Husband as default parent?

[Anonymous]

Despite doing all the important things for the kids, there will always be at least one thing that wasn't done the way DW would have done it, which equates to he's a lousy father. Don't be that DW/mom.

As long as you (DW) keep your ego in check about how things get done (it only matters that things get done in a timely way), let all the other BS and mommy-drama crap go (there is a TON of this sh*t all over the DMV).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the originator of the default parent list a few posts ago, and I just thought I'd clarify a few things.

First, I never said that everything was **mandatory.** I even noted that some things like swimming lessons are optional. Birthday party attendance and hosting is obviously optional as well; I just personally can't imagine not letting my kid go to birthday parties.

Second, I sincerely hope that you never wake up to text messages from your mom asking for a picture of your toddler in the shirt she just sent, or an email from your mother-in-law complaining that the dropbox link you sent her "doesn't work," and she needs access to the photos so she can make a photo book. If you either don't get these messages or can ignore them, fantastic. They just happen to take a fair amount of bandwidth for me and my husband. (Fortunately, he deals with his mom's tech issues!!)

Third, there are definitely childcare options that don't require as much backup coverage as daycare does! Hiring a nanny probably gets more days covered overall. We've done both daycare and nanny, and I found that nanny had its own set of costs. You have to find, hire, and socialize this person. She might leave and only give you two weeks notice, and then you find yourself scrambling and probably covering some days in between nannies. And you have to be someone's "manager," which I found I just didn't have any patience for in my personal life. So, although daycare has a lot of closures, I like that they are mostly more predictable than a nanny's absences.

The daycare coverage issue is also mitigated if you have local grandparents or other family who can help in a pinch. That just doesn't happen to be our situation.

Anyway, you can argue with my list. Those are all things that have come up in my family recently, but some of them probably are not mandatory. And goodness knows we do a craptastic job with a lot of them--hair cuts and nail clipping in particular.

Except going to the dentist. I'm not arguing about that one, and I'm not waiting until my kid is FIVE to go to the dentist.

The flabbergasting thing to me about what you wrote is how you considered what I would call optional (chaperoning a field trip for daycare!! LOL) mandatory, and what I would call mandatory (swim lessons if child is going to be near a pool) optional.

Oh, I should have explained better. In our case, chaperoning **was** mandatory when our kid was three. The whole class went on field trips, and three year olds each had to have their own chaperone. It was pretty absurd, and they subsequently scaled back the field trips pretty dramatically, so I think a lot of us must have complained.

And swim lessons are not optional in my family. I was just saying that others might consider them optional.

you are certifiably bat sh*t crazy. your list is completely absurd and so much of that plays to your own vanity and is absolutely not a necessity

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm the originator of the default parent list a few posts ago, and I just thought I'd clarify a few things.

First, I never said that everything was **mandatory.** I even noted that some things like swimming lessons are optional. Birthday party attendance and hosting is obviously optional as well; I just personally can't imagine not letting my kid go to birthday parties.

Second, I sincerely hope that you never wake up to text messages from your mom asking for a picture of your toddler in the shirt she just sent, or an email from your mother-in-law complaining that the dropbox link you sent her "doesn't work," and she needs access to the photos so she can make a photo book. If you either don't get these messages or can ignore them, fantastic. They just happen to take a fair amount of bandwidth for me and my husband. (Fortunately, he deals with his mom's tech issues!!)

Third, there are definitely childcare options that don't require as much backup coverage as daycare does! Hiring a nanny probably gets more days covered overall. We've done both daycare and nanny, and I found that nanny had its own set of costs. You have to find, hire, and socialize this person. She might leave and only give you two weeks notice, and then you find yourself scrambling and probably covering some days in between nannies. And you have to be someone's "manager," which I found I just didn't have any patience for in my personal life. So, although daycare has a lot of closures, I like that they are mostly more predictable than a nanny's absences.

The daycare coverage issue is also mitigated if you have local grandparents or other family who can help in a pinch. That just doesn't happen to be our situation.

Anyway, you can argue with my list. Those are all things that have come up in my family recently, but some of them probably are not mandatory. And goodness knows we do a craptastic job with a lot of them--hair cuts and nail clipping in particular.

Except going to the dentist. I'm not arguing about that one, and I'm not waiting until my kid is FIVE to go to the dentist.

The flabbergasting thing to me about what you wrote is how you considered what I would call optional (chaperoning a field trip for daycare!! LOL) mandatory, and what I would call mandatory (swim lessons if child is going to be near a pool) optional.

Oh, I should have explained better. In our case, chaperoning **was** mandatory when our kid was three. The whole class went on field trips, and three year olds each had to have their own chaperone. It was pretty absurd, and they subsequently scaled back the field trips pretty dramatically, so I think a lot of us must have complained.

And swim lessons are not optional in my family. I was just saying that others might consider them optional.

you are certifiably bat sh*t crazy. your list is completely absurd and so much of that plays to your own vanity and is absolutely not a necessity

I just want to say that I am the person who said I was flabbergasted but I did not write the above!

[Anonymous]

What is so crazy about the list? Are the people who responded not parents yet? Because it seemed like a pretty realistic list of what is expected of parents today.

[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).

JHC. Not enough criticism can be made for this post.

To begin with, you over-complicate life a LOT. Your list is made of up things that fall into these categories:

- take absolutely minimal effort (literally minutes)
- unnecessary
- Are not representative of all situation

Did you really put "put lotion on" as something you do that is noteworthy? Where is "get child dressed"?

Good grief.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is so crazy about the list? Are the people who responded not parents yet? Because it seemed like a pretty realistic list of what is expected of parents today.

parent of 3 teens/pre-teens. this list is just plain stupid and does nothing more than to make yourself feel socially equal/superior to others. Majority of those things are not essential or even necessary and zero bearing on the well-being of any child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is so crazy about the list? Are the people who responded not parents yet? Because it seemed like a pretty realistic list of what is expected of parents today.

parent of 3 teens/pre-teens. this list is just plain stupid and does nothing more than to make yourself feel socially equal/superior to others. Majority of those things are not essential or even necessary and zero bearing on the well-being of any child.

To me, it's not the actual doing of things, it's keeping track of everything -- the mental load. That is the burden of the default parent -- who must remember that now is the time to schedule the doctor appointment or else she's booked up and you need that school med form, to keep an eye on that rash, to bring in money to contribute to the teacher gift, to buy a present for the birthday party that weekend. So many things to remember. So that list seemed realistic to me.

Sure, you can opt out of things, but sometimes it is an effort to do so and you might be cut of a lot of things. Do I have to contribute to the teacher gift? No, but seems rather selfish of me to do so. Do I need to go to the birthday party or the playdate? No, but it's polite to respond and tell the person who invited me that we are not coming. My child may be upset that she didn't get to go to the party, I will have to deal with that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is so crazy about the list? Are the people who responded not parents yet? Because it seemed like a pretty realistic list of what is expected of parents today.

I also thought it seemed pretty realistic.

[Anonymous]

Originator of the list again. I think it's interesting that I'm being called absurd and much worse, but there's no clear consensus emerging about which items on my list most parents don't do.

And, yes, these tasks are mundane and trivial. That was my understanding of the default parent concept--those thankless tasks that don't often figure into a big account of the work of parenting but nonetheless need to happen.

My list was prompted by the OP's very straightforward accounting for a division of the big tasks of parenthood. She asked if she missed anything. I listed things I've done recently. If OP and her husband could look at my list and say "nah, we don't need to do most of that stuff--don't care about birthday parties, don't have grandparents to navigate, wouldn't want to give teachers gifts," then that's cool. They don't have to worry about who is going to do what. I can also imagine other ways that conversation might go.

And, yes, the lotion was probably too absurd out of context. I happen to have a kid with severe eczema, so it's been a long journey of creams and lotions and bathing routines to find the right balance that keeps his flare ups in check (and avoids infection). If I were OP, I would want to think about whether my husband would pay attention to this developing skin care routine and do his part of it in the mornings.

Of course, OP's kid's thing won't be eczema; none of this stuff is predictable. So, in OP's case, if she wants to re-invest herself in her career, it's important to know that her husband will step up to whichever these challenges or inconveniences emerge. In short, can she settle in to work in the morning, knowing that her husband will routinely get their kid to daycare without interrupting her to ask, "which lotion do I use this morning?"

[Anonymous]

I'm a divorced guy who was the default parent before my divorce and 50/50 now. I think that the list is a realistic representation of everything. Especially if a kid has special needs, but even if not, there is just a ton to do.

As for OP, I expect she will end up divorced like me. If you're so focused on your career, and keeping track of everything on a score keeping basis, your resentment will only grow and grow, especially when you misscore a situation (which both sides do). I think you can make the two working full time parent situation work if you are both devoted to help each other as much as possible and presume the other person is doing what they can. But I don't get the sense that is your situation. I don't mean to be critical, it just is what happened to me, so I wanted to share my perspective. All that said, I love being a dad, mental load et al., and wouldn't give it up for the world, even if I had known it would lead to divorce.

[Anonymous]

I wrote the prior post and wanted to add: I wrote this after cleaning the house for an hour because a friend of my son has lice and slept over a couple of nights ago. Stuff like this happens occasionally. It's why I think the PP's list is real.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm a divorced guy who was the default parent before my divorce and 50/50 now. I think that the list is a realistic representation of everything. Especially if a kid has special needs, but even if not, there is just a ton to do.

As for OP, I expect she will end up divorced like me. If you're so focused on your career, and keeping track of everything on a score keeping basis, your resentment will only grow and grow, especially when you misscore a situation (which both sides do). I think you can make the two working full time parent situation work if you are both devoted to help each other as much as possible and presume the other person is doing what they can. But I don't get the sense that is your situation. I don't mean to be critical, it just is what happened to me, so I wanted to share my perspective. All that said, I love being a dad, mental load et al., and wouldn't give it up for the world, even if I had known it would lead to divorce.

OP here. Thank you for your perspective.

I don't want to keep score, and I don't want a career for my ego. I just want to feel financially safe and not dead-tired from never having a minute to relax for the next 25 years. Honestly, I should have married someone in industry and not an academic, but I do love my husband and he is a good person, so I am lucky in those ways.

I don't have a crystal ball. Right now I am working on simply unloading the things that got shifted to me during period that I was a trailing spouse. My DH got very used to me doing everything, physically and mentally. It is an adjustment for him to have to keep track of things on the home front, but after a lot of conversations and some fighting, he is really making some encouraging adjustments. A big part of this transition is also me just letting go mentally of some of the responsibilities (for example, we need a plumber for a non-emergency situation and I have asked DH to handle it - I need to just let it go now and not be the "manager" of that situation).

Regarding "the list" of pp (lol), I get that there are just an endless number of little incidentals that require mental load when kids arrive, I really do. It does scare me, but my DH has expressed explicit willingness to handle a significant portion of it (he badly wants a baby and looks forward to it). If I back off and have faith, he'll manage fine (maybe not exactly how I would do it, but he is a supremely responsible and conscientious person).

I think your point is really good about presuming the other person is doing what they can instead of attributing malice or laziness or selfishness to them. There is a lot of research to back that point up (you may have seen it yourself). I should really get that tatooed on me honestly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^ That list is ridiculous. Lots of shit just made up to seem busy.

"Interface with grandparents"? Get over yourself.

I don’t know. If I didn’t prod DH we would never send holiday cards or call his family.

Are holiday cards REALLY that important?

It’s this attitude that minimizes emotional labor. I agree, holiday cards are not that important, sending a picture is not that important, writing one thank you note is note is not that important, planning one visit is not that important.

No individual action is that important, but if nobody does any of this, then pretty soon you have grandparents who have no relationship with their grandchildren. Most people don’t want to become estranged from their families through inertia. Your attitude is exactly why women get so frustrated when conversations about emotional labor comes up. It’s easy to ridicule each individual action, but it’s pure drudgery to have to always be the one to think about this stuff.

These are tasks that only get noticed when they are not done. There is no appreciation for doing it and only blame when it gets overlooked - “What? How hard is it to write my mom a thank you note? You couldn’t spend 3 minutes doing that?”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^ That list is ridiculous. Lots of shit just made up to seem busy.

"Interface with grandparents"? Get over yourself.

I don’t know. If I didn’t prod DH we would never send holiday cards or call his family.

Are holiday cards REALLY that important?

It’s this attitude that minimizes emotional labor. I agree, holiday cards are not that important, sending a picture is not that important, writing one thank you note is note is not that important, planning one visit is not that important.

No individual action is that important, but if nobody does any of this, then pretty soon you have grandparents who have no relationship with their grandchildren. Most people don’t want to become estranged from their families through inertia. Your attitude is exactly why women get so frustrated when conversations about emotional labor comes up. It’s easy to ridicule each individual action, but it’s pure drudgery to have to always be the one to think about this stuff.

These are tasks that only get noticed when they are not done. There is no appreciation for doing it and only blame when it gets overlooked - “What? How hard is it to write my mom a thank you note? You couldn’t spend 3 minutes doing that?”

OP here - wow, I now have another thing to be grateful for today because none of my or DH’s close relatives would require formalities, would be proactice about keeping contact, and would be understanding about the stress on a family with kids.

[Anonymous]

The previous list is for stay at home parents, not the default parent between dual working spouses. Also, some parents may split morning & evening routine, not defaulting to one parent.

*I have three kids, and both my spouse and I have always held full time jobs. I was the default parent from 2002-2013. My husband has been the default parent for the past five years.

Morning parent
--basic daily morning hygiene
--breakfast & clean up
--backpack and any special items for school
--school/daycare drop off

Default parent during working hours
--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
--any school/daycare calls or concerns
--take kid(s) to the dentist
--take kid(s) to doctor
--parent teacher conferences if both parents cannot attend

Evening parent
--school/daycare pickup
--dinner & clean up
--homework/backpack cleanout
--evening hygiene (bath, teeth clip fingernails, put lotion on kid(s)

Weekend items that either parent or both parents handle
--plan the kid(s) birthday parties (kids do not need large parties each year. Most years are family dinner, gifts and a cake.)
--coordinate attendance at other kids' birthday parties (buy a box of cards off of Amazon, buy cheap giftcards or keep a few books on hand for parties)
--organize play dates (when life is super busy scratch this altogether)
--sign up for and take kid(s) to extracurricular (though make it easier by having all young kids to do the same activity whether than be swimming, soccer, etc./limit to one activity per kid)
--call the health insurance to argue about a claim (my husband has always handled this, even when I was the default parent)
--split chores among all family members. Even toddlers have minor responsibilities.

**Each spouse manages their own parents. Neither my in-laws nor my parents require any special hand holding, and when my kids were little, they were even more understanding. They definitely do not play into any Monday-Friday daily routine.