My husband is the youngest of four boys. He has been around nieces and nephews but has never spent any quality time with babies. When I was pregnant, I was a little scared that he would have trouble adapting to fatherhood. We were having twin girls, and he had literally never changed a diaper in his life.
However, since the girls were born, my husband has really stepped up and helped more than I thought he would (sorry for doubting you honey!). He did it mostly on is own, but here are some things I did to encourage him.
The most important thing to do to get your husband more invested in helping with the baby is for you to be supportive of his efforts. While I was pregnant, I read an article about having a child that was a little different. It was written from the male point of view. The guy talked about how his wife had made him feel inadequate as a father and instead of trying to get more comfortable with the baby, he started to help less and less.
Now it is true there are two sides to every story. The wife might have said, “Dearest husband, please support the baby’s neck” while he heard, “Are you trying to kill the baby, you rotten jerk?!” But it is true that wives need to be supportive of their husband’s attempts to care for the baby. This is especially true with the first baby because it sets a pattern of behavior that will probably hold true for subsequent children.
Another thing to do to get your husband comfortable while caring for the baby is to let him do things his way. My husband has never tried to use duck tape to close a diaper or anything, but he does not necessarily do things the way I would do them. Because of my slightly anal-retentive nature, there are things that have to be done the way I want them to be done (i.e. the dishes have to be stacked in the cupboard just so).
However, I quickly realized that if I wanted my husband to take care of the twins on his own, I needed to let things go a little and not insist he do things exactly the way I would. It has mostly worked out. The only thing that he absolutely will not do is put bows in their hair.
He considers them to be brain squeezers and wants the little darlings to get into Harvard. I tell him we can’t afford Harvard anyway, but he still refuses to put the bows on their heads.
Basically, getting your husband to help means trusting him. You have to trust that he can, in fact, change the baby’s diaper, feed her, dress her, or what have you without doing irreparable harm. If you criticize what he does or nag him into doing it a certain way, he may back off of caring for the baby entirely.
After all, does it really matter if he fixes six ounces of formula instead of five even though you both know that the baby only eats five ounces? Probably not. Does it matter if he uses a regular towel instead of the cute baby towel with a hood? Absolutely not. Not that my husband and I have argued about either of the previous two things (I sound so convincing).
There are so many things that can come up in the course of taking care of a baby that at some point you just have to let go if you don’t want to go crazy. If your husband is able and willing to help, that going crazy thing is put off for a little bit. So be supportive. You’ll be surprised how far a little appreciation goes with the new dad. You might even be able to score what every new mom seems to want and need, time alone.
Show/Hide Comments
Show/Hide Comment Entry Form
