Hellobee

Thank you for this post! Our baby hasn’t been born quite yet, but I’m already worried that this issue might crop up for us. We’ve talked about it a lot, but it’s just hard. It doesn’t help the I harbor a lot of resentment towards how things worked in my house growing up where parenting was split something like 95%-5% between my mom and dad. I would like to have a 50-50 split w/ DH, but I know that without fail the mom usually does more of the parenting work.

I absolutely feel the same way as you do. The hubs gets full nights of sleep EVERY night, gets to be at work amongst adults, go for coffee breaks, have lunch with friends, and come home to an already-in-bed baby. It makes me feel sad sometimes. I deal with it by knowing that my baby needs ME…She is still breastfed, too, and won’t take a bottle so I just have to deal.

I totally could have written this post this weekend! My husband (who works while I stay home with LO) went to the gym, and then went to watch golf. While I was home with LO. My thing is, I don’t want to leave LO. If and when I do, he watches her. But I like to be with her, and I want him there too when he can be to help. That way I’d get the best of both worlds, I’d get to stay with my sweet baby girl but it wouldn’t feel so much like work with someone else’s help!

You’ve basically wrote everything I was feeling our first year with L. My husband and I had multiple conversations regarding this matter. I guess small things that helped was my husband was in charge of certain things: bath, feeding dinner at the table, bedtime routines. In addition, I didn’t want to stiffle my husband, so we agreed that one day during the weekend was family fun time – where we both did things together with L. The other day we alternated… one week I got to stay home and read books/watch movies, another week my husband had a day to himself.

@gkim81: That is a great idea. Even a couple of hours on one of those days!

I don’t have any helpful comments on spousal resentment, I just wanna say I was super excited to see a picture of NZ in your post

Thank you for posting this! I’ve got 4+ months to go before our baby makes its appearance, but I’m worried about this because I struggle with it already and we have no kids yet. I feel like our “domestic” tasks are split about 75/25 and I would like it to be more like 50/50.

I hate to reveal this to all the other moms & moms-to-be out there, but all of the “excuses” you listed for why your hubby can get out of helping with the baby are unfortunately more for our benefit than the truth. I work full time, bring home just as much (if not a little more) bacon than my hubby, and our baby is formula-fed but I still somehow end up doing 95% of the work when it comes to the baby.

The only women I know who tells me it should be 50/50 when it comes to baby-related tasks are women who have not yet had babies (with me being one of them until mine was born). All of my girlfriends with kids admit that reality is more like 99/1 (unless you’re one of the lucky exceptions with a husband who adore babies). I think men will take on a bigger role once the baby is older (such as disciplining) and can “play” with daddy. So hang in there ladies, you are all definitely not alone!

I think it can definitely be 50/50. My husband and I both work. I am a teacher so I come home early and I do spend more time with baby during week days but he takes the morning shifts- even on weekends. He takes care of baby in the morning from 7am on until he has to leave for work at around 7:45am… and on weekends I get to sleep in (or occasionally I let him sleep in and take care of the baby but that happens about twice a month). I come home around 3 – 4 in the afternoon and baby is mine until bed time (7pm). We share housework… I do all the cooking and he does all the cleaning.

I think a lot of it has to do with ourselves. When I get my “me” time with my girls. I constantly think about the baby. I realize I just have to let go and enjoy myself.

I think once he is not breastfeeding it’ll be much better

unfortunately, it’ll probably be that way for me because my husband is so busy at work. and he gets so stressed out i don’t want him to be stressed at home. i just hope i don’t feel too resentful! but i think i will try to see if i can squeeze 5% of help… =) maybe that will make me feel better.

50/50 is possible (even 40/60 him if I was honest about it)! It’s definitely easier to get there once you reduce/stop breastfeeding, and both of us working full-time did make it easier to quantify who is doing what baby-related thing when, but most of all I realized that I needed to stop being the martyr and let him be an equal parent. He wanted to step up and do things, and he wanted me to be happy and go out with friends, go to an exercise class, go to a coffee shop and stare at the wall, whatever, but for some reason early on I felt I had to be the one always with baby, the one who always knew the right thing to do, etc. One the best thoughts on this top that I ever heard was that both parents should get equal free time, which doesn’t necessarily mean equal working time. If he gets a few hours a week to have a drink with a friend, play a round of golf, etc. you should get those few hours to do what you want too.

I would be amazed if it could ever truly be 50/50. Even if we both spent the same exact amount of physical time with our daughter, who does most of the mental work? I find that it is normally me.

-Who is the first to realize that we need to size up in diapers and then changes the Amazon subscription accordingly?
-Who plans ahead to buy spring, summer, fall, winter clothing as appropriate?
-Who searches high and low for “green” hand soap for my LO to use?
-Who stays and up and can’t sleep googling crazy things starting from pre-TTC, TTC, pregnancy, birth, breastfeeding, etc etc etc?
-Who spends their free time on HB learning more about parenting every day?

Ok, you get the point.

My DH is great about giving me breaks and I am great at taking them!! We share time with the LO as 50/50 as we can. I think our current situation is the best that it can be because I really believe he is not biologically programmed to do all the mental legwork that I can do concerning our child’s needs and I am fine with that. I just feel like I was born to do it and he was not (hope I don’t sound uber sexist).

Anyhow, back to your post – I’m very glad that you told DH how you feel. Hopefully he understands where you’re coming from and will work towards solving the issue!

You’re not alone. I was doing everything M-F 24-hours a day until I got pregnant with #2 last Fall. My son was 2.5-years-old then. Then my husband finally took over bathing duties which helped out A LOT since I didn’t have the energy to do it in my first trimester. Now he also does the bed time routine and help clean him up after dinner. I pretty much just told him he has to do it. Didn’t really give him a choice. LOL! But he’s great on weekends and very helpful; but there are times when I do get upset when he gets home at 8pm during the week days in a row, especially now that I’m 38 weeks pregnant. And then there’s the occasional “I bought a golf deal and it’s expiring so I HAVE to use it.” Ah-hem…”have to?” I actually don’t mind that he goes and does his thing as long as it’s within a reasonable number of times and spread out AND that he checks with me to make sure I don’t need him around. I like a heads-up, that’s all. I don’t mind caring for my crazy little boy all the time but I do need breaks like all SAHMs! But we’re pretty lucky that we live in a very convenient area where there are tons of kid-friendly things to do and a mall with a nice little toddler playground for him to play at in the Winter.

I’m glad that you told your husband how you felt. Sometimes men just need to be told b/c they don’t notice things as easily as us women. I think once your LO is older and you’re done with breastfeeding you’ll feel more “free” and it’ll be easier too. Breastfeeding can be restricting in a way b/c only you can do it. I felt that way too, but I also had a good sleeper so I had to wake him up after a while just to nurse him at 4am. Then I finally stopped b/c I didn’t feel he needed to eat since he wasn’t waking up. I was finally able to sleep through the night then. Whew!

LO is 6.5 weeks old and I already have some of these feelings towards hubby! I had feared this night happen before LO was born because I am the same way – I try to do it all and let everything that bothers me build up before I just stew hoping hubby will “know” what is bothering me. I know he gets annoyed not knowing what’s wrong and I get pissy thinking he should exactly what’s wrong! Hubby really tries to help by offering to bottle feed, change diapers, put her down for naps and all, but I just say I will do it 95% of the time thr blame him for not helping. I’m really bad at asking for help so I need to work on that.

I also like to be acknowledged – like Mrs Yoyo said, not a medal or anything but just to feel like what I do is noticed. It’s not like LO can pat me on the back and say “good job mama!”. Lol I know that sounds ridiculous but it really makes a difference.

@skibobrown: It’s good that you already are talking about it. That’s half the battle, and it’s the half I’m not good at!

@Rubies: No bottle at all? That is tough. Baby Y doesn’t get one often, but he will take it, thank heavens.

@artbee: I think that sometimes I appreciate Baby Y more when I leave him for a bit. Hope that doesn’t sound horrible, LOL.

@gkim81: I like your weekend idea. It would be interesting to try it once we’re living in a place where there are more things to do as a family … besides going to Walmart, sigh.

@Penny Lane: Are you a Kiwi? Gorgeous country you’ve got. And the nicest people ever, I think!

@reggie: I think 50-50 is doable for some people. I don’t know that it will ever truly be 50-50 for us as long as his job is as demanding as it is. But he has taken on more housework as I’ve had more childcare, and has been the main dinner go-to person ever since we had the kiddo. So he’s definitely helping out in the ways he can.

@Andrea: True on most of the mental work (although he always likes to pick out clothes, LOL). He had one book to read during pregnancy (I think I read like 5) and I’d be shocked if he got more than 1/3 of the way through, ha.

@erwoo: He is already bath master, thankfully! He loves that. Are you also a golf widow? I’m glad he has a hobby he loves, but I wish it weren’t so time consuming. And expensive.

@ElisaT: Yup, just a little bit of appreciation goes so far. But I will say the early days are the hardest. Hang in there.

@Mrs. Yoyo: yes I am! I’ve been in the states for about 4 months now, and oh my goodness I miss New Zealand SO much! Luckily we’re flying back tomorrow!

Also, I think it’s awesome that Papa Yoyo likes to pick out baby clothes! I have enough trouble trying to get DH to pay attention to what he’s wearing, let alone someone else

@Mrs. Yoyo: DH did read one book that he picked out himself but I read many more.

I agree with @Andrea: that its never truly going to be 50/50, Our baby isnt here yet and somtimes I already feel like the scales are tipped and its all on me… ofcourse at this point since the baby is in my belly it really is mostly on me.

I totally understand! And it’s a crazy battle between LOVING being the one that can provide so much – but resenting how much of your time it takes!

Funny – I was just thinking about this today on the way to work. We’ll be having baby #2 in July and I was dreaming about the day (PROBABLY 2+ years from now!) when I’ll be done nursing baby #2 which will totally open up my freedom! My ability to leave the house at 6am bike to the pool for a swim – then head to the track for a run and bike straight to work so I can actually start working at a reasonable hour while my hubby handles both kids and getting them to daycare before he goes to work. Kinda a silly dream – but whatever!

I just stopped nursing #1 in February – so I was pretty much the one that did bedtime 95% of the time for ya know 17 months – and there are some nights now where I hand ROO over to the hubby for ‘bedtime’ and I go lay on the sweet sweet couch for 20 minutes relaxing and listening to the sweet conversations coming from upstairs. OH HOW I LOVE THIS QUIET TIME WITH NO RESPONSIBILITY.

Ok I just read all the other comments. I need to give my hubby credit that he does do a lot with our little guy. And it’s definitely increased as Lil One has gotten older AND as I’ve been so tired with being pregnant. He gets off earlier than me so he’ll often pick him up from daycare early to spend time with him. Helps with cooking meals for us and him. Does some of the cleaning! Handles most baths. Almost ALWAYS is the first to run him to the bathroom when he hears grunting noises (He hates changing dirty diapers!) He’ll spend lots of time reading to him and playing with him. (Especially when I ask for a break) So I have it pretty lucky. I’d say our house is 65/35 these days – and that’s with a 19 month old who is no longer nursing.

BUT – Mentally, the moms are the ones that think ‘BABY’ first all the time and then about themselves. Most guys are still ‘ME FIRST’. I guess it’s just the way we are wired. I feel like I’m still BABY all the time – and trying to find just a little bit here and there for myself.

Great post! I feel the exact same way. Even now, at 16 months, after baby boy is weaned and at daycare for a large chunk of the day … I still do the majority of the work.

I’m not sure how it works out that way; my husband and I both work and we both have busy jobs that require a lot of time and attention. Maybe it’s just something about being THE MOTHER.

But I think you are right. We are happy to make sacrifices for our kids. It just feels good for those sacrifices to be acknowledged by our parenting partners.

Hopefully, if we hang in there, it will all be worth it. And in the meantime, hearing that other mamas feel the same way helps me get through it!

I hear you, I’m 90 mins from the nearest mall and although baby hasn’t arrived yet, I’m kind of terrified of the isolation & resentment!

I hear you – thanks for this post! This is one upside of bottle feeding! I get more freedom, my husband gets equal responsibility for feeding, and I feel less resentful! (And so far our little one is perfectly healthy!)

@babycrz: That is so not a silly dream. That is an AWESOME dream

@ainsworthe: Yes. But I hate that implicit thinking that as THE MOM things default to us unless otherwise arranged, you know?

@kml636: That is one big reason we’re moving. I’m fortunate to have a few friends here with kids, but there is nothing to do for either mom or baby.

@chicagowife: I definitely am a little jealous of bottle feeding for that reason sometimes. I’m glad I made the decision I did, but that is a huge upside.

@ yoyo: agreed! which is why resentment is normal. I’m so glad other mamas feel this way too!!!! this post really makes me feel good.