COURTESY OF LYDIA FINE
Exit
But when Fine’s contractions
started three weeks early, her husband was glued to her side, pressing her left leg back while she
pushed and even peeking as the
baby emerged — something he said
he’d never do. “I thought, ‘Wow,
I’m literally looking at the grossest thing I’ll ever see,’ but I didn’t
care,” Timmel said, laughing. “I
was watching my child be born.”
For Timmel, threatening to stay
out of the delivery room turned
out to be a bluff, but other dadsto-be say they long for the days
when men got to skip the blood
and the screaming and just show
up when there was a clean, bundled baby to hold. For many American couples, it’s important — and
expected — for the man to be fully
present throughout the birth. But
in some dark corners of the Internet, on blogs and forums, women
confess that their squeamish significant others would prefer simply to stay in the waiting room.
Are those partners the weak, outmoded black sheep of modern parenthood? Or has society gone too
far in expecting all dads to be active participants — through labor,
pushing, crowning — while giving
them little clear guidance on why,
exactly, they’re there?
LIFESTYLE
Throughout the early 20th century, American women gave birth
at home with the help of female
relatives, friends and midwives.
“Men were completely not related,” said Ziv Eisenberg, a researcher with Yale University’s History
Department. As hospital births
took over, partners were confined
to the waiting room, or “stork
club” — because doctors and nurses didn’t want anyone bothering
them. Having another person in
HUFFINGTON
10.20.13
New mom
Lydia Fine
rests in the
hospital with
newborn
daughter
Hillary in
August 2012.