When a couple decides to have a child together, it’s quite likely that both of the parties involved expect (unless agreed upon differently beforehand) to be as equal partners in childcare as possible. And yet, sometimes, reality turns out to be not as pretty.
Just like in today’s story, a couple became parents and, for a while, were a perfect team. Then, suddenly, the husband started tailing off from his responsibilities and talking about how taking care of kids isn’t a man’s task. And let’s just say this sent his wife into quite a spiral.
More info: Mumsnet
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When this couple became parents, for the first couple of weeks, they were a dream team
Then, seemingly out of nowhere, the man started distancing himself from his parental responsibilities
He talked about how other men he knows aren’t taking care of their kids, and it’s completely OK for them, so why should he and things like that
This made his wife spiral, as she felt abandoned, so she turned to people online
The OP and her husband have a 12-week-old baby. While that baby was a newborn, the husband used to be a brilliant parent – he would change the diapers, do the night wakes, and go through all the other trenches newborns’ parents have to go through. So, such behavior made his wife feel safe – she believed she’d be raising a kid with a man who does his parenting duties.
Parents taking around equal amounts of childcare isn’t only beneficial for themselves as a time management technique, but it is also good for a child. Studies show that children who spend similar amounts of time with both of their parents tend to have more educational success, emotional wellness, better interpersonal relationships, and many other things.
But such a fairytale lasted only at the beginning of their baby’s life. The mom started noticing her husband, the dad slowly tailing off his responsibilities. This immediately made her daily life harder.
What made matters worse was that anytime she called him out on it, he started saying, “If you think I’m so [bad], I’ll just stop doing anything.”
Apparently, the idea that he doesn’t have to do anything came from his work colleagues, who shared stories about being, let’s admit, rather neglectful parents, as they don’t lift a finger with parenthood duties.Well, clearly, the stereotypical gender roles play a role in men acting this way.
When it comes to childcare, some men believe that they aren’t created to take care of kids. That’s because gender roles expect men to adopt things like strength, dominance, and the suppression of emotion, and childcare involves at least some emotion.
Of course, there’s also a fact that, over history, kids were inseparable from mothers due to breastfeeding and other biological factors, which made childcare seem solely a woman’s job.
It’s needless to say that such a belief is somewhat toxic – when a woman gives birth to a kid, it isn’t only her child; it has a father, too. If the family isn’t a single parent, expecting him to do his duty without expecting to be treated like some kind of hero is normal.
Yet, the man from the story expects his wife to be grateful every single time he lifts his finger, which drives her mad. In fact, she is not just mad, as it makes her doubt whether she signed up for parenthood with a proper partner.
The netizens couldn’t help themselves but feel bad for the woman. They pointed out that the couple should seek couple’s counseling or something like that as soon as possible. His behavior is far from healthy, and if someone whispers this kind of nonsense into his ear, it won’t get any better.
In the update, the woman clarified that she decided to have a firm talk with her husband, and he seemed to understand where she was coming from. Well, let’s just hope he actually did, and from that point on, he improved himself. After all, parenthood is hard enough, even without your partner acting out, isn’t it?
Netizens felt bad for her and suggested she talk him into couple’s counseling or something similar because if looked over, their situation can become even worse
