Good for you! That time with your family is really important.

I'm from the US and I caused quite a stir when I took 4 weeks off; 3 days paternity leave and the rest was accrued vacation. HR was trying to convince me to break it up because "it would self a bad precedent." But my boss was supportive and approved it anyway.

Don't listen to those morons. Paternity leave is a legit great way to stay with your wife and children when they need it the most.

You must be American...

Holy shit, 12 weeks ! I'm from France and paternity leave is notoriously lacking (compared to other forms of welfare that exist alongside it). I feel 12 weeks is generous and fantastic.

the us serious lacking the amount of leave you need, or makes its super-convoluted.

12 weeks paternity leave at 85% salary? Damn, that's sweet, even by many EU standards.

I wouldn't think twice about taking it.

Absolutely take paternity. Why wouldn't you?

You are surrounded with workaholic, misogynists. My company gives full pay for 12 weeks for mothers and fathers. Several of my coworkers, mostly men, have used their leave in full (usually 9 weeks together and the other 3 broken up). Nobody ever looks down on people for taking leave.

Maybe they would take all of it if it was for full pay. Ya'll motherfuckers need a union.

Enjoy your leave. You obviously have the sense to know that you are taking it for: your wife, your child and your mental health. You will give your family a better head start. Corporate won't notice. If they are going to fire you, they'll do it even if you had spent the time period working double overtime instead of being on leave.

Your coworkers desperately need class consciousness, working until your bones give out is not "supporting your family" its being a wage slave.

I've seen my coworkers take paternity leave, which I think is like 8 weeks where I work.

Generally, they've staggered it with their spouse so that one parent is working and the other on child care, rather than both being out over the same window. Typically the Dad's have taken their leave a couple months after the baby is born when Mom is returning to work. It keeps the baby out of daycare for as long as possible.

Your coworkers are fucking idiots.

Most democratic countries have a full 12 months leave or more for whichever parent ( or shared between both.) Maybe this lack of early bonding and co-regulation between family members explains US as it is today.

My US company went ham on paternity leave. I adopted a 3-day-old and got 12 weeks leave.

I provided pretty decent support from home for my position for the first week, I did small things and help people in my department get up to speed on what I had to do. I was kind of sleep deprived but they needed the help to start with. 9 times out of 10 I was holding the baby because at that age there's not much you're doing other than holding feeding or changing them. And that's what they really need.

I then took a solid 6 weeks of only minimal interactions. I would drop in on occasional daily meetings mostly so I knew what was going on.

The vast majority of my work can happen from home. The sleep deprivation and bonding time are the important things to take care of, along with giving my partner a decent level of support and adjustment time. Putting in a little work here and there in between things actually gave me a little bit of mental stimulus when I needed it.

The six to eight week period, I ramped up a little more and remotely attended most meetings. I started coming in a few times a week from 8 to 12 weeks so that my partner didn't feel my support just fall off a cliff for 8 hours a day.

It's important to get that early bonding time in, it's important to give your partner the support they need to adjust. I honestly feel that what I did makes a lot more sense than just 12 weeks of off time. I think I'd probably rather have 8 weeks solid and then have another 4 weeks of flexible PTO that I could take around them learning to crawl, walk, have medical issues.

Nothing about child rearing fits nicely into a 12-week box.

Both parents should be entitled to take 12 months leave as a minimum, and their employer should be required to pay their salary and protect their position during that time.

I went through the same thing when I took my paternity leave. Other male coworkers bragged about how they went back to work the day after their kid was born.

It's a culture thing where our society is conditioned to be boot lickers for the ruling class. I responded to them at the time, "Congratulations on being a bad father, I'm going to take every day entitled to me"

Don't fall into their trap.

The "work yourself to death" is a stupid boomer concept. It's a hugely negative aspect of traditional masculinity.

When people say weird stuff like this, I always question why. Why would you have a kid and then work so hard to be away from it? Why would you work for a company that will lay you off the moment it earns them a higher stock price to do so? (no modern company deserves your loyalty.) Why would you brag about suffering instead of relaxing?

I understand that we're all wired differently but those values literally don't make sense to me.

My Colorado Comrades in corporate environments take the time. I've seen a number of guys go out on Paternity since we enacted paid paternity leave in our state. It's legally protected, we fought and voted for it. If your boss doesn't like it they can eat shit and die because it's your right. Your family is more important than some corporate nonsense.

I heard that early childhood (first weeks, months, maybe years) are vital for development of emotional intelligence. Neglect could lead to life-long struggles. So I'm happy to hear you favor the idea to stay and care. Good for you, you both, and all of us.

Honestly, fuck those coworkers. What I will tell you is this: They're only newborns for so long, and after that they're only babies for so long. Those are some of the most precious moments in life. Giving that up to wage slave for a company that at the end of the day doesn't give a shit about you? When given the opportunity to experience something that will probably only happen once or twice in your lifetime? You should 100 percent go for it. The other option is looking back on how you missed out on something you will never get back. I missed out on one kids baby phase pulling 60 hour weeks. Was lucky enough to be around for my second and was able to take paternity leave. Best decision I was given, and hate myself for missing out on my first kid.

almost bragging how little time they took after their kids were born

I had a coworker bragging about lying to his wife that he couldn't take time off. This is fucked up on so many levels: why even have a kid? Why do you lie to your wife? Why are you telling people you barey know (I had been there for like two weeks) that you lie to your wife? WTF?

I feel like I’m missing something.

Maybe they're insecure? They don't know what to do with the new kid, and instead of figuring it out together with their partner they run back to the things they know and hide behind a fake martyrdom. I wonder how many of them will in a few months or years say that women are "naturals" when it comes to taking care of kids.

Congrats on the kid and on being an actual dad!

What you're missing is full brainwashing from the patriarchy, from the bootlicking capitalists.

Any partner who can but doesn't support their partner and newborn is an ass.

Any partner who can but doesn't take advantage of the leave benefit they earned is giving free money to their employer overlords like an absolute cuck.

Be revolutionary, put your family over your employer.

Americans are weird.

Honestly the time with your partner and kid is precious irreplaceable.

Anyone who's weird about it is insecure about their own paternal involvement.

Do it. Be with your offspring as much as you can. Anything else is barbaric corporate slave mentality.

In our country, both parents are allowed to spend 6 months (each) at home with the newborn.

I got it. I think it was 3 weeks. Unfortunately it was unpaid. I had to take on extra work before and after to make up for the loss in income. It was all we were allowed.

I would do it again. Those 3 weeks at home are irreplaceable. Should it be paid? Should it be longer? Abso-fucking-lutely. But paternity leave? Take it if you can get it.

this is part of your compensation. you pay state taxes for it. And you deserve it. decades of corporate propaganda has made most people believe they don't deserve leave at all. ignore the haters and take your leave.

Sounds like attitude of wage slaves that have been brainwashed into doing everything for the corpos and being fine with getting scrap. They live to work as opposed to work to live.

Can't change the slave mentality of some people. They were just born to be one.

That group you overheard were reinforcing their excuses for ignoring the needs of their child along with the needs of the mom, and reinforcing beliefs that have overwhelming evidence of being false.

Kids needs dads in their lives, the earlier the better. Moms need dads to help out and support them.

You're not taking time off work to laze about, you're switching from one job to take on several related jobs for a while so that you,your child, and your woman have a brighter future than any amount of money could buy.

You're only missing out on taking the easy, shortsighted route. You're missing out on ignoring the future cost your family has to pay in or for you to get back to the familiar routine of work as soon as possible. You're missing out on staying with the known game of work to avoid taking on something new.

You're not missing out, they are.

Today I witnessed a group of coworkers almost bragging how little time they took after their kids were born. I've heard stuff like "Most men are hard working and want to support their families so they don't take leave".

Toxic masculinity.

The traditional view that the father needs to work is strong. In Denmark we have had the opportunity to share the maternity/paternity leave between parents for several years, but most often the mother would take the majority, with only 2 weeks being specific for the father.

This is due to the imbalance in pay, since the cut in pay would be larger for a man (generally), so men voluntarily gave the leave to their wives. This is obviously not the intention of the leave and also based on the flaw of unequal pay. Keep in mind that the wage difference is often explained as being caused by the mother taking more leave and thereby not advancing her career during the years when they have small children.

So, to fix his, the latest law make more weeks untransferable. The father now has 11 weeks that can not be transferred. Use it or lose it.

One would expect such a removal of flexibility to make people upset, because technically it will cost the families more potential income, but it hasn't.

It turns out that most men actually wanted the additional weeks of paternity leave. They just needed it to be normalized and/or the legal framework to demand it, so they don't have to have this discussion with their employers or wives. No man is ever asked why they're taking it now. Use it or lose it makes sense to everyone.

In addition we still have 26 (13+13) weeks that can be transferred however the parents want. Still very flexible.

Those people are jealous fucking idiots. 12 weeks is hardly anything. You get a fucking year for each parent in Norway

I was so mad that I only had 1 week of PTO to take care of my wife and son after the rough birth. Thankfully some friends pulled us into their place to help take care of my wife while I had to work, otherwise she would have had to get grippy socks....

I fucking hate this country.

Honestly it took me years to lose the American work mindset. It was destroying my brain.

Take the leave and feel no shame. Others are reacting because you taking leave challenges their understanding of work. Something that is exceedingly rare in the US.