Stay At Home Partners

danibean19

FTM here! After much tinkering with our spreadsheet budget, we've decided that DH will stay at home with little one when I return to work after maternity leave. DH is excited/nervous/scared about becoming a father and part of that is that he has not been around a lot of babies. I have tons of nieces and nephew so I've been around babies since HS, so I think it intimidates him that I have more "experience" but that he'll be primary care-taker. 

For those with stay-at-home-partners or anyone in a similar dynamic, how did you help support and encourage your partner ahead of the birth (or after)? Really any advice you have on navigating this will be helpful! 

babyrummom

My husband gets 8 weeks paternity leave with his job, so he is going to take a couple weeks off at the beginning and then stay home with the baby on his own when I go back to work for the remainder 6 weeks. He knows other males in this situation and they have told him that doing it that way really helped them to bond with the baby. They felt like at the beginning it was harder to bond with the newborn, since it just wanted mom for the milk. The baby will be a little more interactive at the point that maternity leave ends. I think that maybe telling him that other guys who have stayed home with the baby felt that it strengthened the bond with the baby. 

mercury94

I’m taking maternity leave and then DH will be home with the baby for the summer (he’s a teacher). We already have a kid, so he knows what to expect more or less. He kept DS at home the first summer after his was born too. Neither of us had ever held a brand new baby before he was born, but you figure it out.

mflowers929

DH stays home with DS while I work and then works later in the day. DS was a little older when I went back (about 9 months) but honestly, I just kind of ran DH through what our schedule looked like at that point and then let him figure it out on his own. They've now got their own thing on days I work.