Men, let’s be honest here—you’re not going to have it as bad as your significant other during pregnancy. It’s going to be worse. Ok, I’m just kidding, but a father’s roles during pregnancy change frequently and often times, without much notice.
In this article, I highlight how pregnancy was for me, a soon-to-be father, and what I want to do better and/or differently in the future. As opposed to my first article that largely summarized the pregnancy, I go a little more in-depth in this one.
Before I jump in here, I am going to use the word ‘wife’ a lot during this article because that’s my experience. I can hear the woke “it’s 2023, man, you don’t have to be married to have a kid!” in my ear, but that is the word I’m choosing to use.
Father’s First Role During Pregnancy: The Therapist Guy
Pregnancy fucks with hormones which then fucks around with your wife’s emotions. We’ve all seen the sitcoms where the mother turns into this gremlin-type thing who throws things, curses at you, and just generally makes you question every decision you’ve made up until that point. That was never my experience and if it is yours then all I can say is that you drew the short straw.
But my wife did have plenty of emotions that, to me anyway, changed for no particular reason. The problem with my wife was that during pregnancy she would be more likely to get in a car, drive to the airport and hop on an international flight to avoid talking about what was bothering her before voluntarily telling me something was wrong. To be fair, I’m the same way. She never did get on that plane, but I can’t think of an instance where she told me something was wrong without me badgering her about it.
I can read my wife like a book most of the time, and after we spoke about what was wrong, everything was okay. But I really underestimated how difficult pregnancy was on her and that’s a mistake I won’t make next time.
Father’s Second Role During Pregnancy: The Make A Decision Guy
There are times in a marriage when one of the participants just needs to take charge and make decisions. Fortunately, I have that kind of personality to begin with, and it was exceptionally useful during pregnancy.
My wife had to undergo a more-than-average amount of tests and appointments. So after being poked and prodded a couple times a week while carrying another human being, she was understandably tired. That meant she didn’t want to have to decide where we ate that night, what we were going to do that weekend, or even the time that we attended Mass.
Ultimately, we want to make our lady’s life as easy as possible. Stress isn’t good for a pregnant women, especially when she can’t drink. Stress also isn’t good for a baby. Be prepared to make more decisions in general to take things off her plate.https://giphy.com/embed/rVZEejvVWEbug
Father’s Third Role During Pregnancy: The Sex Guy
For the first few months after getting pregnant there is not much that changes to your wife’s body on the outside. In general, she is going to be just as attractive as she was before being pregnant.
Around the fourth month things start to change because the bump becomes more noticeable. For me, this next piece of advice wasn’t difficult at all because I was still incredibly attracted to my wife. But if you’re not feeling it then I advise you find a way to feel it—no pun intended. The advice is simply to try to have sex with your wife as often as you can during pregnancy. It gives you a release and I GUARANTEE it is going to make your wife feel sexier, more desirable and put her in a great mood.https://giphy.com/embed/BpGWitbFZflfSUYuZ9
We were having sex all the way up until the very end of pregnancy and I truly believe it is one of the things that kept my wife as happy and tolerant of being pregnant as she was. Also, I wouldn’t recommend commenting of the attractiveness of any other woman during this time—even as a joke!
Father’s Fourth Role During Pregnancy: The Punching Bag
I want to first state the obvious—your wife hitting or throwing things at you is simply not okay. If you’re having that problem then discuss that with others and figure out a solution.
I don’t use the term ‘punching bag’ literally. And the term can also be adjusted to ‘garbage disposal’, ‘garbage can’, ‘toilet’, etc. Again, none of these are literal. These are just terms to generally say that you’ll be handling a lot of shit coming as you. You are the person with whom your wife feels most secure. The person she can say anything to. Plus, as a man, you should want to take on that responsibility!
For example, if your wife had a bad day at work, expect to hear about it and agree with her. If another woman said something to her that was innocuous that she turned into a federal case, then your response is, “fuck that bitch”. Is she talking about how someone cut her off in traffic? Ask her if she flipped them off.
That is not to say that taking her side is somehow the elixir that will prevent you two from being nasty to each other from time to time. Fights will happen. Terrible things will be said. There will be hurt feelings. Apologize when needed and move on—don’t hold a grudge.
Father’s Fifth Role During Pregnancy: The Financial Planning Guy
As I wrote in a previous article, pregnancy can be a real drag on your finances. While planning ahead is great, there will be surprises. If your wife handles your finances, I would strongly encourage you to talk about shifting that responsibility to you throughout the pregnancy.
Few things can be more stressful than talking about money or finances, but I can say with the utmost confidence that pregnancy ranks higher. Take this off of her plate. This isn’t to suggest you can’t talk about money during that the pregnancy (you absolutely should), but if there aren’t huge financial implications at stake, then why bog her down in minutia?
So Many Roles, So Little Time
This article is not to be misconstrued as a 1,000+ word document saying women can’t do anything during pregnancy. After all, plenty of women carry babies in their womb without the father ever being involved with a pregnancy. Everything I wrote above was our experience and, after producing a healthy baby and a wife who doesn’t have postpartum depression, I’d say my wife and I did a pretty good job!
However, this article should be construed as an accurate depiction of an active father’s roles during pregnancy. If you think your job is to put the bun in the oven and not come back until you hear the ding then you are sadly, sadly mistaken. Don’t be a piece of garbage.
Whether it is emotional, physical or financial, you have a lot of roles to play. Seize the opportunity. Man up! And welcome to the first part of fatherhood!
