Having a baby ain’t easy.
In fact most parents will tell you about all the things they learned no one ever warned them about.
What people always neglect to discuss is the difficulty.
Besides the physical burden, those first few months can be exhausting and stressful.
And beautiful of course, but not without issues…
Case in point…
Redditor rayzrisme wanted to discuss their story for some feedback. So naturally they came to visit the “Am I The A**hole” (AITA) subReddit.
They asked:
“AITA for asking my wife to take care of our newborn during the night hours while she is on maternity leave?”
The Original Poster (OP) explained:
“My wife works at a company that gives 16 weeks of paid maternity leave.”
“I only asked her that during that 16 week time period that she take care of the baby during the midnight hours while I sleep, since I have to wake for work M-F.”
“I told her that after I get off work I will take over entirely, do all chores, cook, take care of the baby and even more so on weekends where I have no issue staying up late, waking up early or multiple times in the night for her to catch up on all of her needed rest.”
“I also know that some nights even if I’m working I will stay up with the baby.”
“But she still thinks it’s unfair if it’s not an even split, which I disagree with.”
“Be honest I may be the a**hole I just want opinions.”
Redditors shared their thoughts on this matter and weighed some options to the question AITA?:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
Redditors declared our OP WAS the A**hole.
It’s a tricky situation.
Let’s hear some thoughts…
“YTA. What exactly is she doing during the day while you’re at work? Daydreaming?”
“Looking after a newborn during the day, alone, is stressful.”
“She’ll be deeply postpartum, healing, and you expect her to get up every night Monday-Friday.”
“I get it. You’re working. I’m the breadwinner in the family.”
“But you know what you get at work? An entire lunch break to do whatever you want.”
“You get to piss whenever you want.”
“If something is over your head, you have colleague’s to help you.”
“Your office isn’t dependant completely on you.”
“Looking after a child is emotionally and mentally draining, far more than work.”
“Those tiny humans can bring you to your knees in an hour on a bad day. “
‘You get to walk out of the office and leave work behind.”
“Even when you come home, her work is still there. Screaming.”
“Man up and help out at night.” ~ Comprehensive_Food35
“My wife took a year off when we had each of our 2 children.”
“After a time, she started expressing milk and I could feed my boys with a bottle.”
“They both used to wake up early and she would want to feed them, so I used to feed them at night when they were asleep at about 1am (I think it’s called ‘dream feeding’?!).”
“This allowed her to get a good nights sleep, but also allowed me to as well.”
“It all worked out pretty good.”
“I think the key to raising a family is communication and teamwork.” ~ SirLostit
“When I was on maternity leave (female) I wish I got to go to work.”
“Babies are so hard. I think you don’t understand how hard and lonely taking care of a newborn is.”
“I know being sleep deprived sucks at work but it’s even worse watching a baby.”
“Trust me. I’ve done both once I went back to work.”
“YTA, but this is an easy fix. Wake up in the night to help.” ~ AndiMarieCali
“While I will grant you, you are right for the most part, I will argue that it also depends on his job.”
“Which I can’t make out from the post above.”
“Speaking for myself, I tried as much as i could to let my partner sleep during the night while on leave.”
“Considering he is a courier, and drives around all day.”
“Him being sleep deprived is a hazard.”
“So if OP is working heavy machinery, or driving around all day.”
“I don’t think his request is unreasonable.” ~ Fun_Macaroon9841
“Jumping in this. YTA.”
“Yes every situation is different and yes some jobs are dangerous without rest and should be factored in but maternity leave is not vacation.”
“My baby never slept except for in my arms until 4 months old, she cried constantly unless being held.”
“I got zero rest or break all day.”
“Every family is different but this guy is an AH for assuming that she can take all night duties before even knowing if they will have a colicky, low weight baby that gets chicken pox at 4 weeks old resulting in pure torture.”
“My husband got shingles when she was 2 weeks and couldn’t help, then he went back to work and i took night shifts so he could rest.”
“It was f**king awful and looking back I should never put myself in that situation because I became so exhausted and unbalanced it could also have been dangerous to the baby.”
“I spent several sleepless night just sobbing on the moms 24 hr hotline.” ~ chi_30
“She needs rest just as much as you do.”
“Getting a bit of sleep on weekends doesn’t come close to making up for being up nights all week.”
“Also in a few short weeks she will presumably be going back to work so you both are going to have to do nights then.”
“Might as well start how you mean to finish.”
“I think I’m going with NAH because working out newborn care is really hard.”
“But you need to consider that she is also healing physically from a pretty big event and needs sleep to heal just as much as you need sleep to work.” ~ katiejanestitsandass
“YTA, the way I see it, your wife is going to have a ‘job’ on daytime taking care of the baby and the house, with a newborn.”
“I call this a job considering the huge amount of mental and physical work it takes, while recovering from pregnancy, while you have your job on daytime as well.”
“Except you ask her to do this ‘job’ while not having at least 1 night of full rest which means a daytime job AND a nighttime job AND health recovery at the same time with your support only on weekends.”
“To me it doesn’t add up.”
“Sleep is important especially while recovering, your support and involvement is important from the very start.” ~ Maynon_ShellCity
I mean I don’t have a kid, just as a disclaimer.
“But here are my thoughts – you’ll both be working during the day.”
“She’ll be with the baby all day, you’re at your place of employment.”
“You get home and you’ll get help out.”
“Great. And then after…?”
“You’re saying she has to keep working through the night, while you get to sleep.”
“She needs to sleep too though.”
“So yes, you should also be helping out during the night because otherwise it’s her working basically 24/7 and you’re not.”
“And that’s not fair.”
“Suck it up because you’re both going to be sleep-deprived, but you need to do this together.”
“Figure it out. A soft YTA. Good luck with the baby!” ~ DaleCoopersWife
“OP should be doing more than a 50/50 split.”
“How is she supposed to heal when she can’t rest physically or mentally?”
“Soft YTA. It’s f**ked that we don’t give the non-birthing parent adequate time off to co-parent and that the birthing parent only has a couple months to heal while also keeping a newborn alive.”
“This makes it impossible for both parents to stay healthy and get adequate sleep.”
“But given that this is the situation, you gotta do more man.” ~ doubledoublebubble69
“YTA. If I may make a suggestion from my maternity leave…”
“My husband would get home by 6, I went immediately to bed, he handles kiddo til midnight, I get up then and he sleeps midnight to 6 am, when he gets up for work.”
“It’s not 8 hours for anyone, but then that’s not possible with a new baby.”
“Fortunately my kid was sleeping thru the night by 5 months so we could get back to sleeping all night.”
“Edit: thanks for the award, must credit my husband for the idea, my post pregnancy brain thought I had to be super mom and do it myself.”
“I can blame the lack of sleep, right?” ~ DiscountKnown6388
“YTA. The implication here that it is more important for you to be well-rested because your job is more important than hers is gross.”
“Just because she is on maternity leave doesn’t mean she isn’t working.”
“She’s working to keep the tiny human you two brought into the world alive!”
“She deserves just as much sleep as you.”
“When you are home you share 50% of the responsibility.”
“That includes at night. Having work the next day doesn’t excuse you from raising your child.” ~ a_toxic_rose
Looks like OP may need to lose some nights sleep.
Seems like it comes with the territory.
Hopefully OP and wife can move past this quickly and find a way to support one another and baby, with sleep.