Why The Maternal Instinct Is A Scam

“We wouldn’t survive without mamas,” I read in a post whose sentiment I share—the importance of care in a baby’s life — but whose way of conveying the message runs a major risk of generating resistance.

Simply because statements like “without mom we won’t survive” aren’t true. And using such language — aside from stigmatizing those who don’t have the fortune of having a mother — can have the opposite or undesired effect and feed into problematic narratives.

Unfortunately, a biological mother can also die before giving birth — and her baby can survive (and go on to live a full life). In any case, the most important thing is to have a committed, loving and stable caregiver, more than a “mamá”. We know that in general, it is women who occupy this role, but:

1. It’s not always their conscious or free choice.
2. It definitely doesn’t have to be her — especially not only her.

I know it might seem like a minor detail, but it seems super important to me and is at the base of the domino effect, because it ends up reinforcing the idea that, even before a child arrives, motherhood becomes the center of the conversation, without taking other actors into account.

This, among many other things, later reproduces injustices and deepens the lack of sharing of the chores and responsibilities for the person who is coming into this world.

The role of dads

In the context of heterosexual couples, this idea also sidelines men to a secondary or dispensable role, giving them an excuse to step back with arguments like “In a child’s first years, it needs its mother,” or “Men can’t really do much,” or “The baby needs its mother,” because it is a “biological question”. (I put these statements in quotation marks, as we have all heard these empty words before.)

Let’s be clear: the only thing a man cannot do is breastfeed (which is a major demand and can be a deeply important stage for mother and baby). But not all mothers can or wish to breastfeed (less than half of babies worldwide are exclusively breastfed), and even if they do, it won’t be forever, nor is it the only thing that a newborn needs.

Everything else — caring, cleaning, soothing, supporting — is just as doable by a man as by a woman. The big difference? Women are usually raised for this. Through dolls, games, and cultural conditioning, they internalize caregiving. Men, on the other hand, are raised to do other things — not to care.

To some extent, some mothers reinforce these dynamics, because they feel that they should fulfill the role they were prepared for, above all, by the demands of society.

At this point, it should be clear that the maternal instinct is a scam. As Dr. Anna Machin, a British evolutionary anthropologist and author of The Life of Dad: The Making of the Modern Father, said in a BBC article: “Women and men are equally instinctive as parents, because both are biologically equipped to be.”.

And before birth?

There’s a lot that happens in the nine months of pregnancy, and much of it often falls on the mother — though it doesn’t have to. Growing and delivering a baby is already a huge and unique task. But that period also offers us men a chance to step up—or miss out.

Neuroscience tells us that a baby’s brain grows a lot in the womb. Fetuses even learn to recognize voices and languages.  But because men don’t physically experience the pregnancy, they sometimes struggle to connect — and may feel like they’re “losing” their partner, who is also changing.

To get to the point: men don’t need to wait until their children can speak and reason to be involved.

The connection with an unborn child should begin with those very first moments in the tummy. In fact, studies show that the earlier the father connects, the sooner he can start caregiving and the more his brain adapts.

How fatherhood changes men

Darby Saxbe, professor of psychology at the University of Southern California, is writing a book about how fatherhood changes men. Her research looks at how men’s brains and bodies change with fatherhood.

In the New York Times, in an op-ed from June 2024, Saxbe wrote: “The brain and hormonal changes we observe in new dads tell us that nature intended men to participate in child rearing — it equipped them with the neurobiological tools to do so. Men, too, can show the nurturing instinct that’s often attributed solely to mothers.”

According to Saxbe, fatherhood changes men just as much as it changes women and any other person who dedicates their time to raising small children.

She adds that fatherhood can give great benefits to men in the long term, for the health of their brains, but also for society: “At a time when boys and men seem to be experiencing greater social isolation and declining occupational prospects, the role of father can provide a meaningful source of identity. But the transition to fatherhood can also be a time of vulnerability, which is why supporting fathers should be a priority for policymakers,” wrote Saxbe.

One of the main hormonal changes in men who become fathers is a drop in testosterone (the male sexual hormone), which allows for more patience — a key quality when managing the arrival of a newborn — and it opens the door for a deeper connection between a father and his child. This makes spending time together, playing and chatting easier. At the same time, it can trigger postpartum depression in men who become fathers.

False narrative

It’s understandable that men feel they can’t do much during pregnancy or the baby’s first months. But it’s just not true.

We buy into a false narrative. We practically tell ourselves — panting with this projected resignation — that we’d like to do more but it’s impossible because it’s a question of biology.

This trap, on the one hand caused by society and on the other by personal laziness, leads us to repeat these ideas that the mother-child bond is unique (as if the father-child bond wasn’t) and there’s no other choice but to be at the sidelines (which is almost synonymous with getting less involved).

At its extreme, we’ve all heard men who, after becoming fathers, lament that “sex isn’t like it used to be.” But instead of just saying “she doesn’t want to anymore,” maybe ask: Why? What changed? What’s happening emotionally and physically for both partners?

Why it happens

If this is the case, I’d like to hear a profound reflection about why this happens. It’s not enough to proclaim “she doesn’t want to; all she cares about is the baby”. It would be good to ask ourselves certain questions, such as: “What is it about the arrival of a child that means one person wants to have sex, but the other one doesn’t?”

In the Argentinian daily elDiarioAR, Gastón, a father, tells journalist Natalí Schejtman about what it was like to become a widower with two children, aged three and seven: “I used to get frustrated when my wife didn’t want to have sex. But after being alone with the kids, I understood. They drain you. You just want to sleep.”

It is not hard to relate to Gastón’s experience of the hormonal, physical and psychological changes that come with caring for a baby. If a load is not balanced, it’s normal that it would have an impact on a person’s desire.

Men under the microscope

Men are now being studied more when it comes to parenting, helping bust myths. In her newsletter The Double Shift, Katherine Goldstein interviewed gender expert Kate Mangino, author of Equal Partners: Improving Gender Equality At Home.

Mangino cited a study on heterosexual couples after the birth of a baby. Before the baby, each partner worked 40 hours a week and did 15 hours of housework. After birth:

• Women kept doing 15 hours of housework and added 22 hours of baby care.
  
• Men did 14 hours of baby care—but reduced housework to 10 hours.

For Mangino, this shows how we still define fatherhood and motherhood differently: “A man can be called a great dad with just 14 hours of parenting, while a mom doing 22 is still told she’s not doing enough.”

She adds: “When kids enter the picture, we confuse biology with gender roles. Even feminists sometimes fall back on ideas of a ‘natural’ mom-baby bond. But there’s plenty of evidence that fathers, too, undergo hormonal changes—like decreased testosterone—when co-sleeping with infants.”

Context is key

As always, the context is key to this dynamic. Mangino explains that when you are flexible, you tend to earn less money, work fewer hours, obtain fewer promotions and gain less influence in a company because you’re prioritizing the home.

“So it’s a cycle of undervaluing care work and underpaying women and keeping women back from achieving their potential in the workplace. So it’s a chicken and the egg thing,” says Mangino.

Let me end with something I wrote to a reader a few months ago, who was expecting a child and shared his experience with me:

“Thank you for opening up about those moments—like touching your partner’s belly and connecting with the life inside. It reminded me of something I think about often: the baby may be in her belly, but the pregnancy belongs to both of you. There’s so much men can do.

I say this because I recently heard two dads on a podcast say, ‘During pregnancy and the first year, there’s really nothing for men to do.’ And then they complained about feeling left out.

But here’s the thing: we men have to learn to do a lot of essential things quietly—without spotlight. The kinds of things women are usually expected to do. And we need to make them our own.”