Monday, January 19, 2015

Day 6 - Working dad, tired dad, excused dad



I haven’t had many encounters with dad’s in my life raising children, all my life I have only encountered dads who come home and sit somewhere and do something with their own time, while the mother is still working/raising a human being (the baby/child).

I used to think nothing of it, it was normal to be that way – because it is all justifiable according to what has been generally accepted, which is – mom raises baby/child/human while dad is out working all day and when he comes home he may just sit and do nothing else but relax and carry the “burden of working and providing.

BUT – this was many years ago, times have changed –in today’s time’s most moms are also working, so now mom and dad are working while the baby/child is taken care of by someone else, either a nanny or a family member, or the child is send to a creche.

So now in many families – including my own, there is a different situation, the situation is both parents come home from a full day of work, and then there is still a baby that needs to be taken care of.

So now we have two scenarios – the one where mom takes care of baby all day and dad comes home from a long day of work and rest/do nothing, and then the other one where both parents work all day and come home and now there is still a baby to look after.

Now what happens within both these situations is quite fascinating – no matter which situation it is – dad gets to rest – primarily in most families, while mom who also came from work still needs to do everything for the baby, which is hard work, plus cooking and cleaning and all the other things.

These are my observations of other families/people that I have met and been with. It is unspoken in the families and simply accepted, or to place it better – it is how they have chosen to accept it.

After observing people and families, I have come to be in the same situation, having a baby and a wife and myself, all three of having to live together with the same circumstances as everyone else in a manner of speaking.

I am working, my wife is working and there is our baby – My wife/partner works from home as she always have, she has a responsibility within work plus now having a baby at home, I work away from home – I have a job that can keep me busy all day as long as it must take to do my work.

So what now? When I come home, my wife has been working plus taking care of the baby and here I come home with the idea that my work for the day is over, meantime my wife never gets off, she is working 24/7.

So what excuses me from not doing more when I get home, what excuses me from doing that part equally as my wife with raising the baby and doing what needs to be done, I mean she is doing it.

This raised an interesting question within me – we MEN love to boast how strong and physically better we are than women, we love to be the provider and the “strong” being in the relationship, we men like to impose that we are better than women, yet I think we men simply like the idea of it all. Because when it comes to what the men are doing versus what the mother/women is doing, we do not compare.

We live in a time where there cannot be any more excuses why we aren’t taking over half the diaper changing once home after work, and doing half the feeding of the baby once home from work, or education and playing with the baby once home from work, mom is able to do it, so why is dad not doing it?

I have been pushing myself to live up to my potential as a worthy father of life by simply using my wife/partner as an example.

I will be sharing real encounters in the next blogs, each point at a time on the topic raised here.
To be continued.



2 comments:

  1. Awesome Sauce. Being the example for fathers EVERYWHERE

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  2. Clear and well observed and within this both partners have the responsibility of looking at all the dynamics involved and from that share the load equally

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