A mom shared a painful situation with the Reddit community after two comments from her fiancé about their baby boy left her questioning how he really feels about being a father. What made the situation hit even harder was that the remarks were not made in the middle of a fight, but in quieter moments that seemed to reveal what he may have been thinking all along.
In her post, the 24-year-old explained that she and her fiancé had been together for nearly eight years and got engaged about a year ago. They now share a 7-month-old son, who she described as having a rough start due to colic and multiple food allergies during his first several months. Even now, she said, he is still a fussy baby who wants constant attention and cannot easily be put down.
Still, she made one thing very clear: despite the challenges, she loves her son deeply and would not change him for the world. That is why her fiancé’s words seemed to cut so deeply.
One comment stayed with her for months, then another made things even worse
According to the post, the first moment that truly unsettled her happened during a hypothetical conversation about what would happen if she died. She said her fiancé told her that if that ever happened, he would put their son up for adoption.
The comment stayed in the back of her mind for months.
Then, more recently, he said something that felt even harder to shake. She wrote that when talking about his feelings toward their baby, he said, “if there was one word to describe my feelings towards him it would be regret.”
That remark left her heartbroken. In the post, she said she could not stop thinking about what it meant for their son to have a father who seemed to feel that way. She also admitted that while her fiancé is not a bad father, she had always pictured herself building a family with someone who truly loved being a dad.
The bigger question was whether those feelings were temporary or something more serious
The mom asked Reddit whether she was blowing the situation out of proportion, or whether the comments were as troubling as they sounded. Part of what seemed to make the situation so confusing was that her fiancé was still involved enough that she did not see him as an outright bad parent. But the words themselves felt impossible to ignore.
Readers also took note of the fact that the baby’s early months had been especially hard. She described her son as super colicky for roughly the first four months because of multiple food allergies, and said that even by seven months he was still a pretty unhappy baby. Even so, many readers felt the father’s comments crossed a line, especially because one of them involved giving the child up entirely if she were gone.
The situation raised a painful question at the center of the post: was he struggling through a brutal season of new parenthood, or was he revealing something much deeper about how he saw his own child?
Reddit users said the newborn stage can bring dark thoughts, but urged her not to ignore the comments
In the comments, many Reddit users tried to strike a balance between compassion and concern. Some said the newborn stage can be emotionally brutal, especially when a baby has been colicky, unhappy, and hard to soothe for months. One person wrote that the first year can make many parents question their life decisions, while others pointed out that fathers can also experience postpartum depression or anxiety, even if it is talked about far less often.
Several commenters urged the mom to keep the lines of communication open and encouraged her fiancé to seek therapy if possible. Others said they had experienced dark thoughts themselves during the hardest months of early parenthood, only for those feelings to shift once their child got older and their personality started to shine through.
At the same time, readers did not dismiss her concern. Many felt the “regret” comment and the adoption remark were serious enough that they should not simply be brushed aside. One commenter said fathers can absolutely struggle emotionally too, but that does not mean the comments should be ignored. Another said counseling could help before those feelings settle in more deeply over time.
One follow-up detail also stood out to readers. When asked whether sleep deprivation might be making everything worse, the mom said they were actually not sleep deprived at all — their baby sleeps from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. every night — and she added that her fiancé only spends around two hours a day with their son after work. For many readers, that made the situation feel even more complicated, because it suggested exhaustion might not fully explain what he had said.
For the mom, though, the most painful part seemed simpler than that. She was not just worried about two upsetting comments. She was struggling with the possibility that the man she planned to marry might not feel the kind of love for their son that she had always assumed would come naturally.
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