When my husband talks about spending time with our baby, he says he’ll “watch” her…

If my husband said he would “babysit” the kids I’d be bothered but probably not if he said “watch”

What’s worse is when I worked part time and I’d say my husband is at home with the kids. People would reply back “so he’s baby sitting them while you work, that’s nice.” Since I am the primary care taker. Like uh no he’s just taking care of his kids. He’s the father i didn’t create them on my own.

Might be where I'm from, but 'watch' is super common. I'll often ask my husband to watch the baby if I want a shower. If it's irking you, let him know, he might not realise he's doing it x

Just happened to me now lol how ironic is this post! 🤣

I use watching so I said just you but it’s more of a she’s eating can you watch her to make sure she doesn’t choke kinda thing. Most of the time dad is in charge of babies we call it daddy days. The weekdays are mommy days and weekends are daddy days

I understand the frustration. Whether I get mad depends on how literal he is about watching. Sitting on the phone and making sure baby doesn't die is literal watching and angers me. Actually parenting and bonding is good and I can deal with the term.

I only said just you cause I can’t see me using the phrase can you parent them while I shower, get my nails done or etc. for me/us watching is parenting. And a lot of the time it’s just a “the kids are doing x and I’m going to go do x”. Babysitting your own kids is another can of worms.

Lol I honestly don’t know what else I would expect for him to say other than watch😂 I mean that’s what I do too!😂

My husband gets irritated when other people say he’s watching or babysitting but as someone above said when we need to go do something we do say watch so idk lol

For me it’s when they say “I’ll watch them for you” as if him parenting is a favor and not his role 🙃

@Jaz 😂 babysitting would irritate me, but saying watch your kid is legit😂 because yea you need to be actually watching them to make sure they’re not doing anything they’re not supposed to be doing😂 they can’t watch themselves. But yea I say it to my fiancé too when I’m about to leave the house but it’s more like a reminder because he plays the game and he’s one track minded and I’ll be gone and come back home to her having my stuff all over the house because he can’t focus on more than one thing at a time 😂

I feel like the most important is what he does with your baby and not the use of the word ? If it’s just the word, just have a kind discussion with him to tell him like for example« you are so cute while playing with our baby, I love your relationship, but something bothers me : why do you qualify it by just « watching » ? I feel like you mean just « babysitting » and it seems a detail but it hurts me. » If it is just his whole way of behaving that seems not what you expect from a daddy, that’s a deeper issue which has to be addressed

My husband says he babysits OUR son. It drives me wild and he thinks it's funny... no hun it's not.

I don't think the word 'watch' is that deep tbh. I say, "Can you watch __?" or "I'll watch __ while you go"

If he's spending time with the baby regularly and he's volunteering to do it (and doing things well), then you're being petty here. Sometimes, we play ourselves when we have a good man (myself included), and we're being petty and caught up over semantics. It's the sentiment, not the semantics! Now, if he's not doing well, then my bad, Sis. Disregard me, lol 😅

It’s just a word that comes out they don’t mean anything by it. Like if I’m out someone would ask “who’s watching Tay?” Like it’s a normal question. No one’s gonna ask “who’s parenting Tay?”

My husband says hes taking care of the baby but in reality she's in the swing and he's on his phone. Like don't try to sell me that you're taking care of her. 🙄

I didn’t mean literal use of the word “parent”, y’all 🥴

But what exactly would you like for him to say?

It’s about context for example I’m the default parent and it irks me when he only watch’s the baby but won’t make any parental decisions he has to come to me about it the baby has pooped or if I think his diaper is squishy or if he’s hungry like it’s not that hard

I always tell my husband to watch our son 😅

My husband describes it as ‘helping out’ like he’s not also a parent 🙄

It’s the concept of it being looked at as babysitting, helping, etc. when he’s also a parent, not just a sitter or helper. I’m not referring to “hey I’m getting in the shower, can you make sure you watch the baby?” - that’s obviously different.