We are closer and closer to delivery and the anxiety runs high. Surprisingly it is not coming from us, rather the world around us. “Are you ready?” family asks me. They don’t ask Chris, you know, the father. Just me.
Our health insurance company called the other day. There is a program they offer to new mom’s. Basically they ask some baseline questions, follow-up after you have the baby to make sure you are not suffering from postpartum depression, and send some books. The woman on the phone kept saying “you” and I kept answering “we”. Finally she caught on. “Is the father going to classes with you?”
“Of course he is,” I answer, “Why wouldn’t he?”
“Oh, that is wonderful! You are so lucky!”
Lucky, really? Is he some sort of card game I’m really good at? This is who he is and why I love him. I wouldn’t be with anyone who wasn’t like this.
It isn’t just our families, or the insurance woman, who assume this baby is exclusively my job, men are pretty invisible in the new baby realm. There are new mom classes but nothing for new dad’s. Excluding men from parenthood sends a message that babies aren’t their business. I don’t know why we can’t just join together and have a new parents class. Sure our issues are different, but our goal is the same: learn to care for a child. I don’t want to keep him at arm’s length just because he is a man, to assume that just because he doesn’t breastfeed means he doesn’t need to learn about the process. We all have a lot to learn. It takes a village, right? Why, when it takes so many, would we exclude the person sitting right next to us?
