by Jeremy Martin-Weber, Relationship and parenting coach and dad of 8
this post is sponsored by The Leaky Boob New Baby Guide, available here and by Martin-Weber Relationship, Family, and Parenting Coaching, sign up for your free consult here.
A Letter to Non-Birthing Partners
Congratulations, you’re having a baby! Or have recently had a baby. Or maybe it was a long time ago. Whatever it is for you, congrats! Having a baby is a wonderful thing that changes you forever. Even as the non-birthing parent, there is a lot of change when you welcome a whole new entire human being into the world.
That’s a good thing! Not an easy thing but still a good thing.
A lot of the time, energy, and focus has likely been lavished on your partner and the baby growing in their body. That’s understandable – growing babies is a big deal! You may feel unsure about your role in all this or how to best be engaged in caring for your new baby when they’re here, let alone before or even as they are being born. I’m no expert but I’ve been there myself, 8 times now. There’s always a learning curve to becoming a new parent. As the non-birthing partner expecting a new baby your role isn’t relegated to being on the side-lines, you have an active and important part to play.
In the partnered life, most responsibilities can be approached and divided between partners through a conversation based on each person’s strengths, interests, skills, talents, availability, and so on. It rarely comes down to who’s capable – most people are capable of handling most responsibilities – they may not want to, but they can. It’s completely possible to divvy up those responsibilities through conversation that leads to an agreement about who does what.
There’s one area in particular where, for many, it simply can’t play out that way: growing, birthing, and breastfeeding babies.
Typically, one partner does all that, and the other partner does… what? Puts the crib together? Smokes a cigar?
Well, from one non-birthing partner to another, I can tell you that there are many ways for you to be involved that go beyond putting a crib together and maybe fertilizing an egg (or ovum, to be exact).
For all the books and articles and even classes for the birthing parent, there’s not a lot for the non-birthing parent. So what exactly do you do? Besides wait for the kid to grow up and then you get to be the “fun parent?” (Hint: don’t do that, it won’t serve you, your partner, or your child well.)
The most important thing you can do is to regularly tell your partner that you want to be as involved as possible and then demonstrate that by being present, interested, curious, and active (that means taking the initiative and actually doing some stuff instead of waiting around to be invited or told what to do). Listen to your partner about what they actually need and want – don’t do something they don’t care for and expect appreciation and praise. The demands on them are massive, don’t make it even more. The biggest difference between you and your partner is that they don’t actually have a choice but to think about having a baby – their body is literally changing every day to make that possible. It serves as a constant reminder. And eventually, it’s not just their body that reminds them, it’s the little body inside their body that reminds them too! You, on the other hand, have a choice. And it comes down to the choice of being involved, or missing out, and it takes effort. Which, translated into your partner’s perspective means that they’re either going through this experience without you or together with you. Don’t wait. No matter how far along the pregnancy is or how old the baby is, it’s not too late to start demonstrating that you want to be involved – the longer you wait the harder it will be, so back to this: don’t wait. You don’t have to know everything. You don’t even have to know anything. You’ll figure it out together. Don’t expect your partner to manage you, you’re not an employee they have to work to direct, be a partner by being proactive.
Following is a list of some of the ways you can be more involved:
PREGNANCY
- Don’t wait. Demonstrate that you want to be involved now, and every day.
- Tell your partner that you want to hear about what it’s like for them to be pregnant.
- Tell them that they’re not a nuisance for sharing about their aches and pains and the special parts.
- Massage them to help with the aches, but also for connection, and to help relax them.
- Get informed about pregnancy, birth, and babies beyond what your partner is willing to share.
- Don’t get cocky about what you think you know about growing a baby in your body. No matter how much you think you know, you still aren’t the one experiencing it in real time.
- Listen.
- Be willing to talk about pregnancy, birth, and babies with your partner as often as they want to. It may feel like you’re talking about it all the time, and that’s all you two talk about anymore. GOOD. It won’t last forever, but your partner doesn’t get breaks from being pregnant, so you can deal too.
- As a matter of fact, don’t expect your partner to always be the one to bring it up. You go ahead and start that conversation too. Let your partner be the one to say that they want to talk about something else for once – they will, if they get a chance to talk about it enough. This demonstrates your invested interest in your partner, their experience, and the baby.
- Be a more attentive partner. Offer to do more for your partner.
- Tell them they’re beautiful.
- Don’t forget romance – keep doing the stuff that reminds you of your love for each other. And it’s ok if that turns into talking about babies. It’s just the deal.
- As your partner gets closer to birth and things get harder for them to do, you do more of those things – unless your partner doesn’t want you to.
- Don’t coddle your partner, or treat them like they’re sick. Let them tell you when they need to do less. You can ask them about it, but don’t tell them what they can and can’t do.
- Talk about the birth. What they want. How you want to be involved. Discuss a birth plan together.
- Go to prenatal appointments with them whenever possible and rearrange your schedule to do so.
- When they start nesting, do all the things that they say need to be done in order for this baby to arrive in a safe space. It doesn’t matter if some of those things don’t make sense to you. They matter to your partner.
- Welcome all of your partner’s feelings. Listen and validate your partner’s experience.
- Pick out baby clothes together.
- Prepare for the birth together.
- Go to the birth classes.
- Go to the new baby classes.
- Talk with your partner about what you’re both looking forward to, what you fear, how you feel.
- Be more present.
- Your partner will need more time to be in their own head to sort out what they’re experiencing and how they feel about it, and just be in the moment. Do what you can to help make that happen – more responsibilities around the house, more cooking, meal planning, etc.
- If you smell bad to her because of what you eat, don’t eat that again until after the birth and don’t take it personally- pregnancy hormones can create the nose of a bloodhound.
BIRTH
- More than any other time in this experience of bringing a baby into the world, labor and birth needs to be all about your partner. Your job is to support your partner.
- Do everything you can to allow your partner to focus on the work their body is doing – in other words, minimize distractions, and don’t be a distraction.
- Let your partner call all the shots.
- Do what they say they need.
- Remind them of aspects of the Birth Plan as needed.
- Go to bat for them. If there needs to be a conversation about the Birth Plan or what your partner wants with a nurse/doctor/midwife or other birth attendant, you do it. Run interference when needed.
- Encourage your partner.
- Ask them if what you’re doing is what they need but don’t be needy about getting accolades that you’re doing the right thing.
- Massage them when they need it.
- Keep your hand where they directed you to put it, and don’t move it! You’ll never put it back exactly where it was before.
- Tell them you love them.
- Say affirmations to them (you’ll want to have discussed them beforehand).
NEW BABY
- Support your birthing partner as they recover from birth. Encourage them to rest. Do everything you can for them so they feel like they can focus on their healing.
- Take on all of the household responsibilities, and it’s ok for the house to not be perfect. That doesn’t mean that it’s ok to just let the house go entirely. Dishes still need to be done. Laundry. Trash needs to go out. The house still needs to be clean, even if it’s messier.
- Spend time with your partner.
- Bond with your baby as you change their diaper.
- Your partner gets to feed your baby – you get to enjoy watching them. At some point you may have more of a role in actively feeding but it usually takes WAY more work to pump than to nurse directly and you giving the baby a bottle could undermine lactation at first so just sit back and enjoy the bond your partner and the baby are developing through feeding.
- Keep being attentive to what your partner needs – this will be a part of your bonding with the baby and your partner.
- Go to baby well checks.
- Hold your baby.
- Feel insecure about that, or other aspects of caring for a new baby? That’s normal. Ask your partner about it. You’ll become more comfortable and confident in time.
- Talk about the birthing experience with your partner. Invite them to share what it was like for them, what they liked, didn’t like, what surprised them.
As you can see, there’s plenty to do to not only demonstrate that you want to be involved, but to actually BE involved and strengthen your connection with both your partner and your new baby. Do it. Jump in. Don’t wait. You won’t regret it. Nobody ever looks back and says they regret the time they spent loving their loved ones. This time and stage may be consuming in the moment but it really is so brief. Neglecting your role in this time is something you’ll never be able to undo and could damage your relationship with your partner. You matter in all this, don’t minimize the impact you have in this time by not fully being present and participating to connect with your partner and baby.
Jeremy Martin-Weber, relationship family, and parenting coach has been married to his wife Jessica Martin-Weber for 24 years and is the father of 8 children. His background includes music performance, teaching, non-profit director, mentor, and running a non-profit coffee shop. To support as many families in their relationship goals as is possible, Jeremy co-created We’re All Human Here and helps administrate The Leaky Boob in addition to his work as a relationship and family coach. For a free coaching consult, sign up here: https://bit.ly/3akaRR7.
