Husband as default parent?

[Anonymous]

I am a successful academic, a mom and the default parent. BUT, being the default parent has entailed considerable sacrifices during my academic career. I have male colleagues who are not the DP who are able to travel every summer on research trips, take sabbaticals abroad and attend multiple international conferences per year.

When my kids were little, I published like a fiend and did a great deal of academic reading and writing in bizarre venues (in the cafeteria at a local high school while my kids were in youth orchestra, in the stands at day long swim meets). I made it work. BUT I also had to play the mom card on occasion. For years I didn't teach evening graduate seminars because I needed to be home.

However, if your husband doesn't have tenure yet he needs to be on campus, doing all the crappy facetime things that we expect. He needs to attend other people's research presentations, volunteer to lead the club, etc.

We made it work in our family because we all sacrificed and pitched in to make sure mom got tenure. This meant a lot of frozen pizza and precooked chickens and crazy weekends where both parents drove kids to activities and did errands in between. It meant lower expectations for holiday decorating and meals and birthday parties and things. It also meant paying more for a house cleaner, online shopping, etc. because one person cannot do it all.

Even if you think you can convince your husband to kick back and put family first, the whole family needs to understand that until he gets tenure, you may be looking at a dirty house, etc. It also means teaching your kids to be independent as soon as humanly possible -- doing their own laundry by the age of 9, making their own lunches and not forgetting their crap and expecting someone to deliver it to school!

It will not be a walk in the park.

[Anonymous]

I am a successful academic, a mom and the default parent. BUT, being the default parent has entailed considerable sacrifices during my academic career. I have male colleagues who are not the DP who are able to travel every summer on research trips, take sabbaticals abroad and attend multiple international conferences per year.

When my kids were little, I published like a fiend and did a great deal of academic reading and writing in bizarre venues (in the cafeteria at a local high school while my kids were in youth orchestra, in the stands at day long swim meets). I made it work. BUT I also had to play the mom card on occasion. For years I didn't teach evening graduate seminars because I needed to be home.

However, if your husband doesn't have tenure yet he needs to be on campus, doing all the crappy facetime things that we expect. He needs to attend other people's research presentations, volunteer to lead the club, etc.

We made it work in our family because we all sacrificed and pitched in to make sure mom got tenure. This meant a lot of frozen pizza and precooked chickens and crazy weekends where both parents drove kids to activities and did errands in between. It meant lower expectations for holiday decorating and meals and birthday parties and things. It also meant paying more for a house cleaner, online shopping, etc. because one person cannot do it all.

Even if you think you can convince your husband to kick back and put family first, the whole family needs to understand that until he gets tenure, you may be looking at a dirty house, etc. It also means teaching your kids to be independent as soon as humanly possible -- doing their own laundry by the age of 9, making their own lunches and not forgetting their crap and expecting someone to deliver it to school!

It will not be a walk in the park.

[Anonymous]

It works for us. I probably am default parent 60% of the time (mostly due to my work schedule which allows me to be home during the day). And DH picks up a little extra with around the house stuff.

I was default parent for 3 years between SAHM and working part time. Then I went FT in an awesome but at times demanding job. DH stepped up in ways I couldn't imagine.

How is your DH normally? DH has always been good about reading what I need without my saying it. And he's always been good about following through on things. I'm also not super uptight so if he does things differently than I do, I don't care as long as it gets done. For these reasons I never had any concerns when he said he was going to step up on the "default" parenting.

[Anonymous]

Do not have a baby.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do not have a baby.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Long story short:

DW was a trailing spouse for first part of marriage for much longer than anticipated. Now DH has his desired job (academic), and DW is trying to get her career back on track after 4 years of disjointed work and freelancing. DW is 34, and it is time to have a baby, but DW doesn't want to permanently tank the possibility of a decent paying career. Therefore, DW wants DH to take on at minimum 50% childcare responsibilities while she tries to get promoted and work her way up the corporate ladder to a middle manager level. DH claims to be on board, but DW is concerned that in practice things will fall apart, in large part because she reads all of the sob stories on this board.

What say you?

Academia has excellent work life balance and allows for contributing in the home front.
Well done!
Try to get your wife a similar well paid, work life balance job! But first she might have to pay some dues, we can’t all have it as cushy as academics!

[Anonymous]

This totally worked for us. I had taken six years off with our young kids and after our last was born, I was ready to reenter the workforce. I knew it wouldn't be easy to do if I had to be the default parent, leave work early, etc. So DH took fully over as the default parent for a year and I really focused on my career. He cooked, drove the school/ pre-school carpools, coordinated kid schedules, took them to the doctor/ dentist, bought birthday presents, took them on activities, etc. We had a part-time nanny (20 hours week) and a weekly housekeeper so he had help but he managed her. That year was a godsend to my career. I know earn in the middle six figures and have a completely flexible schedule where I dictate my hours and have dropped back down to part-time hours (but can go full-time anytime I want). It can be done and my DH was amazing!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a successful academic, a mom and the default parent. BUT, being the default parent has entailed considerable sacrifices during my academic career. I have male colleagues who are not the DP who are able to travel every summer on research trips, take sabbaticals abroad and attend multiple international conferences per year.

When my kids were little, I published like a fiend and did a great deal of academic reading and writing in bizarre venues (in the cafeteria at a local high school while my kids were in youth orchestra, in the stands at day long swim meets). I made it work. BUT I also had to play the mom card on occasion. For years I didn't teach evening graduate seminars because I needed to be home.

However, if your husband doesn't have tenure yet he needs to be on campus, doing all the crappy facetime things that we expect. He needs to attend other people's research presentations, volunteer to lead the club, etc.

We made it work in our family because we all sacrificed and pitched in to make sure mom got tenure. This meant a lot of frozen pizza and precooked chickens and crazy weekends where both parents drove kids to activities and did errands in between. It meant lower expectations for holiday decorating and meals and birthday parties and things. It also meant paying more for a house cleaner, online shopping, etc. because one person cannot do it all.

Even if you think you can convince your husband to kick back and put family first, the whole family needs to understand that until he gets tenure, you may be looking at a dirty house, etc. It also means teaching your kids to be independent as soon as humanly possible -- doing their own laundry by the age of 9, making their own lunches and not forgetting their crap and expecting someone to deliver it to school!

It will not be a walk in the park.

OP here. Thank you for your perspective.

I think I am really having a hard time imagining exactly what having a kid will be like. My husband will get tenure (or get kicked out) well before our first kid is in kindergarten. I am picturing day care drop offs and pick ups and sick days being the major obstacles to either of us having uninterrupted work. Based on how I am imagining kids, don't the activities and really time consuming things start when the kids are a bit older? I am not planning on having a 3 year old do a lot of activities. Am I missing something in my perspective (serious question)?

I don't have high expectations around how the house is run. We have a roomba (LIFE SAVING), and we keep the house clutter free. I expect post baby we'll hire a twice monthly cleaner to do bathrooms and dusting.

I don't care about holiday decorating. I don't care about elaborate cooking.

Here is what I would want from my husband if we were to have a kid:

*Do child's laundry and put it away (I do his and mine currently to ensure we have unwrinkled work clothing). I figure he can do cotton children's clothing without too much trouble. I also don't care if the kid looks like a fashion icon or even matches.
*Do morning routine with child so I can get to the office early (I get most work done in AM as I am a morning person) and my office in general is morning office (Lot's of people leave by 3:30 or 4 to pick up kids at daycare).
*Clean up dinner, load and unload dishwasher in evenings (I am picturing that I would do daycare pickup, dinner and bedtime routine with child)
*Be primary contact with child's doctor and be the one responsible for keeping on top of that, arranging dr.'s appointments around his teaching and seminar schedule
*Be primarily contact with daycare in case child is sick, needs to be picked up early, etc. UNLESS it conflicts with his teaching schedule (his teaching requirement is 2-1, so as light as it gets)

Am I missing anything major or am I being unrealistic?

[Anonymous]

I think that sounds reasonable, OP.
It sounds sort of clinical though. I think that you don’t understand until it happens that having a baby is a little bit taking on a new huge job that and a little bit falling madly in love.
But I think that if you can stick to him doing drop off and you doing pick up, then you are doing better than I did about trying to make things 50/50.

[Anonymous]

Does your DH want to be the default parent? If not, it won’t work. If he DOES want to be the default parent? Then go for it, but allow him to figure out how to do all the things without micromanaging him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a successful academic, a mom and the default parent. BUT, being the default parent has entailed considerable sacrifices during my academic career. I have male colleagues who are not the DP who are able to travel every summer on research trips, take sabbaticals abroad and attend multiple international conferences per year.

When my kids were little, I published like a fiend and did a great deal of academic reading and writing in bizarre venues (in the cafeteria at a local high school while my kids were in youth orchestra, in the stands at day long swim meets). I made it work. BUT I also had to play the mom card on occasion. For years I didn't teach evening graduate seminars because I needed to be home.

However, if your husband doesn't have tenure yet he needs to be on campus, doing all the crappy facetime things that we expect. He needs to attend other people's research presentations, volunteer to lead the club, etc.

We made it work in our family because we all sacrificed and pitched in to make sure mom got tenure. This meant a lot of frozen pizza and precooked chickens and crazy weekends where both parents drove kids to activities and did errands in between. It meant lower expectations for holiday decorating and meals and birthday parties and things. It also meant paying more for a house cleaner, online shopping, etc. because one person cannot do it all.

Even if you think you can convince your husband to kick back and put family first, the whole family needs to understand that until he gets tenure, you may be looking at a dirty house, etc. It also means teaching your kids to be independent as soon as humanly possible -- doing their own laundry by the age of 9, making their own lunches and not forgetting their crap and expecting someone to deliver it to school!

It will not be a walk in the park.

OP here. Thank you for your perspective.

I think I am really having a hard time imagining exactly what having a kid will be like. My husband will get tenure (or get kicked out) well before our first kid is in kindergarten. I am picturing day care drop offs and pick ups and sick days being the major obstacles to either of us having uninterrupted work. Based on how I am imagining kids, don't the activities and really time consuming things start when the kids are a bit older? I am not planning on having a 3 year old do a lot of activities. Am I missing something in my perspective (serious question)?

I don't have high expectations around how the house is run. We have a roomba (LIFE SAVING), and we keep the house clutter free. I expect post baby we'll hire a twice monthly cleaner to do bathrooms and dusting.

I don't care about holiday decorating. I don't care about elaborate cooking.

Here is what I would want from my husband if we were to have a kid:

*Do child's laundry and put it away (I do his and mine currently to ensure we have unwrinkled work clothing). I figure he can do cotton children's clothing without too much trouble. I also don't care if the kid looks like a fashion icon or even matches.
*Do morning routine with child so I can get to the office early (I get most work done in AM as I am a morning person) and my office in general is morning office (Lot's of people leave by 3:30 or 4 to pick up kids at daycare).
*Clean up dinner, load and unload dishwasher in evenings (I am picturing that I would do daycare pickup, dinner and bedtime routine with child)
*Be primary contact with child's doctor and be the one responsible for keeping on top of that, arranging dr.'s appointments around his teaching and seminar schedule
*Be primarily contact with daycare in case child is sick, needs to be picked up early, etc. UNLESS it conflicts with his teaching schedule (his teaching requirement is 2-1, so as light as it gets)

Am I missing anything major or am I being unrealistic?

I think your basic framework is reasonable, but you're missing a lot of the intangible and asynchronous tasks of the default parent. These are the things that default parents complain dominate their head space and non-default parents don't see what the big deal is. So who will:

--chaperone field trips (our daycare started them at age 3 with chaperones required for all field trips)
--attend day care shows and parties
--cover sick days
--cover snow days (and other weird weather closings)
--cover random unexpected daycare closings like for a national day of mourning (hello Wednesday!) or a live action shooter drill
--earn the 20 service points that our preschool requires, from such activities as demonstrating something to the class or baking a dish for teacher appreciation day
--coordinate teacher holiday gifts and teacher appreciation week gifts
--track when your kid(s) need new shoes and clothes and buy them
--coordinate christmas and birthday gifts
--plan the kid(s) birthday parties
--coordinate attendance at other kids' birthday parties (and buy gifts for those parties)
--organize play dates (I thought I could skip this one, but my kid was suffering socially as early as preK3!!!)
--take kid(s) to the dentist
--interface with grandparents, including sending pictures as necessary
--take kid(s) to specialists like developmental pediatrician, speech therapist, etc., as necessary
--sign up for and take kid(s) to swimming lessons (I know you said you could skip extracurriculars, and we largely do, but swimming is a life skill, and it's best learned early, so hard to skip)
--take kid(s) for haircuts
--clip fingernails, put lotion on kid(s)
--sort through the school photos, order the ones you want, and send back the others
--call the health insurance to argue about a claim
--read about how to deal with a specific parenting challenge

Anyway, that's just off the top of my head things my husband and I have done in the last month or have coming up. I do have three kids under five, and it's definitely multiplicative, so if you're only planning on one, you and your husband will have to do all this stuff, but not as often. (Also, with such young kids, my list doesn't reflect whatever we will have to do once they're in elementary school.)

Personally, I love having kids, and I do probably 80% of the stuff listed above while working full time, so I wouldn't let this list prohibit you from having kids. But I would use it and others you might find via google as fodder for thought (or discussion with your husband).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a successful academic, a mom and the default parent. BUT, being the default parent has entailed considerable sacrifices during my academic career. I have male colleagues who are not the DP who are able to travel every summer on research trips, take sabbaticals abroad and attend multiple international conferences per year.

When my kids were little, I published like a fiend and did a great deal of academic reading and writing in bizarre venues (in the cafeteria at a local high school while my kids were in youth orchestra, in the stands at day long swim meets). I made it work. BUT I also had to play the mom card on occasion. For years I didn't teach evening graduate seminars because I needed to be home.

However, if your husband doesn't have tenure yet he needs to be on campus, doing all the crappy facetime things that we expect. He needs to attend other people's research presentations, volunteer to lead the club, etc.

We made it work in our family because we all sacrificed and pitched in to make sure mom got tenure. This meant a lot of frozen pizza and precooked chickens and crazy weekends where both parents drove kids to activities and did errands in between. It meant lower expectations for holiday decorating and meals and birthday parties and things. It also meant paying more for a house cleaner, online shopping, etc. because one person cannot do it all.

Even if you think you can convince your husband to kick back and put family first, the whole family needs to understand that until he gets tenure, you may be looking at a dirty house, etc. It also means teaching your kids to be independent as soon as humanly possible -- doing their own laundry by the age of 9, making their own lunches and not forgetting their crap and expecting someone to deliver it to school!

It will not be a walk in the park.

OP here. Thank you for your perspective.

I think I am really having a hard time imagining exactly what having a kid will be like. My husband will get tenure (or get kicked out) well before our first kid is in kindergarten. I am picturing day care drop offs and pick ups and sick days being the major obstacles to either of us having uninterrupted work. Based on how I am imagining kids, don't the activities and really time consuming things start when the kids are a bit older? I am not planning on having a 3 year old do a lot of activities. Am I missing something in my perspective (serious question)?

I don't have high expectations around how the house is run. We have a roomba (LIFE SAVING), and we keep the house clutter free. I expect post baby we'll hire a twice monthly cleaner to do bathrooms and dusting.

I don't care about holiday decorating. I don't care about elaborate cooking.

Here is what I would want from my husband if we were to have a kid:

*Do child's laundry and put it away (I do his and mine currently to ensure we have unwrinkled work clothing). I figure he can do cotton children's clothing without too much trouble. I also don't care if the kid looks like a fashion icon or even matches.
*Do morning routine with child so I can get to the office early (I get most work done in AM as I am a morning person) and my office in general is morning office (Lot's of people leave by 3:30 or 4 to pick up kids at daycare).
*Clean up dinner, load and unload dishwasher in evenings (I am picturing that I would do daycare pickup, dinner and bedtime routine with child)
*Be primary contact with child's doctor and be the one responsible for keeping on top of that, arranging dr.'s appointments around his teaching and seminar schedule
*Be primarily contact with daycare in case child is sick, needs to be picked up early, etc. UNLESS it conflicts with his teaching schedule (his teaching requirement is 2-1, so as light as it gets)

Am I missing anything major or am I being unrealistic?

I think your basic framework is reasonable, but you're missing a lot of the intangible and asynchronous tasks of the default parent. These are the things that default parents complain dominate their head space and non-default parents don't see what the big deal is. So who will:

--chaperone field trips (our daycare started them at age 3 with chaperones required for all field trips)
--attend day care shows and parties
--cover sick days
--cover snow days (and other weird weather closings)
--cover random unexpected daycare closings like for a national day of mourning (hello Wednesday!) or a live action shooter drill
--earn the 20 service points that our preschool requires, from such activities as demonstrating something to the class or baking a dish for teacher appreciation day
--coordinate teacher holiday gifts and teacher appreciation week gifts
--track when your kid(s) need new shoes and clothes and buy them
--coordinate christmas and birthday gifts
--plan the kid(s) birthday parties
--coordinate attendance at other kids' birthday parties (and buy gifts for those parties)
--organize play dates (I thought I could skip this one, but my kid was suffering socially as early as preK3!!!)
--take kid(s) to the dentist
--interface with grandparents, including sending pictures as necessary
--take kid(s) to specialists like developmental pediatrician, speech therapist, etc., as necessary
--sign up for and take kid(s) to swimming lessons (I know you said you could skip extracurriculars, and we largely do, but swimming is a life skill, and it's best learned early, so hard to skip)
--take kid(s) for haircuts
--clip fingernails, put lotion on kid(s)
--sort through the school photos, order the ones you want, and send back the others
--call the health insurance to argue about a claim
--read about how to deal with a specific parenting challenge

Anyway, that's just off the top of my head things my husband and I have done in the last month or have coming up. I do have three kids under five, and it's definitely multiplicative, so if you're only planning on one, you and your husband will have to do all this stuff, but not as often. (Also, with such young kids, my list doesn't reflect whatever we will have to do once they're in elementary school.)

Personally, I love having kids, and I do probably 80% of the stuff listed above while working full time, so I wouldn't let this list prohibit you from having kids. But I would use it and others you might find via google as fodder for thought (or discussion with your husband).

Another one: find and cultivate relationships with occasional babysitters, and then coordinate and schedule with them for date nights and other events. (I find that this is almost necessarily a mom job because dads coordinating with young women is just too complicated/uncomfortable. And all the babysitters we've found are young women. And, yes, I object to all the gendered assumptions here, but this is the world we live in.)

[Anonymous]

Most of the above list is optional at best and ridiculous at worst. Who cares about teacher gifts for a three year old or sending photos to grandparents. They’re things you do only if you have time. Which you won’t. And you don’t need to take a preschooler to the dentist. We do first visits at 5 years old and it’s a half hour thing, no big deal.

Will you be breastfeeding or pumping, OP? Brushing teeth. Spoon feeding toddlers. Wiping up the floor. Those types of things are bigger issues because they’re every day multiple times.

[Anonymous]

Why have kids if you don't want to be a parent or do household chores?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why have kids if you don't want to be a parent or do household chores?

Why respond if you only have the reading comprehension of a 5th grader?