Fatherhood

A Feminist Mother’s Perspective On Why Father’s Matter

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There is great stuff on the site Good Men Project. I like to hear things from a woman’s perspective. Sometimes it is best for people to hear things from women because they might find it easier to hear.

What she is saying is pretty obvious to me. It is apparently not obvious to two generations of women who have been taught fathers don’t matter.

BottleFed

Why Dads Matter: A Feminist Mom’s Perspective – Anne Theriault

 

What seems most important to me is that while our son does get different things from my husband and I, those things are equal in terms of how they’re helping him to grow and develop. My husband plays a crucial role in our son’s life, and so he should.

Why, then, does it seem like society thinks so little of fathers?

You only have to turn on the TV to see how the media portrays fathers – they range from totally absent, like Meredith Grey’s father on Grey’s Anatomy, to unfeeling assholes, like John Winchester on Supernatural, to just plain ridiculous, like Homer on The Simpsons or Peter on Family Guy. The fact that we have such low expectations for dads helps explain why people treated my stay-at-home dad friend as if he was some kind of superhero, whereas I felt like just being a mom all day long without managing to keep a sparkling clean apartment or maintain a busy social calendar made me some kind of failure. It also explains why people refer to their husbands as “babysitting” their children, as if looking after their own kid was some kind of job their husbands had been hired to do.

Biology we obviously can’t change, but we, as a society, can continue to make breast pumps cheaper and more accessible to women who want to breastfeed. We can also encourage workplaces to make themselves into pumping-friendly environments, instead of asking women to pump in the washroom or only during their lunch breaks. We can renew the movement to close the gender wage gap, which seems to have lagged in recent years. Most of all, though, we can work to break down traditional gender roles, and get rid of the idea that men have no place staying at home with their children. Because, honestly, I wonder if growing up in a world where only girls are encouraged to take up babysitting as their first after-school job, where men are shunned from events like baby showers and the thought of a dude changing a diaper seems downright hilarious helped contribute to my husband’s discomfort in his early days as a parent. The plain truth was that, as a woman, I had spent far more time around babies and small children than he ever had.

Look, I’m not saying that all men should stay home all the time, or that women, even feminist women, have some kind of obligation to go back to work after having kids. And before you jump in to tell me that some women want to stay at home, and some women like traditional gender roles, trust me when I say that I already know that, and I’m totally fine with it. I don’t want to take anything away from anyone; all that I really want is for people to have choices. I want men to feel like they have an equal opportunity to be a stay at home parent. I want women to feel like they can go back to work, if that’s what they want. Most of all, I don’t want anyone to feel obligated to behave in a certain way just because of what’s between their legs.

So what does all this mean? How does any of this prove that dads matter? I’m not really sure, except that I know that they should, both because they deserve to matter, and because women and children deserve a partner and parent who is engaged and caring. I know that when we live in a society that tells us that fathers are little more than wage-earning buffoons, everyone loses out. Above all, I know that this stereotype is something that we can, and should, change. It won’t happen quickly, and it won’t happen easily but I believe that we, as a society, are up to the challenge.

I also know that my husband is a great dad, and my son and I are lucky to have him.
Read more HERE

Fatherhood

Marry Him!

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Lori Gottlieb explains why women should stop holding out for Mr. Right

From The Atlantic: “Ah, this is the dream,” I said, and we nodded in silence for a minute, then burst out laughing. In some ways, I meant it: we’d both dreamed of motherhood, and here we were, picnicking in the park with our children. But it was also decidedly not the dream. The dream, like that of our mothers and their mothers from time immemorial, was to fall in love, get married, and live happily ever after. Of course, we’d be loath to admit it in this day and age, but ask any soul-baring 40-year-old single heterosexual woman what she most longs for in life, and she probably won’t tell you it’s a better career or a smaller waistline or a bigger apartment. Most likely, she’ll say that what she really wants is a husband (and, by extension, a child).

To the outside world, of course, we still call ourselves feminists and insist—vehemently, even—that we’re independent and self-sufficient and don’t believe in any of that damsel-in-distress stuff, but in reality, we aren’t fish who can do without a bicycle, we’re women who want a traditional family. And despite growing up in an era when the centuries-old mantra to get married young was finally (and, it seemed, refreshingly) replaced by encouragement to postpone that milestone in pursuit of high ideals (education! career! but also true love!), every woman I know—no matter how successful and ambitious, how financially and emotionally secure—feels panic, occasionally coupled with desperation, if she hits 30 and finds herself unmarried.

Oh, I know—I’m guessing there are single 30-year-old women reading this right now who will be writing letters to the editor to say that the women I know aren’t widely representative, that I’ve been co-opted by the cult of the feminist backlash, and basically, that I have no idea what I’m talking about. And all I can say is, if you say you’re not worried, either you’re in denial or you’re lying. In fact, take a good look in the mirror and try to convince yourself that you’re not worried, because you’ll see how silly your face looks when you’re being disingenuous.

Read more HERE

Fatherhood, Marriage

Men not marrying? How deep does “the problem” go

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From Girl Writes What

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlvMAS_20K4&w=420&h=315]

 

Men used to be able to derive a positive male identity from marriage. That is, through the respected and uniquely male role of husband and father. When that identity is increasingly characterized by society as superfluous, obsolete, or in the words of Harriet Harman, unnecessary to social cohesion, it is no longer a way for a man to defer his disposability, is it? Moreover, when that identity can be unilaterally stripped from him on the whim of the increasingly fickle and hard to please female even when he does everything right, marriage ceases to be a positive way for men to define themselves as men. It becomes a way for men to define themselves as chumps and idiots, and who wants to define themselves that way? Moreover, from sitcoms to romcoms to TV commercials, to billboard ads, the role of husband/father is increasingly one of playing the incompetent buffoon to sassy, smart, together wife or even child. In the mass media there is nothing noble or respectable about husbandhood or fatherhood anymore. Further, when the roles within marriage become virtually indistinguishable and interchangeable, a man’s role becomes less and less…well, uniquely male. It’s just a role. It can be a path to meaning and fulfilment (if he’s lucky), and it may be something he desires to do and become, but it’s not necessarily a path to defining himself AS A MAN.

Family, Fatherhood, Parenting

Manhood & Anger – What Dads Can Teach

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In a recent post in Psychology Today , Mark Banschick, M.D wrote a great explanation of the connection between fathers and sons and why fathers are needed. Single parenthood is not easy for fathers or mothers. The notion of choosing single parenthood is foolish. There are clear reasons why it is a bad idea. Here are a few things we might want to think about:

It’s very difficult for a mother to discipline a teenage son. This is something that I have seen from decades of work. Women can and do raise wonderful boys and bring them to manhood, but if there’s a conflict – it’s tough.

A major reason is that a boy – or young man – will often see caving into his mother’s wishes as castrating. This is largely unconscious. It may not be right, but he hates his dependency – and bridles at being reminded that Mom’s in control. This aggression requires containment, and some single mothers have no one to turn to. One can claim that this statement is culturally biased; that women are perfectly capable of raising healthy, non-violent young men. I agree, but it’s not the whole story.

Too many years of clinical experience argues for the need of both parents.

 

I don’t know how many more times it must be repeated, but yes, children need a mother and a father.

Healthy fathers (and male role models) can serve as an important buffer between a young man’s rage and expressing that rage. A normal, well intentioned, father tells his son that men don’t hit women, or threaten them. The boy internalizes the father’s strength and it becomes his own. He takes pride in containing his anger – in his own developing masculinity. This is the healthy outcome. It’s just tough to pull off as a single mom.

 

Read more HERE

 

Family

Legacy

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my daughter’s great grandmother Elizabeth (aka Nana) with one of her many grandkids (my daughter) summer 2010

My grandmother was born in 1918. Yes, the end of World War I. That is a long time ago. She is still alive and kicking and has lots of stories to tell. I am getting as many of them as I can because she has lived for almost 95 years.

She is one hard working woman who still can remember many things. I hope to leave a legacy similar to hers.

Pay attention to those around you that are still living because they may not be around for very long. Every day they are here is a blessing.