'My wife wants to put our son in daycare even though we agreed she'd stay at home.' UPDATED

"My [35 M] wife [32 F] of five years is choosing to place our son [3 months M] in daycare even though we agreed that she would stay home with him."

My wife and I have been together for 8 years, married for 5. Before we got married, we discussed having children and what we would do. My wife said she would love to be a stay at home mother and we both agreed that it would be easier for her to take off work for a year or two for the babies. Then she would return to work.

After my wife had our son three months ago, she has completely changed. She had to be on bed rest for the last two months of her pregnancy and she has been out of work for 5 months now on maternity leave.

After she had the baby, she started to complain about finances and our bank accounts, saying they were too low even though just 9 months before they were well enough to have a child (we didn't touch our savings).

Now my wife is saying she has to go back to work and place our son in daycare. She is an executive for a hospital and can take off as much time as needed, but she wants to go back to work.

Her hospital doesn't have a daycare or anything like that, meaning that she would have an extra two hours a day of getting our son ready for daycare (I have always adamantly said that if we had kids, she would be the primary caretaker and I would pay the bills).

I don't understand why she has changed her mind. She has been to the doctor and does not have post-Partum and this morning she texted me that I would be watching the baby while she looks for a daycare. I don't think any of this is fair given that our relationship has been based off these gender roles from the start. I work full time as well. Any advice?

What do you think he should do? This is what top commenters had to say:

SundayScoop said:

I can understand why you might feel like this change of plans is not fair when you assumed everything was set. From experience with many women in this postive I can tell you that it's hard to know how you will feel once a baby is born. Some dedicated careerists find that can't bear to go back to work, and some people who plan to stay at home feel stifled and miss their career.

This is clearly a bit of an impasse. I wonder if you have discussed this with your wife in a supportive way, asking her if perhaps her feelings about staying at home have changed, and she isn't enjoying it as much (and using money as the excuse). Since you have pretty strict gender roles in your family, perhaps she feels that you will be critical of her if she admits that staying home is boring her to tears.

Maybe something else is going on. Ask her in a loving and supportive way. Or better yet seek out some short term counseling to work through any communication and expectation barriers. I don't think either one of you is "wrong" here. Life throws you curve balls and sometimes best laid plans go awry.

Chocolatechipz said:

Perhaps the reason she doesn't trust you with the baby is because, as you say, your relationship had been based on "gender roles" from the start. Maybe you have both been too successful in adhering to these gender roles and now you both have trouble seeing each other in a different light?

Regarding women and working, many women find having a career very fulfilling. Even if they had originally thought they would want to stay at home full time after the baby is born, they find that changing diapers and doing laundry not that fulfilling. Your wife has had a change of heart, and it's OK.

Putting your kid in daycare is not going to traumatize him for life. What will traumatize him is having a depressed mother who feels unfulfilled and resentful towards her child and role.

TheBauhausCure said:

The major thing EVERYONE is missing here is that OPs wife does not trust her husband, the father of her son, to watch him on his own. He has stated several times that she won't trust him to watch the kid during the day like that.

I think that requires further discussion, and that if you don't want to talk to a lawyer, at the very least go to a therapist with your wife. This is NOT a normal mindset for someone in a commuted relationship with a child to have, unless you have shown some sort of abuse in the past.

And [deleted] said:

Uh... She's her own person, she should be free to work if she wants to. Your precious 3 month old will survive, trust me.

Unfortunately, the situation escalated. He later shared this update:

Hi everyone. I had a talk with my wife about the situation. I asked her why she wanted to go back to work, she said it was because she was bored at home and didn't want to watch the baby. I explained to her that I was more than willing to stay at home part time to watch the baby, but that she had to trust that I could do it.

My wife then told me that would never happen and that she would get her mom to watch our son if it came down to that.

Some people asked is where we live, and we live in the southern US. We live in a rural area about 45 minutes from a large city (where my wife works). We are also both raised Pentecostal. There is a daycare around here that was cheap, but my wife doesn't trust the woman who operates it. I explained that she couldn't know that unless she went into the daycare for a tour, but my wife refused.

My wife claims that a friend's baby became sick while at the daycare and therefore we wouldn't be sending our son. The daycare she wants is close to the hospital where she works, but that means our son will have to make the commute with her each day.

I tried to explain to her why this wasn't a good idea. The cost was too high, it would be easier for me to take care of our son until he's a few months older. I suggested we try to find a nanny so that we could spare shifting the childcare onto our parents. My wife said that it would never happen that way.

I asked my wife why she didn't trust me to watch our baby, and she said it was because she was scared I would abuse the baby. She told me that she had seen me 'playing with his diapers' and that I couldn't be trusted. From what I understand, the garbage bag broke when I took the trash out and I had to pick up some diapers that had spilled onto the floor.

She saw it and assumed the worst. I felt sick hearing what she had to say and left the room. My wife then freaked out. She grabbed our son and tried to leave with him in the car with no car seat or her shoes. I tried to get the baby from her and she slapped me and drove off. I then had to call the cops who arrested her for child endangerment, because she was speeding 30 mph over.

I already called a lawyer and I'm filing for divorce. I don't care if she snapped because of hormones or any other reason. What she did broke my heart and broke our marriage. I probably will not update again.

Edit: She already has a therapist she's seeing, but I will not be with a partner who disrespects me and who hits me. I have done everything possible in my life to make my wife happy, and now she's done everything she can to make me unhappy. I don't care if she's sick or not, she hit me.

I promised her I would never hit her and she promised me the same. She broke that promise. My son can't be with her for as long as she's acting like this and neither can I. I don't need your judgement.

Do you think we're getting the whole story here?