DH Vent about helping LO learn

cynthia2007 · May 2014

Ladies, are your DH very involved in the teaching/learning for LO? DH and I got into fight last night about this. I do just about everything for LO between feeding, dressing, bathing, daycare etc and do all of her physical therapy exercises with her. The one thing I ask him to do is to when he's holding her (when I give her to him so I can get something done and he puts his damn cell phone down) that he practice words with her and learning because repetition is the only way she'll learn it. Like learning what's her nose, ear, etc. He'll do it like twice and then stop bc she's not following it...well duh, she has to hear it over and over again to learn.

I know he loves her but he's lazy when it comes to her development and it pisses me off! Are other DH's like this???

momofcatan · May 2014

In our house I'm the one that is lazy with teaching LO things and DH is the one trying to do that kind of stuff. DD is really getting the short end of the stick being stuck with me all day....

ETA to add: Since DH only gets to see DD for such a short amount of time after work I only encourage him to spend time with her and interact with her. It's up to him how he wants to do that. Now that DD is crawling he love chasing her around and playing peekaboo behind walls. It's adorable and they both enjoy it. But as I said, I'm pretty lax on the whole "learning" thing at this age. I think she will pick is stuff up whether we spend hours repeating it to her or not (especially since she will be starting DC with lots of older kids soon)

ASmallWonder · May 2014

You guys aren't going to parent the same and that's ok. As long as she's not growing up in a mute environment, devoid of any interaction with people, she'll learn that stuff. They're still really, really young to put so much focus on "teaching." Their entire world is a classroom. Don't stress

nikel13 · May 2014

I guess I don't think about devoting a bunch of time to learning. I take things very naturally and just let them happen. H has been working with Lily and talking, but mainly because he wanted her to say "I love you, mommy" on mother's day. She has the intonation, but not the enunciation. I feel like babies do well if they are learning while they play. Maybe see if there are some games that your H and LO can play together that covertly lets LO learn.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

WasNotWas · May 2014

I'm de-lurking to respond to this...have you ever met a 5 year old who doesn't know where their ear is? Kids will learn at their own pace and it sounds like you are putting a lot of pressure on yourself, your H, and your kid to learn, rather than to grow...if you want YH to get involved, let him find his way...it will help him to bond with your LO and that is much more important than identifying body parts

ASmallWonder · May 2014

WasNotWas said:

I'm de-lurking to respond to this...have you ever met a 5 year old who doesn't know where their ear is? Kids will learn at their own pace and it sounds like you are putting a lot of pressure on yourself, your H, and your kid to learn, rather than to grow...if you want YH to get involved, let him find his way...it will help him to bond with your LO and that is much more important than identifying body parts

Snort. But so true.

cynthia2007 · May 2014

Thanks ladies. Great outside insight and I see your points about just letting her grow and learn on her own pace. I'm just so paranoid because i feel shes already so behind now bc shes not pulling to stand, crawling or walking yet and she's almost 11 months.

@CL8badB‌, the book suggestion is definitely a good idea, I will try.

jmcgra06 · May 2014

I might be misreading your post, but the original post reminded me a little bit of how I was feeling on vacation with DD and DH this week. DH works from home a lot, and he has a really hard time putting down the blackberry and just going on vacation or spending quality time with DD. He is a great dad and I know he wants to, but he's so busy and he's always thinking of his work obligations, etc. This week, DD was learning how to put her face/head in the water in the pool, and DH was sitting on the side with his phone. Every time she bobbed back up, she looked at him to see if he was clapping for her. Even after I asked him a few times to watch her, it took a while before he watched the entire thing and was still watching/clapping she she finally opened her eyes at the end.

For me, showing him how much DD looks to him for praise when she is learning a new trick helps to get him into the moment. It's not the quizzing that DD likes, it's the eye contact and the clapping

And totally agree about kids learning at their own pace. DD was really active physically from birth until 6 months, then kind of just sat there for a while

Then her cousin spent a weekend and she started pulling up on everything.

ASmallWonder · May 2014

cynthia2007 said:

Thanks ladies. Great outside insight and I see your points about just letting her grow and learn on her own pace. I'm just so paranoid because i feel shes already so behind now bc shes not pulling to stand, crawling or walking yet and she's almost 11 months. @CL8badB‌, the book suggestion is definitely a good idea, I will try.

You've got to remember that physical and mental milestones aren't the same but even still, with both of them you don't have to be so "learning" minded while teaching them, kwim? Just like you wouldn't be like "pull up. now sit. pull up. now sit" to get her pulling up, you don't have to be all "Ear. Ear. This is your ear. Ear. Ear? Ear." :-p Play "got your nose" and pretend to nibble her ears while saying "I'm gonna get those ears!" and she'll figure it out in time

cynthia2007 · May 2014

@elmoali‌ , absolutely. I do make it fun like say, where's my mouth and then nibble on her fingers when I put them to my mouth. And that's what encourage DH to do. I just need to not compare to what other babies her age are doing....easier said than done of course.

ASmallWonder · May 2014

@cynthia2007 it's such an easy trap to fall into - I get it. I find dads do things differently with a lot of stuff but unless you can really say "this is causing harm" you just roll with it and they'll find their groove. I cook with our older son. DH teaches him about hockey. I read with him, DH let's him play fight and wrestle to get out some of that boy energy. It's all good

cynthia2007 · May 2014

@jmcgra06‌, not misreading at all. Except DHis not doing work stuff, just playing on internet or espn or stuff like that. Or just watching tv. It just annoys me that he doesn't want to be more involved or interactive. He wanted a kid way before I did but now that she's here I'm the one that pays more attention and does more with her. And don't get me wrong, I love her and get excited to see her after work and hangout and hate that he doesn't. He'll get in the moment when I give her to him or tell him to put down phone and play with her but I shouldn't have to do that. And its not always like that of course but it does happen. But like you said, he misses out when she looks to him when she does something bc he's buried in his phone. Cant force it so it is what it is I guess. I love him but he drives me crazy sometimes. :-w

jmcgra06 · May 2014

@cynthia2007 it might get better the bigger she gets, too. The more DD talks, plays and interacts with him, the better he does. It sounds silly but I just try to point out when he's really interactive - even if it's only for a minute - and mention that I can tell how much DD clearly loves it. The last month or so has been a lot better. GL!

ETA: I started out by making an effort to compliment one thing that he did each day. After a few days, he said I was complimenting him "a lot" which made me feel kind of bad about my usual way of talking to him!

cynthia2007 · May 2014

@CL8badB‌, he used to just put her in his lap and put tv on and go back to his phone and that led to the first blowout we had. He still sometimes does that but most of the time I tell him not to before I give her to him so he's started singing silly songs to her.

ASmallWonder · May 2014

^ Yeah I agree with this. Not "teaching" her is what I thought your issue was and I don't think that's an issue but he should be spending time with her that isn't shared with the phone or the computer. It may be that he really doesn't know what to do with her and most people don't take kindly to being told specifically what to do. I'd probably say "Do you want to read books with me and Daddy?" (to DH - she really loves this book lately) or something.

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DH Vent about helping LO learn

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