There are hardly any books or classes for dads: across the country, the services for new and expectant moms far outnumber those for dads. In the parenting section of any bookstore, you’ll find the shelves stuffed with books geared toward moms, but hardly any for dads.
While you’re pregnant, your husband may feel more comfortable opening up to some other men who are already fathers, so you could help by suggesting he hook up with another expectant dad, or a dad with young kids. Your husband may have met a guy he could be friends with at your childbirth class, and they may have even exchanged phone numbers, but since they’re guys, they’ve probably never called each other!
If you want to get your husband to share his feelings with you as well as with other men, then you must share some parenting activities with him, starting right now. Otherwise, he’ll probably take on a grin-and-bear-it, stiff-upper-lip attitude toward parenting for the rest of his life. Validating his feelings and encouraging his involvement by asking him to participate is a good start toward effective communication habits and strong team parenting. For example, you can involve your husband in activities such as prenatal checkups, getting your sonogram, birthing classes, the baby shower registry and the baby shower, learning how to use new equipment, and the birth (cutting the umbilical cord).
When the baby is born, don’t underestimate the importance of cutting the umbilical cord if your husband tells you he wants to do it. Make sure one of you tells the doctor before, during, and after the birth that he really wants to do this, because doctors can forget.
We Feel Helpless When We See You in Pain.
When someone you love is hurting, how do you feel? Awful, right? How would you feel if the man you loved were in some kind of horrible pain and your role was to just, well, stand there?
For one thing, you’d be frustrated. Most guys are used to being the tough ones in the family, and they’re demoted to hand-holding while their wives are screaming. Most guys who have seen their wives give birth will come back to class and say something like, “Man, I have so much more respect for my wife now that I’ve seen what she went through. She’s so tough!” A statement like this is a sign that your husband is growing emotionally. It has the added benefit of making you more attractive to your husband when you probably feel, as some of the moms in my workshops have said, “like a cow.”
