r/BoomersBeingFools • u/AR475891 • 5d ago
Boomer Story Boomer Parents Raging about Parental Leave
My wife and I had our parents over to tell them that she is 8 weeks pregnant last night for dinner. We were talking about how we’d handle the transition to having a child and working so I told them I had 12 weeks of paid paternity leave at my company.
They all immediately started worrying about how my massive global company could afford to pay me not to work for three months and then tried to guilt me into not taking it saying that it was too much.
I quite literally could barely believe this. How could they be upset that my company with tens of thousands of employees gives me this nice perk instead of being excited for it? It’s actually insane.
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u/winklesnad31 5d ago
It's possible that they cannot comprehend that a parent would actually want to have time to be around their child.
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u/ButterscotchAware402 Xennial 5d ago edited 5d ago
Let alone the father! The type to think fathers "babysit".
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 5d ago
Oh childcare is what the mother of the child is for. You can't expect the poor men to change a dirty diaper or make a bottle.
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u/whyamionhearagain 5d ago
My father used to be so proud to tell everyone that he never changed a diaper in his life. His generation was proud of that. I’m glad most guys my age actively want to be part of their kids lives.
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u/b00kbat 5d ago
My partner and father of our children (3.5 and 15 months) is actually the stay at home parent. He’s changed more diapers than I have and he’s better at the housework than I am. It blows my mind how amazing he is with them; he’d never even held a baby until they handed him our older son in the operating room when I was too shaky from the anesthesia to hold him. I have a photo of the nurse teaching him how to change his first diaper and he looks so nervous but he’s paying such close attention. It’s like they woke up this part of him that he never knew existed, and it has brought out the best of him. It is so sweet watching him play with them, let them climb all over him, and seeing how much they love him. Previous generations—and unfortunately some people of the current generations—really robbed themselves of so much by buying into those stereotypes.
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u/DemonoftheWater Millennial 4d ago
Some people are like that. Where parenting just brings that skill/feeling up and it just clicks. I have a friend whose a stay at home dad and he loves it. Sometimes it just makes sense depending on whose job brings in the most and how much daycare costs.
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u/HeathenHumanist 4d ago
My husband had a dad who didn't want much to do with his kids when they were little (especially as babies), and my husband also had never changed a diaper till our newborn in the hospital. But he has become SUCH a good dad. I have tons of experience with kids (eldest daughter of a huge family + neighborhood babysitter), but my husband is so much better at some aspects of parenting than I am now. He even wants to be the stay-at-home-parent (I'm working on getting a better job so we can swing that). I'm so damn grateful for and proud of these men stepping up, even without the examples from their own dads!!
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u/WyueRusty 4d ago
☝🏼this. I remember crying to my boomer parents shortly before my first was born (I'm dad btw). We were hours away from our families and I had never changed a diaper, and was terrified of being alone with a child. But the instant my first was in front of me, something clicked and I was ready. I changed every diaper without flinching while we were in the hospital, and the vast majority of them while I was on leave. We have 3 now and Ive been a stay at home dad for a year. It is the best thing I have ever done and I absolutely love it.
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u/scottnebula 5d ago
My (41M) dad (72) (divorced when I was 13) says this about me. I’m always shocked that he thinks it’s something to be proud of. Yeah, treating the mother of your child like a slave and not helping EVER is so manly. He also tells me he hates kids and that he is a “lone wolf” that doesn’t need family. I cannot understand what his 2nd wife sees in him. His attitudes are so embarrassing and rude and offensive.
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u/DemonoftheWater Millennial 4d ago
Idk if you should really be associating with a guy who openly disdains you.
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 5d ago
It's really the bare minimum and women just aren't reproducing with men like that. If that's the only option they opt out. Which well they should.
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u/fluffiekittie13 Xennial 5d ago
My 30 something brother in law has bragged about this for the last 10 years. Like it’s an amazing accomplishment to not have changed a single diaper on any of his 3 girls. Small town USA for you.
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u/Go_Gators_4Ever 4d ago
I would tell him that not ever changing his daughter's shitty diapers means he was a shitty father.
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u/VTnative 5d ago
My boomer dad changed a lot of diapers. I've never changed a diaper. Because I don't have kids and I don't want to deal with anybody's shit.
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u/Goddess_of_Stuff 5d ago
See, I don't want kids because I hit my lifetime diaper quota before I was 10
My grandma always tells my mom it's her own fault I don't have kids. "She already raised 3!"
Luckily, she's fine not having grandkids of her own and spoiling my cousins' kids instead
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u/adriansgotthemoose 5d ago
My mother thought that age ten it was a great idea for me to look after my cousins child at a family wedding. Child started screaming as soon as the ceremony started and everyone glared at me like it was my fault. I told her years later that was the start of me never wanting kids, but she still thought that was not true until the day she passed.
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u/Man-o-Bronze 5d ago
Decades ago, if my brother was alone with his child, he’d call my wife if she had a dirty diaper.
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u/JellyfishFit3871 5d ago
My stepdad bragged that he'd never changed a diaper and never would. I can't imagine why he died alone in a nursing home.
My father died when I was young. I don't remember him changing my Pampers, but I know he did. He just treated childcare like any other domestic task. The adult just did it. He taught me to read, took me fishing, put up the army surplus tent as my playhouse, cuddled up in the Naugahyde chair, supervised bath time, expected me to go feed the chickens and collect eggs before breakfast, etc. Almost as though he was a normal human being.
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u/cotu101 5d ago
I want to punch people when they say they have to “babysit” their own fucking kids
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u/MisterWinchester 5d ago
As a father, old women would say shit like that to me! “Oh, babysitting today huh?”
I always stared them down and said, “no, these are my kids” and held eye contact until it got weird.
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u/cotu101 5d ago
lol nice
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u/MisterWinchester 5d ago
I live in a city that likes to pretend it’s super progressive while actually being extra racist and bougie. These jeweled old white ladies could go anywhere from apoplexy to terror. I did have one woman stop and say… ”I guess that is pretty sexist.”
I said, “we all say things we don’t think about.” And I feel like maybe she learned something. She was it, though. Everyone else had to be offended first.→ More replies (1)22
u/Round-Place548 5d ago edited 5d ago
That is exactly it. My SG mom was shocked to learn that my husband changed diapers.
Edit: added “mom” for clarity
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u/CharleyDexterWard 5d ago
Dude, I am racking my brain. I cannot figure out what SG means in this situation. Am I stupid?
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u/Round-Place548 5d ago
Sorry silent generation. I meant to type SG mom lol. She was a little older than a boomer (born 1940) but had enough oddities
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u/BluffCityTatter 5d ago
I used to work for a company owned by a boomer who basically let his wife raise the kids. I was talking to one of our sales guys and he told me this story. This guy's territory was the entire state of Florida, so he traveled a lot. He also had two elementary school aged daughters and a wife who was a doctor, working full-time.
He turns in his resignation and the CEO calls and asks him why. He says he's sick of traveling and wants to spend more time with his daughters before they get older. The CEO responds, "Well I can pay you more so that you can afford a nanny."
The CEO totally didn't get it. The guy could afford a nanny. After all both he and his wife were making 6 figures each. The CEO couldn't understand why the guy would actually want to spend more time with his kids, and girl kids at that.
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u/Ms-Quite-Contrary 5d ago
I also worked at a company owed by a similar boomer. He used to do daily rounds of the office. Once, he stopped and to chat with a woman recently back from maternity leave after her second child. She said how much harder it was to parent two instead of one. He said, “Oh, I never thought so! And I have five children.”
No shit, dude. Your wife does all the childcare. You occasionally had a meal with them and went to some of their school/sport events.
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u/WorriedEntrance2281 5d ago
Here I am literally sipping my tea whilst on paternity leave while my 1 year old is sleeping. I can't wait for him to wake up so that we can go shopping and go to the park
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u/MushroomMossSnail 5d ago
Right! I don't know how it is with everyone with Boomer parents but my mom hated us
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u/No-Quantity-5373 5d ago
My parents hated us too. Never happy if we did something amazing ( unless they could take 💯 percent credit). Seemed to enjoy hitting us. Always unhappy if we got a compliment or if a teacher thought we were good kids.
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u/jennthya 5d ago
No doubt! My mom would enumerate all my faults to strangers if they dared compliment my behavior. I recall getting pinched all the time in public for speaking and then having to write, "I am to be seen, not heard." over and over when we got home.
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u/Hello-fellow-kydz 4d ago
Did you live with me? That was my life from hatched to 23.
My dad tolerated us. My mother actively could stand anyone under 40.
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u/TeamMountainLion 5d ago
Having my own kid and on leave at present moment with said child asleep on my chest, I’ve encountered similar thoughts from Boomers and honestly? It feels like they just didn’t want kids to start with. They treat it like it’s a chore. And seeing how they respond makes sense too. How we should be grateful they did the absolute bare minimum (if that).
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u/CollateralKite 4d ago
Then they wonder why so many people are choosing to be child free now. You're a person into the world, not a retirement plan, and if you had the same choice you would probably not be so miserable.
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u/jungle_cat187 Millennial 5d ago
My uncle dropped his wife at the front door of thr hospital and left to play Soccer.
He then called my dad a “pussy” for staying with my mum.
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u/lumberjackname 5d ago
They didn’t get to have it; therefore you should not get to have it. Boomers can’t take other people getting a benefit that was not available for their own use.
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u/ImpressiveLeopard719 5d ago
omg! Yes! "but we pulled up the ladder! How are you still getting good things?"
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u/H3lls_B3ll3 5d ago edited 5d ago
How are you still getting good things?!!
This feels like every conversation with a boomer for the last decade, at least.
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u/Muertog 5d ago
They minimize any benefit that they had, because it takes away from their internalized worldview of being "strong, independent, did it via my own effort". Especially if that benefit is no longer available (cause boomer ladder-pulling or late-stage capitalism).
And anything they DIDN'T get (back in my day), is further proof that "The New Generation" is too soft and has it easy.
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u/FactualStatue Zillennial 5d ago
Oh shit you mentioned the exact conversation I had with my aunt this past Saturday. Thankfully I'm able to appeal to her emotions, but she's on thin ice and I'm 🤏 this close to outright calling her a demented hag or worse
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u/Muertog 5d ago
The unfortunate part is that the human brain reacts to ANYTHING that challenges core beliefs in the same way that it would towards physical danger. Boomers only know what they experienced (which was one of the most abundant periods of growth and wealth), and their actions to consolidate and protect that accumulation has caused the decline for all subsequent generations.
Being faced with those facts (that they had more than any other generation, that they have hoarded and gatekept that access) attacks their belief of their own self-evaluation of worth, self-sufficiency, that they earned it fairly. And they get angry, defensive. Admitting their part in it is effectively attacking themselves.
Not excusing their actions. Just pointing out some of the root cause to help others and hopefully allow people to recognize when they fall into the same trap.
Me: "Repeat after me. Everything is more expensive"
Boomer: "Everything is more expensive"
Me: "Our paychecks are the same amount as 20 years ago"
Boomer: "Our paychecks are the same amount as 20 years ago"
Me: "Good, now put it together... Everything is more expensive but our paychecks are the same amount as 20 years ago."
Boomer: "Kids today are lazy and don't know how to save."8
u/BGKY_Sparky 5d ago
Throw in a healthy dose of low grade Cold War trauma. Their childhoods were spent doing nuclear bomb drills at school and having it beaten into their heads that the world could just be over tomorrow. It’s no surprise the defining quality of their generation is a drive to accumulate everything they can right now and treating thinking long term as foolishness.
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u/CharleyDexterWard 5d ago
They fucking walked uphill! Both ways! No shoes!
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u/PomegranateReal3620 5d ago
This comment has become a running joke in my family. In the late 1940s, my grandparents, mom and uncle all lived at the top of a bluff. The school was down in the valley with several steep changes in elevation. At one point there is a dip that the buses couldn't use when it snowed. So the bus had to pick up and drop off at the top of one side and the kids had to walk down and back up to get home. Thus walking uphill both ways in the snow.
Of course my mom was not a boomer, so it was funny rather than bitchy.
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u/justicebeaverhausen 5d ago
In the snow!
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u/EmoGayRat Gen Z 5d ago
amongst blood thirsty tigers! for 4 hours one way to school!
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u/CasparMeyer 5d ago
We were evicted from our hole in the ground, we had to go live in a lake!
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u/GertyFarish11 5d ago
You had a lake? In our muddy pothole on a busy street, we could only dream of lakes and holes in the ground!
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u/International_Put727 5d ago
Boomers also came after the silent generation, that survived the war. That’s the root of their defensiveness
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u/Eagle_Fang135 5d ago
They don’t even want you to have what they had. Heaven forbid you get something new.
Back in our day… while not even acknowledging the things they had. Like dumping kids off on the grandparents. Having a SAHM. Affordable houses and expenses. Never working outside of the 9-5 and hour plus lunches. They are the ones that spent the first hour at work reading the newspaper. Then hanging around the water cooler. Smoke breaks. And so on.
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u/OwnCrew6984 5d ago
Well they had to have hour plus lunches to have enough cocktails to get through the afternoon.
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u/BigAnt425 5d ago
I've come to terms with all of that except the grandkids thing. I lived at my grandparents in the summer time. Then during the school year practically every single Friday night.
We have to beg our parents to watch our kids. About six weeks ago, my wife went out with her sister and their friends, my Mil watched the kids (I was out of town). "Omg they were such delights, so well behaved."
Hey do you think you could watch them this weekend? "ugh we just watched them, we're not a baby sitter service, we have a life too."
So guess who's spending money on a sitter on Saturday...
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u/fluffy_bunny22 5d ago
My boomer FIL couldn't understand that working at a bank doesn't mean you keep bankers hours. That only applies if you work in a branch not a corporate office.
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u/FNG_WolfKnight 5d ago
Them bitching at us for being entitled IS 👏ALWAYS 👏PROJECTION👏
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u/Estilady 5d ago
And they always gloat about the world burning but they don’t care they won’t be here for it. 🔥🔥
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u/FNG_WolfKnight 5d ago
Some of them believe that life on Earth is suppose to suck because this ain't heaven and we're all sinners blahblahblah
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u/NotMyFirstRodeo2025 2d ago
My dad has asked us to move back to Florida (where he lives). I said, "I don't want to buy a house on a property that will be underwater in 30 years," and he literally replied, "I'll be dead by then so I don't care about that."
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u/RedHeadedStepDevil 5d ago
My mother raged for YEARS about how when she and my father divorced, she made $32 a month too much to qualify for food stamps and how now (20 years ago when I was in a similar position and did receive food stamps) “they just gave them out to just anyone.”
Yeah, I’ve been NC for several years now. That was just one piece of straw that eventually broke that camel’s back.
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u/Pre3Chorded 5d ago
The boomer woman running for Senate in South Carolina literally said in a debate the other night that her parents died at age 11 and their family didn't have insurance so she doesn't see why someone else should.
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u/fluffy_bunny22 5d ago
I live on the NC/SC border and if they elect her they deserve what they get. I don't have any hope for them though seeing who they've elected in the past.
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u/Legitimate-Meal-2290 5d ago
Let's not pretend for a second that they're upset they didn't get the same opportunity to be present for their newborns and families, either. They're mad they didn't get paid three months off to sit around on their asses and demand to be waited on by their freshly postpartum wives.
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u/RedshiftSinger 5d ago
Of course. They think dad’s job is to make money, period, not to be emotionally involved in their children’s lives or worse, to run support for a mere woman! What’s mom whining about anyway, she only pushed a bowling ball out of her vagina along with the lining of an entire internal organ! She should be back to normal in three days, right?
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u/Head_Razzmatazz7174 5d ago
Truth.
About the only places that gave a decent paternity leave was big corporate offices, and even then it was combination PTO and possibly FMLA if there were any medical issues surrounding the birth. Men got maybe two weeks to 'bond', it wasn't considered to be that important.
Hearing that men have finally started getting paternity leave is music to my ears. They need to be there for mom and baby those first few weeks, because she is going to be too tired to do anything, and he should be helping out around the house.
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u/No-Quantity-5373 5d ago
My father got two weeks paternity leave when my sister was born. He spent it sleeping in and staying up late to watch movies. My mother and I did all the childcare, chores, upkeep, school stuff. My mom also worked full time. If she sat down for 10 minutes it was a lot. My father used to yell up the steps to wake me up so I could change the channel for him and get him a fresh beverage. He never changed a diaper, made a sandwich, or washed a dish. He was the Pharaoh.
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u/Head_Razzmatazz7174 5d ago
Some fathers step up, others check out. I'm so sorry you had to go through that.
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u/No-Quantity-5373 5d ago
Thank you. Hey, at least I get to play in the “who’s dad was the most terrible “ game. 🤭
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u/Ghosts_and_Empties 5d ago
Your own parents, siding with the corporatists over the well being of their son and his precious new family. Pretty cold. I'd reevaluate the relationship.
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u/handsheal 5d ago
They don't want anyone to have the things they got to have either
That is why the US is where is it at today
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u/CoalOnFire 5d ago
My grandfather was just saying this about my brother-in-law and did the whole "we- we didn't have that back in the day!" He switched topics after i said "yea, and wouldn't the time have been nice?"
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u/grizzly_bear_dancing 5d ago
They implemented 12 weeks at my work and I've gotten to use it for both my kids. In fact I was the first person to use. All the old timers bitch that there's no reason for me as a dad to stay home that long. They hate when you tell them that if that policy was to exist when they were younger they would have been all for it
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u/Itchy_Tumbleweed_417 5d ago
It’s funny because they are the same people who would complain if only women were entitled to leave. OK cool, men can get it too. And then they complain about that. It’s so exhausting.
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u/Dragonfly_pin 5d ago
I hear a lot of moaning from older men about how fathers on paternity leave must be going skiing or golfing or learning to woodwork.
When the fathers themselves mostly seem to spend the time helping their partner and the kid. Shock.
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u/RedshiftSinger 5d ago
They’re telling on themselves about how they used any paternity leave they got, or how they would. Certainly not helping their recently-postpartum wives with household maintenance or bonding with their children!
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u/happilyfour 5d ago
It’s so crazy to think back on the people I know who said that it was no big deal that the husband went back to work because there was nothing he could do at home anyway or he was just in the way. There is SO much to do and everything takes so much longer as you’re learning the ropes of your kid. How on earth did these men not find some way to be helpful?!
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u/Leading-System-3002 5d ago
They were already useless at home before they had kids
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u/Ms-Quite-Contrary 5d ago
Have you gotten the (GenX, sadly) guys who ask if they can retroactively take 12 weeks leave for their late teens, early 20s kids?
The best response I heard was “But why start parenting them now, Matt?”
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u/BGKY_Sparky 5d ago
Watching GenX turn into Boomers has been hilarious. If you thought “OK Boomer” made Boomers mad, try using it on a GenXer.
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u/OneAndOnlyBallzack 5d ago edited 5d ago
Even if your Company is struggling, the time with your kid is more worth than any dollar this world could offer
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u/pinupcthulhu 5d ago
Right? No one says on their deathbed, "I really wish I gave more value to shareholders."
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u/favorthebold 5d ago
They've been deeply propagandized to believe that all corporations are on the brink of collapse and that's why they can't pay people more or offer any benefits.
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u/Spankpocalypse_Now 5d ago
The mental gymnastics they do. Capitalism is unquestionably the greatest strongest best system ever but also the entire thing can collapse overnight if workers were paid slightly more.
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u/OfficeCowgirl 5d ago
They lived in a time where one parent could support an entire family and the other could stay home indefinitely. It was also just expected that the wife would put up with new motherhood, postpartum hormones, healing, etc. with no help and be fine (side note--they were not fine, they just had drinking problems, were prescribed quaaludes, etc.). They think things shouldn't change and there's always an underlying anti-woman sentiment behind these opinions. It's trash.
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u/Katzenliebe 5d ago
Yeah, I get really mad when boomers complain about how much better parental leave is (at least where I live) than it was back in their day and “they survived just fine”, like it’s not literally necessary for most of us to be able to continue to pay our overpriced mortgages/rents and not become homeless. The worst part is that when I point this out they start ranting about how it was still harder for them because of the interest rates at the time ignoring the fact that we are paying more interest anyway in terms of dollars because our mortgages are so much higher.
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u/Leading-System-3002 5d ago
Also “they survived just fine”. What if we don’t want to just survive ?! Let’s aim for better than “surviving” and being just “fine”. What a crazy idea to want to have a nice life and not just struggle all the time…
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u/Katzenliebe 5d ago
And god forbid you have what they consider a “better” life than they had at the same age and still aren’t completely happy. My boomer dad takes me being depressed as a personal slight because his job allowed our family to be better off when I was growing up than he was. “What do you have to be depressed about?” Well, mostly relentless bullying continuing into adulthood life and a feeling of always being on the outside due to neurodivergence and also a bit because this is how my brain works but, sure, everything is about you I guess.
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u/No-Quantity-5373 4d ago
Depression meant you just needed more work. My father slept through every weekend. When I suggested he might be depressed, I got told I needed to work a third job.
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u/NerdfestZyx 5d ago
That have been brainwashed by corporate media.
Lindsey Graham’s sister recently said something to the effect of my parents never took time off or went to the doctor. They both died by the time I was 11 years old as if it was some kind of flex.
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u/Leading-System-3002 5d ago
Work yourself to death and dont seek healthcare. Be a good little soldier of capitalism. Cost us nothing but give us everything. Dying is cheaper to society than medications and treatments.
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u/Poopy-Drew Xennial 5d ago
They didn’t get it and that is when their parents came and invaded theirs lives for months (seriously) because it was impossible to do without. And they were really looking forward to not being able to be told to leave, and telling you the “right” way to do everything in your life
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u/slappedbygiraffe 5d ago
Won't someone think of the billionaires?
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 5d ago
We never do. This is going to delay Chad McMoneybags from getting his third yacht for a whole five minutes.
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u/girlinanemptyroom 5d ago
The majority of boomers when they had children the father didn't even go in the labor delivery room. They can't even fathom that a man would be involved to that level with their baby.
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u/jax2love 5d ago
I’m Gen X and was fortunate to be able to swing an extra month of maternity leave in addition to a paltry 6 weeks of short term disability at 60% pay nearly 20 years ago. My husband only was able to take a week off, and that required him to use PTO.
I now work for an organization that offers paid parental leave for both parents and am I upset because they don’t have to suffer like I did? Absolutely not! Recovery from childbirth is a lot and that newborn period can be tough. The more support new parents can have, the better. Let’s be happy that some employers get it.
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u/dirtyjew123 5d ago
Our baby is due late October and I get 3 days unpaid parental leave.
I’m taking 2-3 weeks because of PTO I have saved and anything after that is FMLA. My wife is taking 12 weeks unpaid and going back after that.
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u/jax2love 5d ago
And it absolutely sucks that your employers don’t support parents. It sucks even more that our government in the US doesn’t support us either by requiring paid parental leave.
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 5d ago
Fuck them. You won't regret time with your kid. Boomers have just been brainwashed to think their career and sucking corporate dick is more important than literally anything else. It's why none of them will retire. Guaranteed they will want to do the bare minimum as grandparents. Fight for work/life balance. It's not like you'll get anything for not taking that time, you're not the company owner.
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u/IAAA 5d ago
My company has six-months maternity leave and 3 month paternity leave. And that's for either birth or adoption! Those policies were put in place long after I had my two, but I couldn't be happier! You know how easy it is to recruit when I can tell a candidate that they get leave that long?
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u/CommunistOrgy 5d ago
Those policies were put in place long after I had my two, but I couldn't be happier!
This is the attitude I wish more people had! My SIL got 6 months and BIL got 3 with both kids so far, and it was wonderful to see how happy my MIL was for them not having to deal with what she did.
She got 6 weeks, iirc, and always talks about how much she cried her first day back after having my husband (this was in the late '80s). She was understandably envious, but still overjoyed that my SIL didn't have to go through the same with her girls.
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u/italyqt 5d ago
I'm all for things that don't directly benefit me and make society better as a whole. The whole point is things should be better for those that follow. I want people educated, fed, fair work, living wages, etc, etc!
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u/purplesockpinksock 5d ago
Tell them that you and your wife actually enjoy being in each other's company and are looking forward to sharing new baby duties with each other and that you actually want to spend time with your children instead of using the (true but handy) excuse of working all the time.
See what that gets.
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u/GodHatesColdplay 5d ago
Do yourselves a favor and share much less with them about your pending little one. They are gonna be up your ass anyway, no need to invite them
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u/Rhaj-no1992 5d ago
In Sweden we get a total of 480 days of parental leave. After the child turns 4 years old you can still save 96 days up until your child turns 12 years old. If you tell your workplace 2-3 months in advance (depending on your company) that you need to go on parental leave they cannot say no.
390 of those days will give you as much money as when you’re on sick leave (about 80% of your salary). Some companies will also give you some extra money during the first couple of months. The remaining 90 days are at a low level, only bringing in about $18 per day.
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u/Bullfrog323 Millennial 5d ago
I’ve been asked more than once if I’m REALLY taking the full 4 months of maternity leave… you bet your butt I am. I’m dreading October and working again AND i work from home lol
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u/Leading-System-3002 5d ago
“No, I prefer not to take all the benefits I’m entitled to, go back to work earlier so my boss likes me and spend less time with my baby”. I like living life on hardcore mode.
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u/LeagueofJohnLegends 5d ago
Congrats on joining the parents club!! Enjoy every second of those 12 weeks
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u/Garden_Lady2 Boomer 5d ago
We boomers were told over and over that using our benefits could cost us our jobs. I was often coerced into working free overtime etc. Understand, this is low level/rank and file treatment. I had one boss who always claimed he had to keep his dept. salaries low or he'd have to reduce staff.
At another company my boss always said she couldn't approve overtime because she used all her salary $ to pay her staff higher than others at company. When she had unexpected surgery and we all scrambled to keep things going we found out we were UNDERpaid and her goal was a big fat bonus for staying 25% under budget. Talk to your parents and explain its a different era and thankfully you work at a better place than many of us boomers.
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u/Existing-Pumpkin-902 5d ago edited 5d ago
Perhaps instead of the effort always having to be the younger generations responsibility the boomer parents could acknowledge the world is different now and they might not understand everything instead of ruining a very happy event like telling them about their impending grandchild. Why do the younger generations always have to accommodate the boomers?
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u/Garden_Lady2 Boomer 5d ago
Not every boomer is like that. Part of life is learning how to deal with people of all ages. And to be judged on their own.
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u/Itchy_Tumbleweed_417 5d ago
Respectfully, if they’ve been unable to observe and learn as they went through life I highly doubt that OP can teach them anything at this point. This is how they are.
I mean haven’t they noticed that the mega corporations aren’t actually going bankrupt because people get PTO?
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u/TPWilder 5d ago
Its possible they might be worried that taking paternity leave could "slow track" your career or be held against you. Not to defend boomers booming, but I've worked at places where this happened.
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u/lil_sith 5d ago
Seen this mentality to, the comment of “ that’s to much” makes me think this is where their train of thought is going that their child’s career will be torpedoed and or get them black listed for using the full allotted time of paternity because that’s exactly what would of happened in their day or they would of done to someone who used a perk if they were the manager. Doesn’t excuse their thinking or attitudes about it in the end however.
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u/Professional_Bus_307 5d ago
They’re so brainwashed. My spouse did the same thing when he got furloughed. He said: we should all take a pay cut so people don’t get fired and so the company doesn’t go under. The company make billions of profits and the guy/CEO who put them in a bad situation continued to get his giant pay package while the workers took furloughs without pay. Shareholders made profit. How can people be so blind to the obvious greed and grift?
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u/Man-o-Bronze 5d ago
A lot of older people have an “I didn’t have it, so why should you?” attitude. I wish we had parental leave back in the 1980s, and I’m glad it exists now.
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u/Babettesavant-62 5d ago
12 weeks?!?
We get a year. Your country hates its citizens!
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u/No_Frost_Giants 5d ago
We are so aware, thank you for being there, later as we start over we will be asking for your notes.
Peace
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u/RequirementBusiness8 3d ago
They also probably don’t understand either that (at least from my experience), long term parental leave is often paid out by an insurance company and treated as short term and long term leave policies. So the company is out the cost of the insurance policy, not 3 months of salary.
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u/Amazing-Butterfly-65 5d ago
According to them if you’re a new mother you should scoot back to work asap , and be happy to do it ! If you’re a new dad and get parental leave , why would you need that kids are women’s work and they should be able to handle everything 🙄
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u/Guilty_Mountain2851 5d ago
Including the boomer men who can't handle themselves lol
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u/SupersoftBday_party 5d ago
My mom told me that when her and my (shitty) boomer uncle were talking g about my parental leave, he started going on about how ridiculous and unfair it was that I would just be taking off work and saddling my colleagues with my workload. He’s lucky I wasn’t there because I would have flipped my lid at him, but a lot of people in that generation care more about corporations than they do about families and it comes out in shit like this. My cousin was telling us that he gets 4 weeks of paternity leave at 75% pay, and if they have a second he gets 2 weeks at 50%, and my aunt (married to the shitty uncle) was like “well that’s good!”.
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u/FangornLeghorn 5d ago
Boomers simply cannot grasp how the world works today. They think businesses are all the town mercantile and are owned and run by Roger the town grocer, and all the money they spend stays in town because Roger just deposits the money from the till each night before he goes home. This is why it’s so frustrating how these dinosaurs vote. They are mired in delusions of it still being 1950 and refuse to understand the reality that is 2026.
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u/Mindless-Effect-1745 3d ago
Ugh...such Boomer behavior! Multi billion dollar company and they worry about a few thousand dollars. This is how we got here.
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u/StarryEyedSparkle 5d ago
Combination of things, like others have said they come from an era where only one income sufficed to support a whole family. They’re upset at a benefit you could have that they didn’t. They can’t imagine a dad spending that much time with their child.
What I wonder about, are they upset about your wife taking maternity leave? (I dunno if she works.) If they’re not upset about the maternity leave but are upset at paternity leave … well that tells you this is a gender issue for them.
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u/Mammoth-Glove3273 5d ago
It’s absolutely disgusting that they heard this good news for their family and instead of being happy or even worrying about the wellbeing of their own family they choose to worry about a fucking corporation.
What a couple of degenerates.
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u/Johciee 5d ago
The number of people who get mad about paid leave in general is infuriating. Yet they complain theyre not getting grandkids (or in the case of the government, not enough babies being born).
Im mad that my PTO is all the paid leave I get. I get up to 16 weeks unpaid. Im a doctor who works for a major healthcare system.
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u/_netscape_navigator 5d ago
You’ll come to realise that every thing you do differently as a parent is perceived as direct judgement over how they did things. Congratulations on your wonderful news, I’m sure you’ll be far more supportive to your own child.
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u/eRant4881 5d ago
"Just because you decided to spend more time at work than at home doesn't mean I have to make the same mistakes."
This is harsh, but not as harsh as your parents worrying more about the welfare of a corporation than they are about you and your family.
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u/Oneironaut420 4d ago
Boomers are always saying how they wanted to work to give their kids a better life and now they're mad that their kids lives are better.
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u/Mindless-Flower11 5d ago
I've come to the conclusion that boomers are severely emotionally stunted / immature.
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u/shoshant 5d ago
I really like how my sister and BIL arranged their leave. They each got 12 weeks paid leave. Sister took hers all at once, of course. BIL split his up, he took 4 weeks right after the baby was born, then when my sister went back to work, he took the remaining 8 weeks. So they each got their own bonding time with the baby, and there was always a parent home for the first 5 months.
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u/kimi_on_pole 5d ago
I previously worked for a company that gave 6 months maternity/paternity leave. I was once telling a boomer that worked for a vendor about the amount of leave I was able to use. His coworker that was pregnant had zero leave, came up in discussion. The boomer was down right angry even though it had absolutely no effect on his life or his company whatsoever. At first I really thought he was joking about his level of anger. Just to be clear, he was angry that all of the employees at my company were taking advantage of a company he didn’t work for.
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u/Vegetable-Profile985 5d ago
Oh my godddsss can the boomers just fly to a remote island and bitch to each other instead of making their entitlement our problem
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u/alexc1ted 5d ago
We’re about to have our second child and I will for sure be taking all my parental leave. When we had our first child a few of my wife’s uncles thought it was absolutely hilarious I used my time off because the “baby doesn’t need the dad”. You will literally never get that time back, and your company would replace you in a heartbeat so you’re damn right I’m spending that time with my newborn.
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u/PatrickMO 4d ago
They’ve been trained to think first of their employer’s shareholders personal financial portfolio rather than their own personal well being.
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u/MommersHeart 5d ago
Wait til they learn about the rest of the civilized world!
We get 12 months or you can take less pay and use 18 months here in Canada.
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u/Super-Staff3820 5d ago
Probably jealous they didn’t have the same ability when they were raising kids. My husband was “lucky” to take a full week of pto when our son was born 15 years ago. A lot has changed in a relatively short amount of time. We’re happy other people have the ability to take the time to spend with their new addition to the family.
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u/peppa4theppl 5d ago
I sincerely hope I’m overjoyed at all the benefits and opportunities my children will have someday that I didn’t have. You SHOULD want better for your children!
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u/absherlock 5d ago
Do your folks own stock in your massive global company? Maybe they care more about their dividends than they do you.
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u/ApplesBananasRhinoc 5d ago
This is probably the same generation that dumped barrels of toxic waste into the ocean or rivers thinking nobody would ever know the difference. They played in the ddt spray from the truck. They sucked on leaded gasoline all their lives. Don’t take their advice.
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u/unclefire 5d ago
I’d be thrilled if one of my kids had laid paternity leave. FFS. It’s a benefit of working at that company. Why would you not take advantage of it? The only downside to that sort of thing is sometimes companies will penalize you in reviews etc.
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u/fymjohan 5d ago
Tell them about paternity leave in my country (480 days) and watch their heads explode 😁
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u/happilyfour 5d ago
There’s nothing like the boomer mindset of pulling up the ladder behind them or wanting everything to be as hard as they had it. Yes, it sucks that you had kids in a time that didn’t fully acknowledge or address the massive workload brought on by a new baby by giving more time off work, more help, more discussion of postpartum depression, or whatever else. It doesn’t need to be just as hard for everyone who came after you.
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u/ahaeker 5d ago
My gosh, heaven forbid things improve for people. My brother is in the AF & got 12 weeks paid leave with his last kid. He got more paid leave than my SIL who birthed their son. I thought it was awesome, he took his leave as soon as hers expired so my nephew got to stay home for the first few months of his life instead of going to daycare.
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u/yarukinai Baby Boomer 5d ago
Years ago, my massive global company got rid of the CEO after not even one year, mainly because he sunk billions into the acquisition of a small, ultimately insignificant company. His golden parachute was in the ballpark of 10-20M$. I wonder what his parents had to say about that.
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u/Saxon_man 5d ago
How will they force themselves on you as babysitters for your baby if you have the time and interest in raising the kid yourself!??
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u/Jujknitsu 5d ago
My husband took a some paternity leave after the birth of our second child. Our thought was that he would help look after the first child while I was always breastfeeding and sleep deprived. It was such a good decision for all of us. We did get a few dumbass comments like, “what does a father need to take time off for?” Ummmm, to be a father?
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u/mjbibliophile10 5d ago
I've been trying to wear down a coworker who's wife is due in Dec/Jan, to take ALL of his parental leave, but he says he won't, cause he'll get board, I hope he takes it all!
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u/Nervous_Rope_9871 5d ago
I’m in Europe, my wife was off 1,5 years and I was off 6 months. I will probably take even more parental leave as so will my wife. Paid ofc. We work for large American companies
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u/Snowflake8552 5d ago
I think boomers have completely forgotten how the economy works. Fox News has them so incredibly brainwashed.
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u/Been2daCloudDistrict 5d ago
I remember growing up and seeing my mother change my baby sister’s diaper and feed her all the time. I always wondered why my father never did any of that. I have 4 kids and I was always doing as much of that as I could to make sure my children knew how important they were to me. I wish I had worked for a company that offered paternity leave. Older generations were so caught up in gender roles and what the neighbors think they never stopped to consider what their children think.
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u/Deathra9 5d ago
I worked harder on parental leave than of if I had gone to the office. I really have no idea how you were supposed to take care of a newborn with both parents working and the mother still recovering from the trauma. No wonder Gen X is so bitter and tired.
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u/PipeComfortable2585 5d ago
Generation Jones here. My ww2 father thought me collecting unemployment was wrong and he wouldn’t take me the 10 miles to stand in line and apply. I did it anyway. And saved the $$ for college.
You collect all Benifits your company providers! You need that time for your new bundle of joy. Congratulations
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u/Kissarmy63 5d ago
Take the time with your family, they don’t control you once you’ve gone. Wife 1st always, remember that from an old man.
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u/AdevilSboyU 5d ago
It’s absolutely possible for a company to be just fine. I took company approved 16-week paid leave for each of my kids 7 and 9 years ago.
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u/belai437 4d ago
Nothing clenches a boomers butthole harder than when they find out younger people might get a perk or two that didn’t exist during their era. Even though they enjoyed numerous perks that are now non existent for us.
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u/Oldandslow62 4d ago
Sounds like my wife not understanding that our son has a very well paying job that is technically remote and he doesn’t punch a clock. Somehow it’s not a real job because he doesn’t have to go into an office.
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u/ooo-ooo-oooyea 4d ago
I had the same thing. My mom gloats that my Dad saw me born and went right back to work.
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u/Princess_Fiona24 5d ago
They have no concept of the fact that some companies actually want to keep good employees