn’t always agree on things and sometimes it was just so hard. But it does get easier, it really does. Both of you are adjusting, talk to each other and try to help each other.

PinkSyCo · 06/12/2021 01:24

If it’s ok for your DH to look after the baby while you nap, why is it not ok for him to take the baby out for a couple of hours? Do you not trust him?

NoKandoo · 07/12/2021 09:35

Tell him to F off. If I was treated this way after birth I'd probably be threatening divorce

@ironorchids You'd really do that? What would you think if the baby's dad were telling the OP to fuck off and threatening divorce for not "letting" him take the baby for a walk? Let me guess: divorce the bastard.

Men absolutely can't win on here (and I had an abusive husband, so am no stranger to properly shitty behaviour - but women on MN are far too quick to suggest "tell him to fuck off" and "divorce him" for things that could be resolved by a bit of conversation and willingness to listen on both sides).

JustWonderingIfYou · 07/12/2021 09:55

I think I popped to the shops when DS was about 10 weeks old.

Nothing to do with not trusting DP, he was very hands on. Just natural mothering instinct not to be apart from newborn.

Unnatural to try and part a 2 week old from his mother. Bit self obsessed of him to make it about him too.

Dreamstate · 07/12/2021 14:10

Well op won't address suggestions that when she is napping and clearly apart from the baby why he cant take baby for a walk during her nap time.

So since op doesn't seem open to any sort of compromise because that is the most obvious one that won't cause distress either then well you reap what u sow

Nellesbelles · 07/12/2021 14:27

I think DD was about 8 weeks when I left her with DH for 3 hours to go to my best friend's birthday meal. It was too soon for me even then and I couldn't wait to get home. She is 3 months now and I still struggle to leave her but DH, DM and MIL do have her for a few hours now and again just so I can have a bit of 'me time'.
Don't let anyone tell you when you should leave your baby, even if they are well-meaning. Your baby, your choice! Explain to DP it is about how you are feeling, not him

SunflowerTed · 07/12/2021 15:07

@Nellesbelles

I think DD was about 8 weeks when I left her with DH for 3 hours to go to my best friend's birthday meal. It was too soon for me even then and I couldn't wait to get home. She is 3 months now and I still struggle to leave her but DH, DM and MIL do have her for a few hours now and again just so I can have a bit of 'me time'. Don't let anyone tell you when you should leave your baby, even if they are well-meaning. Your baby, your choice! Explain to DP it is about how you are feeling, not him
It is their baby not just her baby so is not just her choice!
Giraffe888 · 07/12/2021 15:12

When my DS was about 10 days old DH took him out for an hour for me to have a nap. It was my idea to try and get some sleep but I just cried the whole time they were gone!

layladomino · 07/12/2021 17:15

If your DP looks after your baby while you nap / shower, then why can't they take them out for a walk?

Cold weather it not a reason not to take a baby out. Mine were winter babies and it never occurred to me to stay inside until the spring! You just wrap them up appropriately and don't stay outside too long.

There is no good reason to stop the child's father taking them out for a short walk.

Yes he is wrong to pile on pressure if the Op is upset, but that doesn't make the Op's position right. It isn't fair to expect someone with a perfectly reasonable wish to back down because someone else is upset by it.

Soontobe60 · 07/12/2021 17:22

@Outlyingtrout

He’s not a supportive partner or father if “showing off” the baby and going for a walk on his own is more important to him than not doing something that you’ve been clear is very distressing to you (and understandably so) just 2 weeks after giving birth.
What about if it’s distressing to him? Do the fathers’ feelings count for nothing? OP, your baby has 2 parents. You’ve been the parent who’s had complete charge of your baby from conception to now. I completely understand your dh’s desire to have some 1 on 1 time with his baby. I really can’t see any difference between him looking after his baby whilst you have a nap / shower etc and him taking his baby out for a walk by himself for half an hour. It’s so important for babies development and relationships to bond with both parents (if they’re both around).
Poppinjay · 11/12/2021 23:30

I guess you have to experience the powerful urge to keep your baby close before you can understand it.

Those who don't understand it think that logic is relevant to the situation. It isn't.

Some people have an overwhelmingly powerful instinct that is there for a good reason, if unnecessary in modern times. It's not reasonable to cause them distress by taking their baby away from them when other people can bond with the baby perfectly well in the same vicinity as the mother.

FolkyFoxFace · 12/12/2021 02:19

If you're not comfortable, don't let him do it. Baby is so small, it's only the start of the fourth trimester! It would have been distressing for my son, let alone me at that age...I couldn't even go for a wee!

DS is 9 months now, next week I'm getting a haircut, facial, and massage. Three hours. DH is coming into town with me, and will take DS for a potter. It's the first time I've allowed this. I'm not feeling great about it, I'll feel weird, but I can manage and more importantly I think DS can. If I get a call that he just wants me, he'll get me!