support for dads

My friend and his wife had twins recently and some of the things he's saying basicalloy have made me think that dads really don't have a lot of support when it coimes to becoming a father for the first time.

I'm not saying us mums have a got a hell of a lot, but we seems to find it easier to talk about things than men - I mean plunket. la leche and even forums like this are a lot more "women friendly" even if they aren't at anti-men

My friend said a few days ago "how much did lew help when jake and taine were small - at night" I said" well, not too much as I was breastfeeding and I said earlier that if he stayed asleep that was okay with me". he said "Oh,it's just I am "doing the shift" from 12-5am and all A does is feed them. I'm really tired" I said "of course you are, you're a dad now" and he honeslt didn't realise that with parenting comes tiredness. I think this generation of dads especially had a lot of stay at home mums and working dads that maybe didn't have a lot of hands on parenting themsleves, so new dads are struggling withj their role.

Then again, my other way of thinking is if new dads DID have more support - would they use it? i mean, how many dads compared to mums are on this site chatting about problems?

My DH does.. he finds this site is lacking lots when it comes to dad stuff which is partly why he did the diary of a dad to be thing. But he's part of an expected and new dads group, which is aimed at the guys obviously.. he always says the only downside to his group is that it doesn't have many kiwi dads.

I also noticed there wasnt much support for new dads. My DH had no clue about anything! He hated the antinatal classes so we only went to like 3 of them... and then he had to learn as we went along but I think he has done great!!

My DH doesnt have a very good role model of a father as his dad was in the Navy and was always away when he was younger and has never been very involved with him - especially after his parents divorced.
I think that also makes it harder for men who didnt have a very good male role model. Though often it means they try harder - like my DH.

Gosh I hope that made sense... the afternoon sun is making me sleepy!!

kebakat wrote: My DH does.. he finds this site is lacking lots when it comes to dad stuff which is partly why he did the diary of a dad to be thing. But he's part of an expected and new dads group, which is aimed at the guys obviously.. he always says the only downside to his group is that it doesn't have many kiwi dads.

We find it incredibly hard to get Dad's involved with sharing their stories and their perspectives on parenting, so we really appreciate the input that Richard's Diary of a Dad to be and Adam's Dad's Diary provides. We do put out a call two or three times a year in our monthly email for Dad's to share their thoughts but we never get much response.