Disheartened

How involved are the daddies here in your LO’s day to day? Please describe. Post our first child i see the side of my husband that I do not like more apparently. He still sleeps till post noon everyday day including weekends. Otherwise on the phone or on the couch watching TV. No he does not do shift work - he is self-employed and his time is flexible. His thought is since we have a helper we can be hands off totally and involved only when needed. I totally disagree - we hired a helper as we need help with chores and LO since nobody can help us when we are working. But when we are not working we should be involved as much as possible. He also likes to do irritating stuff like feed our food to LO at dinner time knowing it will disrupt her eating her food during meals - by disrupt I mean LO will refuse to eat her food after etc. Even after telling him a million times not to do so he will still ask me can LO eat this or that (referring to our food). He also likes to react with big actions and sounds which freaks LO out. Kept telling him a million times not to do so as LO refused to go near him for fear of the reactions. He thinks it’s funny and just playing. I don’t know which part of it is not clear to him when he witness the effects himself of LO rejecting him till now at 18mths old!. So far only me and my helper are looking after my LO and for my husband his help is very minimal and more apparent only during my helper’s off days when he has to make milk, fill the bath water. I manage our helper, my LO’s needs at every stage I.e her toys, books, formula milk, clothes, diapers, vaccination, PD appts, parenting forums and tips etc. I feel very distant from him post the birth of our first child and kept thinking I married the wrong person and I don’t need him around if he’s not contributing. I can’t help this feeling. Appreciate any advise from mummies or daddies.

Anonymous

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Super Mum

I can totally feel you and I think most mummies face similar feelings to varying degrees. For me hubby doesn't proactively help out but will try to do something only if I ask. Though mostly what he does is just play with LO and not other caretaking tasks like feeding, bathing, diaper changing. I think it's good to have a heart to heart talk and talk about each other's feeling without actually blaming anything on him, and ask him to put himself in your shoes. Ask him if he really loves your child, as I know many men don't feel the instant connection to the child as us mothers do, and it takes them years to begin loving their child. It's understandable but it's important to find out his actual feelings. You mention he's self-employed which could be a slippery slope. Just because his timing is flexible doesn't mean he can be disturbed around the clock. After prolonged wfh I realized it's so important to separate work from personal life. The best arrangement would be to define a set time frame for his work, from 9 to 6 for example, when he can lock himself in a room and focus on work. Outside of that time there's no excuse to not participate in house work or taking care of LO. If talking fails, I think marital counselling is the way to go. All the best!

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