Women Who Realized How Useless Their Husbands And Partners Were After Having Children Are Sharing Their Stories, And It’s So Frustrating But So Real

Some people think it’s wrong for moms to complain about anything regarding their home life, lest they be labeled a “bad mom,” but when it comes to kids, motherhood, and women’s partners, it’s so, so important for women to have a place to talk about their experiences at home.

Let’s face it: being a mom is a TON of work, and when one’s partner refuses to rise to the occasion and parent, it can be alienating, dehumanizing, and just frustrating. Moms simply don’t have the option to act useless!

So, I decided to ask women with kids in the BuzzFeed Community to tell me about any time they’ve grown frustrated with their partner being, well, pretty much “useless” after they had kids/gave birth. Here are some of the best (and most upsetting) answers:

1.“My husband is a stay-at-home dad, and I work full time. He spends most days playing video games and says educational activities are my responsibility (teaching letters and numbers, etc.). All childcare activities are my responsibility when I am home, because he is ‘off’ then, despite the fact that I hold a full-time position.”

“He is also not able to contribute to any of the housework because he is watching our child, but I am expected to do it all on the weekends while also watching our child.

He does do the shopping and cooking, but constantly tells me what a great husband he is for doing so, and says that ‘a lot of husbands would not do the cooking and shopping,’ but a lot of husbands are not stay-at-home dads without other responsibilities!

Also, we can’t have another kid unless we get a nanny, and I can’t afford a nanny in the places he wants to live on my single income.”

—Anonymous, 36, California

2.“I just don’t understand how he gets to go on living his life the way he did before, while I literally have to ask permission to do anything. I’d also love to be able to leave the house without my kids crying, while they wave to him out of the window every time he leaves.”

—Anonymous, 36, UK

3.“My husband literally refuses to give our 3-year-old a bath or put him to bed. We just had another baby, and if her feeding schedule happens to coincide with our 3-year-old’s bath and bedtime, he would rather hold onto a screaming newborn than let me feed her while he bathes and puts the other down for bed. It’s wild.”

“He’s near the end of his eight-week parental leave, and I can’t wait for him to go back to work. He’s treating it more like a paid vacation, but he still acts miserable every day. I’d rather do everything myself without his constant negative energy around us all day.

I genuinely expected a more even split of parental responsibility, and it’s really disappointing that it’s so off balance, and it makes me resentful that so much lands on me. But he probably feels the same way about being the one who pays the bills. It feels like we both end up being the bad guy.”

—Anonymous, 34, North Carolina

4.“My daughter has beautiful, long hair. Naturally, it gets tangled overnight and needs to be brushed/pulled back each morning. Every day, I take on this task (even when she complains). My husband refuses to even attempt to care for her hair when I’m out of town or have to go to work early. She leaves the house with unkempt hair hanging in her face, and it’s a knotted mess by the end of the day. She’s 8. There’s no reason a grown person can’t participate in the basic care of their child’s hair.”

—Anonymous, 41, St. Louis, Missouri

5.“My husband expected me to have house chores finished all the time, and criticized me for how long it took to cook, to get the kids, and then myself ready, while he’s sitting around watching TV or lounging around. When our kids were infants, I literally was the only one waking up in the middle of the night to care for them.”

“He was super lazy until we ended up having a huge fight one day, and I had to list everything that was not right, say that I didn’t feel supported whatsoever, and explained that if that all kept up, then I’d rather be alone. He finally realized and has gotten better. Not completely, but much better.”

—Anonymous, 36, California

6.“My partner cleaned the house this weekend. He claimed he cleaned it ‘for me.’ So today I went to make the kids chicken nuggets for lunch. I could not find anything because he had ‘cleaned.'”

“Finally, I found everything I needed. I went to use the air fryer, and there was old food in there…it was put away dirty, and with old food in it. So I ask you, how did he help me clean?! He only made my job harder…he put everything away wrong and messy.

Oh, and we have been living in this house for four years now. I’m writing a book on the stupidity….”

—Anonymous, 36 Seattle, Washington

7.“My daughter’s dad has never known who her doctor is, or any names of her teachers. He never went to any dad and daughter dances despite having a few opportunities.”

“He doesn’t spend quality time with our daughter, so she is always looking to me for entertainment. For some reason, he thinks he would bond better if he had a son instead.”

—Anonymous

8.“The first thing my husband would do when he got home from work every night without fail for our children’s entire childhood was come in the side door, go directly to the basement, and get high.”

Arman Zhenikeyev / Getty Images, Maskot / Getty Images

“As they got older, they began to comment on the funny smell. I covered for him for years, but when the drug education programs started at school, they figured it out. It never seemed to bother them. They just accepted it. But what they didn’t understand was how different our lives could have been if their father hadn’t been stuck in his dead-end, low-paying job because he couldn’t pass a drug test. It’s now legal in our state. He still gets high every day. Some things never change.”

—Anonymous

9.“My ex said, ‘I’m tired of being woken up every 10 minutes.’ I was in active labor. Contractions were three minutes apart.”

—Anonymous, 47, California

10.“Our son was born with a genetic birth defect that affected his kidneys. He was in and out of the hospital his whole first year. We had no family within 1,000 miles, I was working 30 hours a week, and my husband traveled on business a lot. I dealt with it, because honestly, what choice did I have?”

OWN

“Many years later, I had to go take care of my mother for a month. People came out of the woodwork! They doted on my husband for being ‘put out,’ brought him meals (though he can cook better than I can), and offered to babysit so he could ‘have a break.’ Talk about double standards!”

—Anonymous, 51, Missouri, United States

11.“It’s difficult not to feel resentful toward my husband. He doesn’t realize just how entitled he is. He doesn’t wake up at night OR help feed the baby, and I do most of her changes. The cycle is endless: feed, burp, lay her down, change the diaper, feed, burp, change diaper, get her to sleep…and he does MAYBE, AT MOST, 20% of the work — usually more like 10 or 15 — and still complains about how much work it is and how little sleep he gets.”

“He’s not the one waking up every two hours to feed her, and that’s by choice. He’s letting me do all the work by choice, and then he complains about how exhausted HE is. Be careful who you have kids with.”

—Anonymous, 36

12.“When our kid was about a year and a half old, I had to dress them in their snowsuit and take them to the local convenience store during a snowstorm — the store was maybe five blocks from where we lived at the time — because my ex-husband said it ‘wasn’t his responsibility to watch our kid’ while I ran an errand. We split up when our kid was 2 1/2, but I was basically a single parent the entire time.”

—Anonymous, 64 Boston, Massachussetts

13.“I got married young and neither me nor my husband were prepared for marriage or parenthood. It was a mistake. We made it through and now have two kids and are pretty happy, but that came from a LOT of work, mostly on my end. I had to teach my husband to be a good partner at the same time I was teaching my kids how to be little humans. That wasn’t fair.”

—Anonymous, 26

14.“My partner didn’t realize how much work came with having a baby. (That is perhaps the understatement of the year.) To be fair, of course, I didn’t either, but at least I had a general idea. He was so shocked by the amount of work that went into a baby, he fell behind, and as the mother, of course I was forced by necessity to pick up the slack. At that time, I hated him.”

CBS

“It took a few weeks of this before he realized just how exhausted and spent I’d become, and at that point, he totally apologized and picked up the slack. He has been trying very hard and is now a great parent.I feel like this only happened because he’s a good person. Most men see moms doing all the work and are happy to let her — because who wants to take care of a baby?! NO ONE. Certainly not men! Guys, be careful who you have kids with. I lucked out!”

—Anonymous

15.“When our only child was a baby, my husband somehow changed from a loving soul to a very selfish man. He was selfish with his time and his energy and almost refused to help with the baby. It didn’t really change with time; he expected that I, as the woman, would do ALL the parenting. I left him when she was 6 and wish I’d done it sooner.”

—Anonymous

If you have any response you want to share, tell me about it down in the comments. Or if you have your own anecdote to share, go for it! I love to hear people’s stories.

Or, if you want to write in but prefer to stay anonymous, feel free to check out the anonymous form below!