Dude, Why Are Books For Dads So Bad?
Men are more than capable of being engaged partners during a pregnancy. So why do so many guidebooks treat prospective fathers like bumbling frat boys?
Not long after we found out I was pregnant, my husband started looking for a book specifically aimed at dads-to-be. The results: disappointing.
The good news is that the pickins aren't as slim as they used to be. Books for expectant fathers actually exist now, because there is a market for them, because more men give a shit. And more women understand that it's no longer acceptable for their male partners to be emotional non-contributors as fathers. There are enough engaged dads out there that the gig is up for the learned helplessness of the manly man who brags about never changing a diaper. One would think--or hope!-- that the selection of books "for dads" would reflect this new reality.
Except it doesn't. Too many books "for dads" still treat men like bumbling morons who stumbled out of the frat house and into a marriage, men who have no empathy, common sense, or emotional maturity. These books are written as though men are perpetual boys. (And if you're one half of a queer couple looking for advice for a non-birthing parent that doesn't rely on heterosexual stereotypes that seem ripped from 1980's beer commercials: forget it.)
Josh ended up giving up entirely on the dad book search and instead reading a book that was written for doulas, and I have made rooting out the stupid books for dads a bit of a passion project. I bought out half my local Barnes & Noble's inventory of books for dads and read them just to get a sense of just how bad they were, and now my brain is a paella of dopey phrases like "the big game" and "night out with the guys" and "hanky panky with the wifey."
Prior to my journey into the Heart of Dadness, I had no idea so many adult men were still referring to other adult men as "dudes." On Amazon, the following titles are available for purchase that include both the word "dude" and "Dad:"
Dude, You're Gonna Be A Dad!
From Dude to Dad: The Diaper Dude Guide To Pregnancy
Dude to Dad: The First Nine Months
From Dude To Dad: The Only Guide a Guy Needs to Become a Dad
A Dude's Guide To Babies: A New Dad's Playbook
The Pregnancy Book for Men: From Dude to Dad in 40 Short Weeks
Thriving Girl Dad: A Dude's Guide to Raising Daughters
Dude, You're Pregnant! An Unserious Guide for the Pregnant Husband and Newborn Daddy
I gave up on page three of my search results, but you get the idea.
I searched for pregnancy books for women that take a similar tone-- like "Bestie, You Got Knocked Up!" and "I'm, Like, Pregnant? WTAF? Pledging the Sorority of Motherhood" and "The Future Wine Mom's Guide To Pregnancy" and "The Bitch's Guide to Absolutely Killing the Baby Game" and all I found were self-published romance novels involving high femme Sapphic college students and books geared at people trying to breed their dogs (along with something called prenatal "Bitch Pills," which are also for dogs).
While there are exceptions, most pregnancy books geared toward women treat pregnancy and childbirth very seriously, whereas most pregnancy books for dads treat the whole thing like a hilarious mishap; There I was, shotgunning a beer with the boys, when suddenly: I became a father. All this seems like setup for the low bar that dads are expected to clear: mother is expected to treat being a parent like it's a full-time job, and the dudely dad one gets to treat it like a part-time hobby. Mom is the family CEO, CFO, and COO, and dad is the guy who brings a karaoke machine to the office holiday party.
Some of the Dude-Dad books offer bland, useless but harmless advice anybody could figure out on their own, like "if your wife is sad, try talking to her" or "share the work by doing some chores around the house." But others give advice that, if followed, would yield poor results.
Horniness is an important emotion for the target audience of these books. "Have no fear: many women still want to have sex after becoming pregnant, some more than ever," one of my bad books proclaims. One book suggests that four weeks was a fine amount of time to wait before resuming sexual intercourse post-birth, which is odd because four weeks is on the low end of how long couples are advised to wait, and "how soon after a major medical event can I insert my penis into the hole in which the event occurred?" seems like a question that should be answered by a woman's doctor and not a humorous book of essays. For some women, sure, that's how it goes. But for other new mothers, the last thing they need after gestating and birthing a whole human is their husband horny-pouting because a book gave him false hopes about how soon the vagina would re-open for business. Calm down, Dong Quixote.
Dudes also love boobs, according to books for dads. The author of one of my Dude-Dad books mentions pregnancy's attendant breast enlargement so much that I have a pretty good idea of what his Pornhub search history looks like. "The extra bra size she has gained has you thinking this pregnancy may have some benefits after all," he writes.
Ah yes, boobs. Pregnancy's main benefit.
One book jokes, "From the moment your partner starts nursing, her breasts are off-limits to you. The property rights have officially transferred to the baby." But don't fear dudes, if you're a good dad and you help out with feedings, your wife will give you her tits back, or, in the words of the book, "it may help you secure your time-share."
The Dad Dudes are also very concerned about a woman's body "bouncing back" after childbirth. One book claims that the first thing a woman thinks after she finds out she's pregnant is "wondering how fat she'll get."
From another:
Nursing helps her uterus shrink back to its original size (sorry you had to read that) and helps her shed excess pregnancy weight (but aren't you glad you read till the end?).
Sorry that you had to read about the thing your partner is experiencing, dude, but at least she won't be fat forever.
One particularly unhelpful section of a particularly unhelpful book encourages dads to perform "field tests" on their newborn infants. Why? Perhaps because it fits in with the theme of the book, which is that being a dad is a little bit like trying out a Go Pro. For example, why not try tricking your baby into thinking it's being dropped? For science?
As you can see: No.
Next is a great example of why parenting books should be updated at least once every 5 years. This book was written in 2005; it relies on wisecracks that would get a Cool Dad frowned out of his cool wife's virtual baby shower in 2021:
If only turning my baby into a sensitive gay boy or tattooed power lesbian trucker on purpose were as easy as a paint job.
Many books in my sad little library treat the mental health challenges that pregnancy can present like a punch line.
"Dealing with a pregnant woman can be like dealing with an unhappy person with multiple-personality disorder," explains one book.
"Her mood swings are a-swingin'!" said another jauntily.
"... she's likely packed on considerable weight and she's starting to sleep less and bitch more," observed one writer, discussing the third trimester. Did you know that a lack of sleep can contribute to real depression? Har har! It's hilarious to have a depressed wife.
Here's something that was both incorrect and hacky:
During weeks 5, 6, and 7, pregnancy hormones start making your [female partner] crazy. Like DEFCON 1 crazy. Typical symptoms include nausea, fatigue, and tender nipples, plus urinating more than your grandfather.
Hm. Sounds like more anecdata.
One Dude-Dad book positioned mood swings as just a means to an end... for makeup sex. "So let nature take its course," the book advises.
Some pregnancy mood swings are absolutely funny. I have cried because a breakfast sandwich Josh made me had "perfect cheese," I have cried at an Instagram photo of a raccoon in a tie, I sobbed during the Olympics. But I've also been so sad that I felt physically unable to leave my house to meet up with a friend I hadn't seen in a year. There was a period of time a few months back where I'd cry for hours a day, for no reason I could articulate. There's a huge difference between amusing pregnancy mood swings and serious antenatal depression, something that often just goes untreated and ignored. Seems like a pretty big miss to gloss over that.
I could go on about the book that devotes an entire chapter to "teaching" one's wife how to use such defunct technologies as a "digital camera" and "camcorder" to capture baby's big moments, or all of the advice about what a pregnant woman shouldn't be "allowed" to eat, or how this one book warned readers that cats can suffocate babies (Point of fact: dogs kill babies more often than cats; parents accidentally kill babies more often than dogs.) But we're busy people. We have busy lives. And spending too much time ruminating on how, even in a modern society, we expect so little of dads can get a little dark to dwell on.
Media that constantly reinforces low expectations for dads has real consequences for their families. It perpetuates the idea that it's okay for fathers to disengage because they "don't know how to do it right" and for mothers to sigh and just do everything themselves.
Earlier this summer, there was an outbreak of e. coli that was linked to cake mix. According to news reports about the outbreak, all of the people who fell sick from it were women and children. I was neck-deep in my bad dad book obsession when that story broke, and my first thought was: of course only women are the only adults getting sick; they're the ones who are expected to make sure everybody gets a birthday cake. There are no stories in my bad dad library about how to plan a perfect celebration to welcome a baby, how to run interference when in-laws well-meaning visits are encroaching on their partner's peace of mind, how to whip up and freeze a few pans of lasagna in the weeks leading up to the birth so that everybody eats during those first few weeks when nobody is sleeping.
Neither women nor men come into the world instinctively knowing how to change diapers or cut tiny baby fingernails or bake cake from a mix, but only one gender's refusal to learn how to do those things has historically been excused, is still being excused. It's insulting to ask that much of women, and to ask so little of men. If men want to be better, where are the resources that will actually empower them?
I hope that five years from now, first-time dads partnered with women will be able to easily find resources that treat them like responsible adults capable of dividing caretaking responsibilities, for both their sake and the sake of their partners and kids. The bar should not be this low. Men who care about being good parents deserve better.
Original illustration by Chloe Smart / Instagram