Baby Loves Daddy More?

emmekaye · October 2015

I'm currently on maternity leave, and my husband has already gone back to work so I am the primary caregiver at the moment. Recently I've noticed more when my husband comes home my son is more engaged with him. DS will smile and babble with my husband a lot more actively than with me during the day. It makes me feel a little sad and jealous!

I engage with him during the day from tummy time to reading books. I also do most of the feelings and changing, etc so have I become the needs parent and my husband the fun time / play parent?

theglitteredpterodactyl · October 2015

My baby is 8 weeks old and I've just noticed how she if finally really seeing her daddy and recognising him, and she's absolutely mesmerised by him. He works from home and is around a lot but I'm definitely the primary caretaker (maternity leave + end) and I just end up spending a lot more time with her.

The way I see it, she's had eight weeks to memorise everything about my face and learn that I'm a permanent fixture but she's just now really connecting the dots with who her daddy is this whole time. Plus, she started at my face all day everyday, so by the end he's way more fun to look. Try not to get bummed, I think it's pretty normal for your lo to be super fixated as they learn object permanence with parents :-)

ETA I've also noticed my default ifi to kerp baby calm and sleepy, it makes me really anxious to keep her awake when she wants to move around and chat. My partner is watt more comfortable with that role, so he can usually get her to talk and babbler nor than I can, although I still get plenty of smiles. He's definitely had to teach me that it's okay to let her be awake lol

chelseajeanene · October 2015

I started to feel like my son likes my husband more as well and it's not the greatest feeling for sure. My husband got 6 weeks off when my son was born, so he was always here but he was also the primary care taker for quite a bit of that. I had a csection so he got to hold him first and spend roughly a half hour with him before I got to meet him. He got the first diaper changes and he couldn't latch in the hospital to breastfeed, so my hubby got to bottle feed him first too. Once we got home my recovery was very hard and I couldn't do much with the baby besides cuddling and trying to feed for a while. I think he became attached to him quicker and at the same time I loved how he looked at his daddy, but it broke my heart too. I wanted him to look at me like that. Now that my husband has gone back to work the roles have reversed and now my husband thinks the baby likes me more lol I love it because I've been waiting 6 weeks for this. I know the baby loves us both and he shouldn't like one of us more then the other, but as the mother I think that's what we all really want. My hubby got all those first, but I got the first smiles and nothing can top that. I know I have more firsts to come and that makes me so excited. Little boys always need their mommy's more in life anyway :x

thinkpink101 · October 2015

With my first three boys they each had stages where they preferred one of us over the other. There was one stage where for months C screamed bloody murder if Dh held him and only wanted me. Dh was hurt and at first I was secretly flattered, but it got old quickly! Then things changed again. Now that they are older they all prefer their dad and thinks he can do no wrong. He can relate to the boys in ways I can't, I will never understand what's funny about gross things for example. I know "they" say boys need their moms... And they totally do...as maids, cooks & drivers!

KissMeImScottish · October 2015

I'll be honest, I'm in a kind of reverse situation. My husband adores our son - truly, the man was made to be a father. He gets up with him at least once a night, never complains about diaper changes, gives him his nightly bath, loves to push his stroller, swaddles him better than I do...you get the idea. He works very, very long hours (Navy submariner on sea duty. Recent days have been 6:30 am to 7:30 pm and he's headed out to sea in the near future). I'm encouraging them to spend as much time as is physically possible together, no jealousy in the slightest, because in February, when our son is 5 months old, my husband deploys for 6 to 8 months. He's terrified that W won't recognize him when he gets home, so he's bonding with him as much as possible while he can. He was crestfallen that he missed the very first smile and he's trying very hard not to think about missing the first steps, possibly the first words, him sitting up on his own, etc. Video cameras only do so much, and we know that for a large portion of our children's lives, I'm going to be both father and mother and that devestates my husband.

So I have a hard time begrudging him all the time in the world with our son right now and I sincerely hope that any favoritism he gets out of it for now translates into remembering his daddy on the pier when he comes home.

eah325 · October 2015

@ktewart your post is remarkable. You sound like a wonderful wife and mother, and your husband sounds like a fantastic dad. I sincerely hope your little one has a big grin on that pier when he sees his daddy again.

I'm sure you've already thought of this, but maybe you can have your husband record himself reading some books for your little one (they have books and stuffed animals that do this). And also, maybe you can create a mobile of daddy's face... My friend did that when her husband was deployed so her son would see him every night as he drifted to sleep.

KissMeImScottish · November 2015

@eah325, that's very kind of you. I really lucked out in the husband department, that's for sure! I'm doing my damndest not to let post pregnancy hormones take it for granted, too, haha. Those are wonderful ideas that we definitely are taking into consideration. Right now, my project is a teddy bear made from my husband's old working uniform (the blue camo that the Navy wears - we call it aquaflage). We'll head to Build a Bear at some point this week to buy one of those voice recorders so my husband can record a message for our son and I'll be putting it inside the paw of the bear I'm sewing. His gift to me for our first Christmas before his first deployment was actually a Build a Bear that has his voice recorded telling me he loves me, so it's very appropriate for our son to have one with daddy's voice, too. We definitely plan to take LOTS of pictures to put around the house and on my phone and everything, especially since subs aren't exactly know for their regular communication with home. I love the suggestion of him recording himself reading books so that we can play that for our son as he gets bigger before daddy comes home.

missliz53 · November 2015

I was feeling this way too for a while. I do most of the work and the getting up at night while DH is working, but when she first started smiling, he got smiles, the cat got smiles, the bottle got smiles, but no smiles for mommy.

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