Splitting duties

He may be going out to work but you are still working looking after your baby. It's taken me 9 weeks to get my partner to fully understand this. Night feeds are both of our duties. I change the nappy, he preps the bottle, he starts feeding while I'm doing stuff like using the loo, then I take over feeding while he goes back to bed, I put the baby back in bed before going to sleep myself. I've got her all day so he can take the pressure off me in the evening for a bit when he's home from work. Doesn't always work that way but that's what we're trying to do

You are still at home with the baby so you need to be alert and able to parent so please don’t think you need to do all the nights! I was doing this with my first and got to a point she was up multiple times and I was burnt out and crying constantly because I just had no energy for anything. I talked to my husband and he would then do some aswell. With our second we’re pretty lucky that he’s started sleeping through but if he is up it’s typically only once in the night so I tend to just take that feed in however, if I’m feeling particularly tired I will just wake my husband to do it. When my husband gets home from work he’ll take over feeds if there isn’t something else he has to do/I need him to do and he always does the last night feed. On weekends he basically does most of the feeds including night feeds when they were regular and now if they do happen too. I still do feeds on weekends but only a couple unless he’s not home for whatever reason. Have a chat and see what works…

.. best for yous. You need time too, remember whilst they go to work, they get to shut off from babies and we never really get that. Communication is key 100%. If you bottle things up you’ll end up burning out and exploding x

We do exactly the same here. But on Friday nights, he does all the feeds, and I sleep in the spare room to catch up on missed sleep throughout the week. I asked if we could start this because I felt similar in that I was doing 'it all'. And honestly, that one night, a week of uninterrupted sleep has done wonders for my mood, mental health, and our relationship

I do both night feeds and am with the baby throughout the days. My partner takes on the bulk of the duties when he gets in from work until bedtime, generally 6-9:30pm. On the weekends either we split the night feeds or he’ll do both night feeds, he also takes over caring in the days on Saturdays and Sundays to give me a break. Obviously it depends on circumstance, my partner is out of the house between 12-14 hours a day with work, which yes is absolutely draining for me but he’s going out to work for us so we work as a team as and when we can 🥰 being the primary carer is definitely hard and I know if I had the choice I’d be in work 😂 but it’s also super rewarding and I know if he could he would want to swap and be with his son much more x

When he gets home from work we split everything 50/50. Our son normally has a feed at 11pm/12am which we both do, then he’ll wake about 3/4am when my husband does the feed. My son is then ‘up for the day’ about 6/7am with my toddler. If my husband didn’t do the night feed i would be ‘working’ (looking after our children) 4am - 11pm/12am and of course at work he gets tea breaks, a lunch time, gets time to himself on the drive to and from work so we thought this was the fairest way. I think it’s good to be in constant communication about it though, as baby’s wake ups constantly change as they grow and some days you may be less tired than your husband and visa versa z

Be curious to hear from any other EBF mums on this one, since it’s quite hard for us to split feeding, although my husband will feed LO with a bottle around 10pm. So far my husband has taken on more of the household chores and cooking our meals, and will do the nappy changes in the evening, however I like the message above that we are both doing a job so we need to split evening and weekend. If I had a choice I would for sure rather be taking care of LO than working right now though and I do think with her napping during the day I do get time for myself.

personally, i do all the night time feeds, do most of the bed routine. also house chores & cooking. i like my partner to be fully rested for his job, his job can turn dangerous very quickly which is why id hate for him to go to work tired. and i like to allow my partner to come home & relax. this is all me though, my partner is more than happy to help & offers all the time to do something - if he’s not tired & had a non-stressful day at work then i’ll accept his help but i like to make sure he has plenty of time to relax.