Does Your Husband Worry Much Differently (i.e., Less) than You About Your Child?

OK, that would bug me too.
BUT! I think it's good to have a parent that doesn't freak all the time. Sounds like you have good balance btwn the 2 of you.

Oh gosh, my husband is the other end of the spectrum, and would keep my kids in a bubble if he could - it is very irritating.

Yup, that's husbands for you.

Look at it this way: there is a reason the word for "nurturing" is MAternal, not PAternal. Women are biologically made to be nurturers. Men are biologically made to be.....well....um....whatever it is they're good for. Okay I'm kidding, sort of.

So don't be mad at him, most kids wouldn't make it to adulthood if they were raised by men. That's what you're around for. :)

Wow, your husband went grocery shopping on his way home from work?

Just my humble opinion: I wouldn't make a big deal about this and if you want to talk to him about it, fine, but it's not like he cares about her any less than you do. I doubt she would have gotten significantly worse to the point of it getting life threatening in the time it took your husband to come in, unload his briefcase, and bring in the groceries - he probably figured nothing was going to change in those few minutes and that you had the situation under control. If you thought she was having a reaction, did you try giving her Benadryl while waiting for him to come home? Did you think you had to call 911? Did you expect your husband to do something that you wouldn't have done or thought of yourself?

My husband and I tend to worry about different things - he will wig out over my daughter catching a cold from going to McDonald's play land while I don't like it when he doesn't keep a closer eye on her while she is eating (she is 3). I don't think it's about less or more, just different. My hubby's ex worried constantly about their sons being kidnapped but thought nothing of letting them listen to Eminem when they were 6 and 7 years old. Again, different people tend to worry about different things. It's probably a good thing that your husband can remain calm in a stressful situation, because someone has to be able to.

At 2 to 3 years old, my son used to fall over, alot, and he didn't have the basic instinct to put his hands out to catch himself. As a result he usually landed on his forehead.

One evening he fell outside on the concrete hit his forehead and developed what I saw as a large purple egg. I freaked out. His father was over at the time and I insisted we go to the hospital because I sure my baby had a concussion or a brain hemorrhage and was going to die. Please keep in mind the child didn't even cry, he got right back up and resumed his playing and asked for something to eat. He was completely unfazed by the fall.

My son's father rolls his eyes at me, closes up the house, packs us all up in the car, and drives to the hospital...obeying all the posted speed limits and listening to classic rock on the car radio. I, of course, am still freaking out and urging him to turn off the music and drive faster, faster.

He calmly pulls out a phone and calls his friend's wife who is a pediatric nurse. Explains what happened to her and asks "Do we really need to spend the next 4 hours in the ER?". She gives him a list of things to watch for and assures him that we can go home.

Meanwhile, I am still freaking out.

My son is babbling away in the car seat, enjoying the unexpected ride, and playing with his toys. Dad turns the car around and heads back to my house. I am now telling him what a bad parent he is and "how can you let my baby die" kind of comments.

Dad is calm. The baby is happy. I am crazy.

Needless to say, my son was fine. By the time we got home, 20 minutes later, you actually could barely see the mark on his forehead. Soooo not a concussion or brain hemorrhage.

Long way to say that I think Dad's are just calmer than we are. Not less caring, just calmer. My son's father could have called his friend from the house but he knew I would just continue to freak out, so he played along, got in the car, then called. End result was the same....the baby was fine.

Do I still over-react? Most definitely. Now it is my son, at age 14, rolling his eyes at me.

There's always one parent that worries more or flies off the handle more than the other. Sometimes it's the men. Believe me, I have seen some real "mother hens'....in male form.

I personally think it's good to have a balance because that way you can hopefully meet somewhere in the middle. Imagine life as a child with BOTH parents panicking over everything. Oh, my goodness.
Please don't fight with your husband about this.
You were wanting him to be as concerned as you and he was probably thinking, "Well, I'll get things in the house and empty my pockets so I can focus and assess the situation."
I'm a single mom and I'm a very protective mother and all that, but there were days when I got home and my daughter, who is 10 years older than my son, would be all worked up about something and hit me with it before I even got through the door. It's not that I wasn't concerned, but as long as there was no blood and nobody was crying, I felt like, "At least let me put my purse down and take my coat off for a second." Coming home to a spazz attack because she'd put something red in with white clothes for heaven's sake...or thought there would be no difference in putting liquid dishwashing soap in the diswasher and there were bubbles coming out. She was a senior in high school when those things happened.
She is high strung like my husband and my son is mellow and "take a deep breath and find a solution" type of person like me. She's my daughter and I love her, but she was kind of hard to live with some days. My son got a little toy laser from a 25 cent vending machine and she freaked out wanting it taken away from him because he could blind people and burn their skin and catch things on fire with it. The darn thing didn't even shine for 3 feet.
She's having her first child in May and my son, who is now 15, is already thinking, "God help that kid."
I'm not making light of your very valid concerns. I promise.
But, you should know that rolling around in the grass can leave red spots, even if it's not an allergy thing. Even the softest grass can kind of be scratchy.
For a severe allergic reaction, watch for swollen eyes, lips and tongue. I'm not a doctor, but you said you were worried about airways. My dad was deathly allergic to bees so even as kids, we knew what to look for and alert and adult. It happened a couple of times when we were out in the yard or fishing with him.

Anyway, talk to your husband about your feelings for sure, but be willing to listen to his side too. He didn't react the way you wanted or expected him to, but he didn't really do anything wrong. I don't think it means he has any less concern for your precious daughter.
That's just my opinion.
Your little one is young so hopefully you can work out a happy medium when it comes to things that could be potential emergencies.
The main thing is that your daughter is okay.

I wish you all the best.

I think you were panicking, but to be fair, I would do the same thing you did. To play devil's advocate, isn't it nice that he has the ability to stay calm in a situation? I think it's extreme to say that your husband cares less. I'm sure he cares about his daughter to no end and would do anything for her, he just reacts differently than you do, and it's not necessarily a bad thing. I think you should wait until you are calm so that you are able to look at the situation for his point of view as well, and then tell him that you prefer that he remain as calm as he does, but that he be more responsive sooner.

If your daughter was really having an allergic reaction (i.e. having difficulty breathing) then you were right to respond as you did. Otherwise I think you were panicking a little and nothing was really going to change in the 30 seconds it took for him to put the groceries down. After all, she was okay enough for you to wait a few minutes for him to come home from the grocery store.

You sound a bit like a worrier to me, which is fine. I'm a worrier myself. But you should understand that this might seem to your husband as "crying wolf." Odds are she's not going to have major injuries, illnesses, reactions, etc on a regular basis. So if you find yourself wanting him to "hurry up" to see whatever you are worried about frequently, he's not going to differentiate between the time she got a small bump on her head and the one time she really clocks herself on something.

You're probably not going to change his behavior with regards to "picking up the pace" to check for injury, but hopefully he can at least be respectful of the fact that it is really scary for you when your daughter might be hurt, even a little.

Good luck.

Your husband sounds just like mine! There have been situations where I totally panic, and my husband does not react at all. At the time, it makes me mad. I want him to worry as much as I do. But once the situation has calmed down, I am grateful that he didn't panic too. It balances us out, to have us on different ends of the "panic" spectrum. Don't be too hard on him. He sounds like a great husband and father. And he sounds like a typical man, actually. Unless the house is on fire, they don't raise an eyebrow lol.

Yes, my husband is like that. I think one time I screamed in a panic (can't remember what in the world happened now) but he did even call out "what is wrong."

Men! They miss so much ...but can you imagine our society if we didn't have at least one stable member of the family. lol

How is your little girl now? I hope she is ok.

Yes, my husband is very 'laid back.' he also has the attitude of 'there is nothing I can do by worrying.' he is also the guy who only once in 6 years had to take one of our children to the pediatrician because it had been a month of her coughing constantly and i was battling the flu so I couldn't take her in myself, he then comes back and says she's allergic to oak trees and hands mea packet of zyrtec. WHATTT? we were in the middle of winter first of all, second of all she has been around oak trees many many times before and no she was not allergic to oak trees. the thing is if the doctor tells him our daughter is a boy he would believe it.
so that was the last time he took any of our kids to ped's without me.
He has also never given motrin, tylenol, and of our kids' medication to them. he also doesn't know where their socks are. or jammies. i take it just as he's being a guy. really. i would love if he were a bit more like me but it ain't happening.

my husband is like that. my daughter is asthmatic and he seems to think its just fine to let his parents run off with her for the weekend when its acting up. they dont even give her her medication that she is to take everyday. i then have to look like a bad guy. my daughter also has allergic reactions to grass and every so often she breaks out in hives like crazy! he just acts like it happens everyday because hes not the one that has to deal with her all day i do.

Yep.

So... aggravating.

My husband and I are the opposite. He is always worried that the worst possible thing is going to happen to the kids, and I feel like I know their boundaries and I let them play. But my husband was raised in a family where children were to be seen and not heard and he had to anticipate getting in trouble because he did something wrong or got hurt. I was raised in a family where there was absolutely no supervision, and if you got hurt, those were just the natural consequences. You might think would make me the worrier.

It's hard to know based in this one example... It sounds as though you are the "worrier" in the family and maybe he under reacts because he feels that you over react?

I think you have to have confidence in yourself to know what is truly serious and what is not. Sometimes that's hard to do and you do need another opinion and in those situations I would be really clear that you're freaking out and need his input asap. Sounds like you have healthy communication and will be able to talk it out so he knows what you need

good luck!

My husband is the same way as yours, though I do tend to worry TOO much about everything. A few months ago my 2 yr old son fell in the bath tub and instantly had a purple golf ball sized bump on his head. I started crying hysterically over this and my husband and son both looked at me like I was nuts. I would not let him go to sleep because I was convinced he'd never wake up but of course he was fine and my husband was not even phased by the whole thing. On the other hand though, for some reason my husband is very paranoid about my son choking. He always thinks he has too much in his mouth and watches him like a hawk when he eats and I'm the one telling him "he's fine!"

I can't disagree with Page more; men are worth a lot-well, if you want them to be.

My husband is more like you and I am more like your husband. My husband worries all the time (not as much with the second kid-it must be a first kid thing) and I always think everything is going to be ok.

I try not to act like I think he's overreacting, because I know he has seen a lot of terrible things happen to little kids so that's why he's the way he is. I think I frustrate him sometimes because I'm so laid back. Probably has something to do with the fact that all of us kids played hard when we were little and none of us got hurt really bad.

Try not to act as if your husband doesn't care as much as you do, it's just that, well...women really do tend to worry more and 'freak' out. :-)

Most dads parents are different than mom parents. My LO just started eating actual food and I'm paranoid about choking. He ended up with too much food in his mouth last night and started gagging and turning red. I yelled out (in a panic) and startled my son, so he then started crying too. I was still freaking out about the gagging and he was still REALLY red. Hubby was like "if he's crying, he's breathing". SO non-chalant about it. I wanted to whack him in the head (once I calmed down).

EDIT----I LOVE Page's answer! Also wanted to add that while he's easy going, laid back reactions sometime infuriate me, they come in handy when I'm freaking out about an injury......he can, at least, remain calm.

Our family is the opposite, usually he's the one who worries more than me. I come from a big family and have seen lots of bumps and bruises, allergies, and such. But it is tough when you ask for a second opinion and your partner seems to be stuck in slo-mo. Just explain to him that you worry (same as you said to us Mommies, that it took so long to have your DD, etc.) and want a more urgent response more often. It'll make things a bit better in the long run.

Good luck!

OK, when I am reacting with a sense of urgency, my husband is lackadaisical. When I take a somewhat major situation in stride, he freaks! I think it's human nature to take up the roll that needs to be played in the situation at hand.
I read a LOT about child raising and parenting... it's pretty much the only topic I read these days. My husband can't be bothered with such drivel and reads what entertains him. I feel that I know a lot about what to take seriously and what not to and likewise I try to remind myself that when my husband acts clueless ...well... he might just BE clueless!!! In general, I think it's pretty safe to say that women are the nurturers and men handle things from a different angle. So, what took place in your house yesterday, TOTALLY NORMAL.
And YES, reading mamapedia daily has given me such a sense of peace about raising my 2 boys (#3 due any day). Seeing what is the bee in other mothers' bonnets makes me feel so sane at times and allows me to learn vicariously on other occasions. Both have been so good for me! Other mothers often tell me they envy my sense of calm and much of it has come from here. :)

I didn't exactly relate to the "worrying" aspect of this problem as much as I related to the "slowness to react" part. YES my husband does this it drives me nuts. Stuff like "ew the baby just sneezed all over her face, quick quick hand me a tissue"----> I see it processing for about 7 seconds before he gets up to go grab it, at his leisure. Or, at the pizza place last weekend, "she just knocked over an entire cup of lemonade on me, gimme some napkins!" blank stare. I finally leaned over and got the napkins myself. Hubby's reaction "oh... I thought you might be talking to someone else..." Makes me crazy! And then he gets annoyed at my impatience and I guess, high expectations for immediate action. I think it's a mom thing. We have to multitask and make use of every possible second of the day, there is very little time for sitting around thinking about what to do next :)

Come to think of it, he says I "catastrophize" things too. A cat scratch might become a serious infection! I might be smelling a gas leak in the house! Is that a new freckle or skin cancer?! Too much static electricity in the air might really mean our home has an electrical problem!

It must be a mom thing. Good thing we have a partner around to keep us calm and grounded in reality.

My husband is the same way. I'm always so worried that my daughter is going to be OK and he is so relaxed all the time about everything that has to do with her, and with life in general. He thinks I worry way too much, and I probably do, but she is my life so I can't be any other way. I've talked to him about the same subject many times, but this is his personality, which drives me nuts sometimes.