Should I excuse DH from nighttime duties?

[Anonymous]

I would talk to your husband about what he thinks. At 4 weeks old, I wasn’t yet pumping and I had to do all the nighttime feeds. It did not make sense for my husband to get up. I also was able to sleep or rest when the baby did during the day. If you are not able to do so, that is a totally different matter.

I guess the question is what does he do now during the night and will both of you be negatively impacted if this changes.

When my oldest was that age my husband was working in person and I was not yet pumping. There was literally nothing he could offer middle of the night. We did the late/early shift. He is naturally a night person. He stayed up until late and I slept early. I did the two middle of the night feedings. When I started back to work at 9 weeks pp, my baby was sleeping until 6am without waking. On the nights that he did wake, we took turns. It worked out fine.

[Anonymous]

Yes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think you should say that you will try to handle all the night stuff after he goes back to work, but let him know that you might ask for him to pitch in again if things get gnarly.

I tried to take over all the nighttime stuff when my DH went back to work at 6 weeks. However, my DS had a mini-sleep regression right around that time and I ended up asking him to help on a couple of really bad nights (specifically when DS wouldn't go back to sleep after nursing and had been up multiple times). Things can change quickly for the better/worse very quickly, so just manage DH's expectations in terms of him being completely off the hook.

If you need to DH to step up for a particularly bad night it is easier for him to do that if he is starting out fresh. Sometimes whipping out the razor and ruler to cut the pie exactly 50-50 will bite you in the azz.

OP it sounds like you don't need it, so don't ask for it. Give your DH the benefit of the doubt he will step up in the future if the need arises. If he's reluctant to do that he will be shrinking away from night duty anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Depends on your need for sleep vs. his. My husband is useless at night. He is slow to wake and grumpy when he doesn’t sleep. I did all night wakings for both kids for 18 mo each. When I weaned them, I had him take over most of the time and by then it wasn't every night. In his defense, I have never washed a bottle or a pump part and he changed 80% of the poopy diapers.

Mine needs 9 hours of sleep. If I made him get up every night he would be a wreck. Occasionally I have a crappy night and I will wake him at 7am then I will drug myself baby benadryl and get in a solid nap (he has the option of working late shifts).

[Anonymous]

If you are on maternity leave, taking care of baby is your job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH's should never be allowed to entirely abscond night duty unless they have a job where specifically being exhausted could be a physical danger (like truck driving or something).

Keep them as involved in the labor as mom from day 1 and then when your kids are 2/3/4/5/6/7 etc they will still be pulling equal weight.

+1 Split the night into early and late and let him pick. But he still needs to do some nighttime stuff. When you go back to work do you imagine he will be fine starting to wake up again after getting used to sleeping through the cries? No, he will not. It will be completely established as belonging to your pile of work, and you will suddenly be doing all the night work along with a job. And then the daytime childcare when you're both home will be split 50/50 if you're lucky. And it will all feel fair to him and breed resentment for you.

This. It sets the pattern for everything that comes after. My husband has a very demanding job, but still ultimately an office job, not out there performing surgery or driving all day or whatever - he regularly took some night feedings from day one. Now that I’m back at my equally demanding job, I absolutely believe that this set us up for a very equal division of childcare labor because he was already super familiar with baby care tasks and had been involved in them for every day of our child’s life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are on maternity leave, taking care of baby is your job.

Sure, during the hours when I would otherwise be doing my regular job. For nights and weekends, it’s our shared job.

[Anonymous]

DH and I actually had different routines for all 3 kids. With the first baby he helped with some night times but not the majority. With DC2 he helped with diaper changes for almost all middle of the night feedings and with DC3 he was literally unable to wake up at all (which was kind of funny to me since I didn't really need help but could remember him popping up each time DC2 had woken up). I excused DH happily with DC3 since it was clear that he was always going to be involved and helpful, but I do see PPs points about not setting a trend to allow DH to be uninvolved.

As long as you're clear on expectations and each parent is trying to do what they can to keep everything running smoothly, then I don't think worrying about exactly what you or DH are doing is too important. DH and I have figured out how to divide what needs to be done and try to keep things balanced but we don't worry too much if it's exactly 50/50.

[Anonymous]

You can change the routine but he still needs to help. Otherwise you are setting a bad precedent for his role in terms of the kids and sharing the hard stuff. Your sleep is important too if you are caring for baby and esp if driving etc.

Unless he's working with heavy machinery or a surgeon or something, most desk jobs are easier than being home with a baby. I say this as a FT working mom.

[Anonymous]

We split it up. Actually slept in separate rooms and rotated every two nights so that the 'off' person actually got sleep. Although, your having 5-6 hours of help a day changes a lot, so if your husband can understand he needs to step up when you're back to work, I might cut him some slack. Maybe let him take both Friday and Saturday and then Tuesday nights?

Really depends on if you trust the dynamic to change when your leave ends and only you know that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes if you are home On maternity leave and have help during the day and he’s working, he should be able to get a good night’s sleep.

This. It would have been different had your mom was not able to help during the day. DH can do his part at times that are less disruptive to his sleep either early morning or the evening / early night. With our first, dh used to do the evening shift (I’d feed & go to sleep 7pm - 1 am) while he burps / changes, but then I’d wake up for the 1 and at 4 am for full shift (feed, burp, change). I was breastfeeding, & would need to be up anyway, so didn’t make sense to wake him up as well. But it also depends on baby’s schedule, your supply, if you’re bf / pumping / formula feeding, if baby is going through growth spurt & wakes up more often, or if seems to have colic and is crying longer… so, if all is well, let him sleep.

[Anonymous]

Normally I would say split things 50-50, but you have such a huge amount of help during the day, which is awesome, I would do night feedings for now while you have the help and are on maternity leave during the week. On weekends you and he should split overnight duties. One week before your leave is over, I would split duties with him for good so he does the 11 PM feed, for example, and you do the 4AM one or whatever works for you.

[Anonymous]

I think it's an amazingly poor decision to choose a lifestyle where neither of the parents is a fully rested functional adult

[Anonymous]

I don’t understand why you needed your mom every day for one baby when DH has been home until now? But either way, you should pump or do formula so he can do at least one/two feedings in 24 hours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DH's should never be allowed to entirely abscond night duty unless they have a job where specifically being exhausted could be a physical danger (like truck driving or something).

Keep them as involved in the labor as mom from day 1 and then when your kids are 2/3/4/5/6/7 etc they will still be pulling equal weight.

DW's should never be allowed to entirely abscond income earning duty unless they are disabled.

Keep them involved in the labor market as dad from day 1 and when your kids are 2/3/4/5/6/7 etc they will still be pulling equal weight.

I mean, I suggested upthread that it’s fine fir the person in leave to handle overnights so the person with work in the morning can sleep. But this is idiotic on its face.

OP has a job and is on maternity leave. If that leave is paid, she has not for one day stopped contributing financially. And her DH just completed his own one month leave. So by your logic, as long as OP has a paycheck coming in, I guess her DH should have to split the nighttime duties. Actually, maybe they can split them proportionally based on how much they make, because sleep is a rewarded for making money, obviously.

I honestly think a major reason many women leave the work force when they have kids is because they realize how little help they will get from their husbands at home and just don’t think they can work if they are going to also do 70-80% of the childcare and housework when they are not working. So if as a DH your main goal is to make sure DW goes back to work, it’s actually in your interest to do as much childcare as possible, even when she’s still on leave, so she sees that you will be an equal partner.