Ask Lemmy

Doing paternity leave is a good must and normal. Being an absent parent is not good.

Godspeed and congratulations with your child!

Men who brag how little time they spend with their kids shouldn’t be having kids.

People who brag about going to work deserve to die at their desks. Godspeed taking care of your newborn and your spouse.

People are idiots. Why would you give up a benefit you're legally entitled to? Nobody is going to as much as thank you for that.

So basically, the choice is to spend 12 weeks with those idiots or with your baby? Seems like a no brainer to me.

My company offers parental leave (generic, not gender-specific, and applies to adoptions as well as giving birth). Everyone I work with expects people—men included—to take it.

A guy on my team took his a couple years ago and now with his second child recently born, he is applying his lesson learned. Instead of taking the time as soon as his kid is born, overlapping time off with his wife, he’s letting his wife take her full time then he’s taking his. That way they stagger the full-time care of the newborn for about 6 months straight, after which his wife will be done teaching for the summer, meaning more like 8 months straight.

Another coworker (Director level) had his latest kid December before last. Our busy time is January to April, so he delayed and took his time off in May or June.

Fuck companies that don’t support it and the small-minded people who think men shouldn’t take it. I can understand how challenging it can be for a small business to support that kind of leave, but as humans we should care more about supporting the next generation than a couple hits to productivity at work for 2-3 months. (I write as a permanently child-free person.)

What you’re missing is that the people you work with are stuck in the mindset from 2 generations ago. Don’t buy in. Taking your leave IS supporting your family; you’re doing it right.

In the U.S. we're taught to brag about how much we're exploited, as if it's a virtue.

It's a very sick culture.

When I'm on my deathbed, I'm absolutely sure I won't be thinking about work.

I WISH my husband had been able to take time off. Those first few weeks of sleep deprivation are fucking ROUGH on your own. I think you did the right thing and that the child is going to get dramatically better care because his parents are actually sonewhat rested.

I'm not a psychologist or whatever to say how long but the dad should get as much leave as the mother does to help deal with all the new baby shit and bond with the child.

You should take all the time you can get. Fuck other people's expectations.

I’m all for paternity leave, but there is a conflict between taking time off to take care of your newborn, and taking time off to breathe.

Newborns aren’t exactly a vacation.

Those 12 weeks will be no walk in the park. You rightfully state you'll be taking care of everyone, and it's 24/7 juggling new dynamics and a whole new human being's needs.

Yes, people survive with less time or no time off at all. I'm convinced some brag about it like some badge of honor to make themselves feel better.

Thank you for being considerate of your family's needs. Good luck!

Come to the EU, noone will scoff at paternity leave here. On the contrary, colleagues will congratulate you for procreating lol

Take the paternity leave with pride

You’re the smart one. Fuck the haters. Ignore them.

What you're missing is some men legitimately hate their wives and children and dislike spending time with them. Others drank the coolaid of American capitalist propaganda. Your child will only be a newborn once and your wife will need the help. If anything you should be normalizing it by telling all your friends and colleagues how great it is and how happy you are to get to spend that time with your family. Never shut up about how awesome it is. Expound at length about the many benefits you personally enjoyed thanks to your time with your new child. Every man you convince makes the world a better place.

Pretty sure THEY are the ones missing something. They've been brainwashed into thinking you should be embarrassed NOT to shun your family so you can be at work 24/7 to make someone else rich. Take advantage of that program while it still exists.

Take the full 12 weeks - you’ll never regret it. Superhero dads are there for their wife and children. You’re doing the right thing.

Their logic is from a POV of they dont get the benefit since they aren't expecting parents or didn't get that benefit if/when they wer, so why should anyone else. When really the proper evolved response is to be happy that new trends are being set and we're improving the cruel system that keeps new parents from critically important family time.

My manager is on paternaty leave for half a year, it is normal here, he is a dad after all!

What moron would pass up on 85% paid leave??

My man, you are literally getting paid to spend time with a tiny human being you helped make. You’d have to be pretty deep into the Kool-aid bottle to say no to that.

I had my mandatory 15 weeks last year and loved it, so from one dad to another: enjoy it!

And remember: if you die tomorrow, you’ll be replaced at work within a few weeks, but you can never ever be replaced at home.

@neomachino,

You will never get the time back to be with your offspring during these formative months into years. I would scoff at any "scoffers" and tell them their bragging about not taking time off to be with their family isn't the flex they think it is. Life is more than just your occupation. I'm an American living in the Netherlands with my Dutch wife these days, and I can guarantee with certainty my European colleagues would scoff at me if I didn't take the time off. Attitudes towards this are changing in the U.S., albeit too slowly in my opinion, but our culture is fundamentally sick. I primarily blame puritanical christian zealotry that made its pact with the devil (pun fully intended) with avaricious capital for much of the woes found in our society, for what its worth. The gods willing, this will die out in a few generations.

Take the time and cherish it; your future self and children will thank you.

It's just hyperbolic masculine capitalism being parroted. Live in the U.S. south and have dealt with many friends and their relatives who have said the same shit. I've been around long enough to see those same people completely fall apart when the lives at home just crumble because they're too busy with work (illness, deaths in family, etc). They always eventually come to regret the decisions and times they've missed once they get in their later years.

There's nothing wrong with choosing to prioritize a work career in one's life though, but hating on someone else's choice is just ridiculous.

My main thought on paternity leave is that it should be exactly the same as the maternity leave so that there is no difference between hiring a man or a woman.

Your coworkers are fucking idiots.

Enjoy it. A great number of people in the US have been conditioned to tie up their sense of worth to their job, and can’t comprehend there’s more to life.

I’d take 12 years paternity leave if I could.

Those first few months, especially with your first kid… man. The sleep deprivation alone makes it worth it. Not to mention all the firsts that happen so fast that you’ll otherwise miss… presumably to work for “the man.”

Am American, but been lucky enough to work with people who understand this, and maxed out all paternity leave I could get.

Any man that thinks work is more important than spending time with the family is a bad father. I say this as the son of a bad father.

Am American. Would take every day of it. Would come back and laugh at them when they picked on me for it, while calling them idiots for not taking advantage of the opportunity. "Have fun talking yourselves out of regret, losers."

Sounds like attitude of wage slaves that have been brainwashed into doing everything for the corpos and being fine with getting scrap. They live to work as opposed to work to live.

Can't change the slave mentality of some people. They were just born to be one.

You are experiencing gender based persecution. Think of men who can't be a stay at home dad, work as a nurse, or can't show emotion, etc. Women who want to do construction work or STEM. LGBT and especially trans discrimination is also that taken to an extreme because the perceived gender divergence is more drastic. For whatever reason, there are many people in society who want to enforce strict artificial gender roles on other people.

Ignore them. If you can, should you try and stagger the time off with your s/o. Don't take it at the same time.

Americans are weird.

Honestly the time with your partner and kid is precious irreplaceable.

Anyone who's weird about it is insecure about their own paternal involvement.

It is a no brainer dude. Absolutely take the leave. You know how the work culture is here in the US, it's pretty ridiculous. The "Live to Work" crowd is getting pretty old now though so I have seen a shift in corporate culture where I am at.

Work is something I do, not who I am.

Americans have been indoctrinated to feel their work is their worth.

You are surrounded with workaholic, misogynists. My company gives full pay for 12 weeks for mothers and fathers. Several of my coworkers, mostly men, have used their leave in full (usually 9 weeks together and the other 3 broken up). Nobody ever looks down on people for taking leave.

Maybe they would take all of it if it was for full pay. Ya'll motherfuckers need a union.

Don't listen to those morons. Paternity leave is a legit great way to stay with your wife and children when they need it the most.

I had 8 weeks fully paid through use of accrued PTO. 8 weeks is about the minimum of paternity leave necessary to kind of get your life back into order imo. This isn't a vacation, it's taking full care of a little person that needs help every 2-3 hours. If both you and your partner work it would be impossible without leave just due to sleep depravation. Our first kid was (is still 4 years later) a terrible sleeper and the first few months were hell. Luckily our second is actually a better sleeper than the first right now and she's only 8 months old lol.

But yes, 12 weeks paternity is not a vacation, it is work. Plan for 12 weeks and if you think that you have everything sorted then great, go back. But daycare might be more than what you would make going back to full pay so just consider that too.

I went through the same thing when I took my paternity leave. Other male coworkers bragged about how they went back to work the day after their kid was born.

It's a culture thing where our society is conditioned to be boot lickers for the ruling class. I responded to them at the time, "Congratulations on being a bad father, I'm going to take every day entitled to me"

Don't fall into their trap.

I have four kids and I took ~6 weeks of paternity leave for each of them (which was in my contract—I’m an Episcopal priest, though I still went in on Sundays because I was going to go to church regardless so I might as well lead services and save the parish money on paying what we call a “supply priest”). It’s absolutely worth it and don’t let anyone make you feel weird about it. You’re doing a great thing for your partner and child—as well as yourself. Babies are a lot of work for dads as well! Acting like dads don’t need paternity leave is a form of patriarchy.

I had 12 months of paternity leave, 11 paid. I dig it.

12 weeks paternity leave at 85% salary? Damn, that's sweet, even by many EU standards.

I wouldn't think twice about taking it.

Life at home would have to be pretty bad for me to rather be at work.