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What the other parent can actually do

Three things carry most of it. Own the admin so it never lands on her. Come to the appointments with your own questions written down. And take over one recurring job completely, so it stops being a decision anyone has to make.

Most advice for partners is about being supportive, which is hard to act on at 9pm on a Tuesday. This page is about work you can take off someone.

Admin you can own outright

Own the whole category, not a task at a time. A category you own is a category she stops thinking about.

• Appointments and the calendar. Booking, moving, reminding, and knowing what is next without being asked.
• Insurance and claims. Reading the policy, finding out what is claimable, keeping the receipts, filing the claims.
• The running list of what has been bought. One list, kept current, so nothing gets bought twice and nothing gets forgotten.
• Being the one who phones people. The clinic, the hospital, the insurer, the confinement agency. Phone calls are a tax and you can pay all of it.
• Registration and paperwork deadlines. Find out what has a date attached and put those dates in the calendar yourself.

At the appointment

• Ask in advance whether partners can come in, and whether that includes scans. It varies, and finding out at the counter is the worst time.
• Bring your own questions, written down. Not hers. Two people asking two different things get twice the appointment.
• Be the one who writes. She is being asked things and looked at; you have both hands free.
• Get the number to call between visits and what should make you call it, and put both in your phone before you leave the building.
• If you cannot go, ask for the four things afterwards: what they found, what changes, the next date, the number.

What to say, and what to stop saying

Worth dropping:

• Reassurance you are not qualified to give. When she says something is worrying her, the honest answer is not that it is fine. It is that the clinic can tell her today, and that you will make the call.
• Anything that starts with "at least". It always compares her situation to a worse one, and it always lands as being told not to feel it.
• Comparisons. To her friend's pregnancy, to your mother's, to the internet's. Nobody has ever been helped by one.

Worth saying:

• "What do you need in the next ten minutes?" Small and answerable beats "what can I do", which is one more thing for her to decide.
• "I have booked it." Past tense. The whole value is that it is already done.
• "I will call them." Then call them.
• "I am taking the laundry from now on." Name the job, keep it, and stop asking about it.

What to have ready for the day

• Your own bag, packed at the same time as hers. A change of clothes, a charger, snacks and something to do during a long wait.
• Both sets of documents in one pouch, and you know where the pouch is.
• The route and the parking, worked out before you need it, plus the after-hours entrance to the hospital.
• The 24-hour number saved in your phone as well as hers.
• A short list of who gets told what, and when, so you are not answering messages in a corridor.

Questions people ask about this

How can I help my pregnant wife in Singapore?
Take a whole category off her, not a task at a time. Appointments and the calendar, the insurance paperwork, the running list of what has been bought, and being the one who phones people are four you can own outright without asking anything of her.

Should I go to the appointments?
Go when you can, and go with your own questions written down rather than as a passenger. Two people asking two different questions get twice the appointment. Ask the clinic in advance whether partners can come in for scans, because it varies.

What should I stop saying?
Three habits are worth dropping. Answering a worry with reassurance you are not qualified to give, when the honest answer is that the clinic can tell you today. Starting a sentence with at least. And comparing her pregnancy to anyone else's, including your mother's.

Do this now

Pick one recurring job tonight and say out loud which one you are taking. Out loud matters, because the point is that she stops holding it.

Next: questions to ask at the check-up, and the hospital bag list. Timing contractions is often the other parent's job, so it helps to know how Braxton Hicks usually differ from labour before the night it matters.