I’m about to start my 12 week paternity leave next week thanks to a state program and almost everyone that I’ve told has had their jaws on the floor that I would even want to do that.

Today I witnessed a group of coworkers almost bragging how little time they took after their kids were born. I’ve heard stuff like “Most men are hard working and want to support their families so they don’t take leave”.

To me it was a no brainer, I’m getting ~85% of my normal pay and I get to take care of my wife, our son and our newborn for 3 whole months. and for someone who hasn’t taken a day breathe in the past 3 years I think I deserve it.

I’m in the US so I know it’s a “strange” concept, but people have seemed genuinely upset, people it doesn’t affect at all. Again, it’s a state program available to almost anyone who’s worked in the past 2 years, I’ve talked to soon to be dads who scoffed at the idea and were happy to use a week of pto and that’s it.

I feel like I’m missing something.

  • bstix
    1·
    2 days ago

    Oh yes I gladly forgot our pumping period. It was two month of not sleeping for both parts. The bottle cleaning, cooling, heating, serving and try to get a nap in between pumping, bottling and boiling the parts of the pump, and then repeat. Add in hospital visits and what not. It was hell. Work could take a fucking hike.

    I absolutely encourage breastfeeding for everyone when possible. However, we gave up on our second and went straight to formula due to past experiences, and I’ll admit: It’s not all bad. It gave me a lot of bonding time as a father. The father can hold a bottle all right. To this day my youngest still tugs into my armpit at bedtime. I also had more paternity leave with her and it does show later on. The bond is so much stronger due to the time spent in her infant years. Those days are all a blur to me now.

    I do think our designated paternity leave is adequate for what physical presence is required. The flexibility is for people who go straight to the formula and where the mother is eager to get back to work. The same rules applies to co-parents f.i. gay couples or people who have taken on the responsibility of someone else’s child, so the flexibility is in favour of how people wants to do it.

    Also, I should’ve mentioned that this is only minimum by law. Plenty of people get full salaries during parental leave due to union agreements, which removes the monetary incentive to choose one over the other. I know this guy who works in a bank who have great terms, while his wife is unemployed and gets paid benefits to the law. He took all of the fully paid paternal leave. It makes no monetary difference. He just had more days off. He couldn’t have done that without the flexibility.