Stay-at-home-dad wants to quit after one weekend

"I couldn't believe the ridiculous reason," his wife says.

Deciding to be a stay-at-home parent should not be taken lightly, as one couple has found out. 

A wife and new mum this week has shared her dilemma: When they were expecting, her husband agreed to quit his job and care for the baby while she went back to work as a neurologist. 

But after a single weekend of solo parenting, he changed his mind.

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 "I met my husband in my third year of medical school. We have been married for four years now," she begins her post.

"My husband works in marketing, and I make three times his salary. From the beginning of our relationship, I was very upfront that I was unsure about having biological children. My dream was always to adopt from foster care, and my husband seemingly understood this."

Her husband's attitude changed when his best friend had a baby boy. 

"He began to press me on having children," she wrote. "I was initially very against this idea because I was just beginning my career. I wanted to wait a few more years before revisiting the topic of children. In August, I found out I was unexpectedly pregnant.

"I was initially considering an abortion, but after many heartfelt conversations with my husband, we decided to keep the baby, and he would quit his job and stay home until our daughter was old enough to start preschool."

After nine weeks, SAHD wants to quit. Source: iStock

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"This isn't a lifestyle I want"

She adds, "I was very clear I had absolutely ZERO desire to stay home and be a housewife. I respect stay-at-home mothers, but my work is my life, and I would go crazy at home all day. This isn't a lifestyle I want whatsoever."

But, he spent one weekend alone with his nine-week-old daughter and now wants her to extend her maternity leave and go back to work himself.

"He broke down and said he can’t do this. He expressed how trapped, alone and overwhelmed he felt all weekend.

"He wants me to extend my maternity leave and wants to return to work. This made me freak out. I asked, 'Well, what will we do with our daughter now?'"

At this point, she lost her cool and screamed, "If I knew you were going to back out of your promise to take care of our daughter, I would have NEVER had your child."

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"I changed my mind is unacceptable"

Naturally, there were thousands of opinions in the comments. 

"You expressed boundaries and rules, and he’s crossed them. Stick to it your boundaries," one suggested.

"If he’s unwilling, consider how important that boundary is to you and how far you’re willing to enforce it. A child isn’t something one can be so flippant over, and 'I changed my mind' is unacceptable if he is the one who pushed for it in the first place.

"Also, economically, it makes no sense." 

Not holding back, this user added: "And what a spoiled brat d*ck he is for taking a brilliant, ambitious, and accomplished spouse for granted, too. How pathetically insecure."

RELATED: Husband makes crazy demand of wife on maternity leave

Another suggested: "Don’t give up your career. But if he can’t cut it, you might want to look into a nanny and include nanny cams if you’re worried about safety. This would probably get me thinking about divorce, to be honest.

"He feels trapped, alone and overwhelmed at home with the baby but has no qualms about her having the same experience." 

Then this stay-at-home mother empathised with him: "Look, there’s no way to anticipate how or whether you want to be a stay-at-home parent until it happens and you are in the thick of it. I know wannabe trad mommies who wanted to jump out of their skin two weeks into newborn duties. OP’s husband has all my sympathy for going into this certain he’d be a happy SAHD, trying it and then realising he felt." 

But then there was this reality check: "You didn't overreact; he needs a wake-up call. You only gave him something so enormous (his biological child) because he promised not to destroy your career and trap you as a mother.

"Now he's discovering that raising a child is non-stop hard work, something you were aware of before getting pregnant. He can't trick you into having his child and then claim it's too hard to be a father. So you give up your life and dreams to become a supporting character of his dreams."

The mother shared an update, "I know. I am taking the night to cool off. I will talk to him about this tomorrow. I don’t think he is a villain, just a bit of a selfish idiot who didn’t know what he was getting into. I am disappointed in him for giving up so soon, though. Hopefully, he will come around."

Originally published as Stay-at-home-dad wants to quit after one weekend