Regardless of gender, in many households, one parent is the primary caregiver.
That doesn’t mean the other parent (statistically, this is usually the father, but increasingly less so) is uninvolved or doesn’t parent; it just means that they’re not the first one on duty most of the time. The primary caregiver may be the stay-at-home parent or another one who will usually take off work if their child has a sick day.
One mom’s TikTok just broke down why a dad who is not the primary caregiver might have an entirely different parenting experience than his wife, who is.
It Starts With A Dad
Looking around, we see every kind of dad with every level of involvement. However, it really takes a certain mindset to step in and parent for a short period of time and then announce that the primary caregiver is exaggerating the level of work involved.
When a dad went viral on the video-sharing app TikTok for just such a claim, he didn’t just say that it was easier for him, personally, than his wife seemed to find parenting. No, he suggested that men, as a whole, need to “explain to our wives” that the kids are totally easier than those wives claim and that he believes it’s because of a shortcoming moms (in his view) share: failing to enforce boundaries.
Uh-huh. Really?
A Mom Claps Back
Jenna, who runs an account called @ifitweren’tfunny, responded.
She said, “Sure, it’s possible that this is what’s going on in his relationship.” After all, none of us know his wife, and none of us are in his household, so we only know what he’s telling us.
But in general, nah, she says.
“You’re just not the person that child has been literally and figuratively tethered to for their entire life. And we can test this theory.”
She wants to know if the kids immediately rush to the wife in this story when she comes home and if “the vibe changes in your house.”
If so, she says, “That’s because their person just walked into the room, and we’re hardest on our people. It’s probably why your mom and your wife get the worst parts of you.”
She also has a recommendation for dads like this. They can, she says, take the time to figure out how they can also meet their kids’ emotional needs like their wives do — “Or, you know, just make a TikTok about it.”
Check out her video below, then keep reading to see what therapists and psychologists say about her theory.
Are Kids Really Harder on Their Moms?
This frequently comes up in an entirely different context.
Many parents (again, regardless of gender) ask, “Why are my kids so demanding/rambunctious/disobedient at home if their teacher keeps telling me what little angels they are at school?”
Psychology professor Vanessa LoBue, Ph.D, writing for Psychology Today, mirrors what Jenna said: Mom, you are your child’s safe space. She writes:
“They know they can have a total meltdown and we will be there to comfort and support them. They know we will still love them when they throw their toys across the room and refuse to pick them up. They know they can show us their true colors and we will always think those colors are bright. We make them feel secure in ways that strangers can’t.”
That’s very validating for parents who are confused by the difference between their child’s behavior for the teacher or babysitter and their behavior at home. But if this is the difference between behavior for one parent and for the other? Yikes. Way to tell on yourself, Dad.
One Parenting Instructor’s Explanation Is Even Sharper
Kate Baltrotsky’s degree is in education, and her practice is teaching yoga, meditation, and Aware Parenting.
She covered this phenomenon in 2022 (along with dozens of other parenting experts) when a fake study circulated claiming to prove that kids are “800% worse” for their mothers than anyone else.
Like most experts who weigh in on the behavioral change, she compared kids’ behavior at school or daycare to the “explosion” that happens when they get home, not comparing two parents. That’s why it might be especially painful for the other parent to read her assessment, published in Pathways to Family Wellness:
“If your child has been holding it together in an unpleasant situation all day, the second she sees you, she knows she can finally let go…that’s what mothers get: the uninhibited expression of a raw emotional release, slapping us in the face the second we stumble through the door.”
So, if you’re the parent the kids never misbehave for, maybe you don’t want to brag about it too much.