More women have to accept they can't be the default primary carer?

[Babycham1979]

Inspired by another thread, I'd like to ask others what you think about the myth (as I see it) that women can 'have it all'.

I know many educated, professional women who have still insisted on being their children's primary carer as soon as they're born. The fathers' preference has always come second and they invariably end-up acting as the primary earner (often against their wishes).

It seems as if many women are asking for the impossible in expecting to fill very senior positions in business and politics, but simultaneously assuming motherhood to have primacy over fatherhood.

Parental leave is almost equally available now; women out-earn men up until child-bearing age (29); and more girls are graduating (esp in law and medicine) than men. Now is surely the time for the sisterhood to actively encourage men to be the primary carers of their children? At least half the guys and dads that I know would love this option, yet it's not been made available to any of them.

Are we really saying that women can do anything in the public sphere as well as men, but men can't parent as well as women? Either we're equal or we're not.

Only when we have real parity at home can we have parity in the workplace, no?

We split care 50:50 in our house although tbh DH does more of the admin - sorting out dinner money, most drop offs/pick ups. We both work full time but I have flexible hours while he can work from home. Taking into account my bonus and more generous pension I can bring in around x 3 what DH earns and I do wonder what we would have done if I was as clearly the lower earner as he is, I probably would have cut my hours. I don't think I know any SAHDs.

Further point - I think the main difference for us if that DH likes his job and probably has more options for career progression than I do despite my higher wage so it feels like a better long term prospect. I feel like I am pulling in the cash while I can - if I was in this job for the long haul then I might have cut hours while the kids were young as part of a long term view.

My DH is a 'Father' and he works full time, no spare part about it! Does that mean mothers that work full time are just a spare parts then?

Do you really think 'society' is making most men fulfill a role they don't want to do - come off it?

Being a SAHM isn't an insult it's the language used to describe the role that's insulting. Men/women alike are not defined by whether they are a parent but neither should you be defined by a position just because it has monetary value. I don't understand how this makes a woman a better person, a better woman?

at least half the guys I know would genius Ely (sic) like to go part time at the very least. A significant proportion would rather sack off work all together, but they're denied that choice because society tells us all that it's not theirs to make.

So, amongst your friends, it is common for male partners to open a discussion about them potentially becoming a SAHD or at least more shared care, and their partners refusing because 'society doesn't give them that choice'? I'm surprised that the decision-making process doesn't involve more reasoned discussion about each partner's role in their relationship and that that anyone, male or female, would cite 'society' in defence of their position.

My husband and I share care fairly equally, as do many families I know, but neither of us took society's attitudes into consideration when we reached the decision.

I think it's pretty obvious this is the main impediment to women having equality in the workplace.

I consider myself a feminist, but if I'm being honest I could never be happy with my husband being the primary caregiver to our children. So I have to concede that I'm part of "the problem".

Oh come on. What I am talking about is the fact that a lot of men aren't left with their dcs wo a long list of things that they need to do, that some of them 'forget' to feed lunch to their dcs or that they have to have lunch prepared because otherwise they can't feed a toddler etc...

As saying that men aren't under any pressure from society is wrong. Have a read this book and you will see everyone is under pressure to behave in a certain way in our society. Not just women.

The fathers' preference has always come second- really?

I dont know a single man that has berged to take extenmded paternity leave and has been refused. not one (thats not a critisue-just a statement)

are you Scandi??

Dojo what is happening is that men don't really go against the grain because it's too hard work. They can't even comprehend a world, their world, not working with different rules.
Eg what if they stop work and their DW suddenly becomes ill or looses her job? They will extremely responsible because their 'job' is to provide for the family and they aren't because they are at home looking after the dcs, which isn't their 'role'
On the contrary, how many women will worry that their DH might loose their job and what are they going to do then? very few because its' Ok for them to be at home.

And then there are all the other things that we, women say wo a second thoughts. Things like 'Oh men, they just don't think do they?'

Or when I picked up the dcs late at after school club following a misunderstanding with DH. The first comment I had was 'Oh that's men for you. They are so unreliable aren't they? Always forget...'.
My Dh was quite annoyed by the comment and was right. He is the one to collect the dcs every single time (but after school comes to see me to sort out payment ). And I was the one who got confused. But hell no it had to be him...

or the fact that men don't see mess and a whole lot of other comments made in passing that are demeaning for men (and for women tbh).
Or the fact that schools always ring mum first if there is an issue with a dc, or that they expect a parent to be available to pick up whenever convenient, or rather expect mum to do so etc etc and the people organising/ringing are 95% women....

My experience where I live and in the field I work is of fluid families where parenting is shared and often both parents have a period as primary carer or there isn't one.

Growing up my father worked from home during the day so was home when we got in from school and cooked dinner, my mum worked nights and went out after dinner.

In my family, I took six months maternity leave and breast fed a baby who refused bottles but now we share the care of our toddler. I work shorter hours most weeks as I'm self-employed so it's easy for me to cut back to 30hrs or so without needing to put in an application to somebody. However I also travel for work and for periods of a few days here and there dh does all the childcare.

I know one father who took the remaining three months of his wife's maternity leave after she went back to work, and of my ante-natal group of five or six, two other fathers have at least one day at home in the week doing childcare.

In the city I live, most people walk to work and I see at least as many women as men walking home from work via a nursery pick up pushing a buggy at 5pm.

So I don't recognise the situation you describe and I think it's specific to certain parts of the country and parts of society.

I do think attitudes are slowly changing.

With DP and I, there is no assumption from either of us I will be the primary carer because I'm the female. In fact, DP would like to be the primary carer and I would like him to be that too, but he earns three times as much as me so it just wouldn't make sense.

If we earned the same he would be the primary carer. We have quite a few friends where the dad fulfils that role.

I think a lot of men don't really go against the grain as they realise that society very much favours their preferences. Men are crying out for equal rights to a career break that would stagnate their income, ruin their chances of promotion, afford them a crappy pension later on in life? I just don't know these men, where are they to be found? Some men 'really' don't want to be a SAHP and some women do - it is a choice we made in our family. It is infantilising women to say they have made no choice and are just fulfilling some societal expectation.

I am the wage earner in our house, and my dh is a sahd. he was working in the family business previously and the plan was we would both try and reduce our hours in order to do most/all our own child care. I really wanted to spend time at home with our baby and so did he. although the business was busy he was rarely paid on time so we couldnt manage on his wage alone anyway - our carefully laid plans were scuppered when there was an argument in the family once our baby was born (long toxic story)we eventually went NC with his family due some long standing problems and so I ended up going back to work full time since any job it looked like dh could get wouldnt cover childcare costs (and we have no other help)
we actually sold up and moved close to my work so I could still breast feed/go home for lunch etc which works well for us. we certainly dont have a lot of spare cash and have to budget carefully, but we are doing ok.

our toddler is happy and bright and loves being with daddy. and he is an awesome dad!
the only thing dh has found is that in some of the local groups (toddler stay and plays etc) some of the women there have been quite rude/suspicious of him - like it the wierdest thing in the world to have a man stay at home and look after a baby! our little one is two now and that is getting better, we have made a small group of very lovely friends (with children the same age) who he meets up with at some of these groups, so doesnt feel so isolated.
it used to be that mums would be asking each other for coffee etc at these groups and would completely ignore dh (and he such an outgoing kind person) but now he is invited and they meet up etc and all is good.

I do feel quite sad though that I cant stay home with LO and go to groups etc, i feel like Im missing out at times. But I have to make the most of weekends and evenings and holidays etc

They are under pressure, just like women, to act in a certain way. You know all the men don't cry, they are providers, they are as good as the size of their bank account, they can't be showing feelings and all that crap.

That's rather an outdated version of masculinity, though, isn't it? I don't recognise it in any of the men I know in my generation or younger.

The problem is that the people currently at the top of organisations are still of that older generation, and the women who are at the top have generally got there by pretending they're just like that. Because people tend to recruit in their own image, the people heading for the top tend also to be in that macho mould. There's got to be some sort of revolution. I thought the financial crisis might be the catalyst, but it hasn't happened yet.

TheFriar

I was talking about the specific cases that the OP mentioned amongst her friends - clearly they are prepared to go against society as they have voiced their desires to stay at home, but apparently they are still unable to because society has a greater say than their partners.

WRT your point about things that we, women say wo a second thoughts - if you do, then you are part of the problem. I don't say things like this about my husband or men in general, and challenge others when I hear them because it is just so much bullshit. I regularly see statements along these lines challenged on MN, for example, and don't hear my friends buying into that belief so I don't think I'm alone in this.
If you are saying things like this or failing to challenge them when you hear them said about your husband or any other man, then you are complicit in this societal pressure. People refusing to accept lazy stereotypes is how things change, but I think there are probably as many or more stereotypes about women that need challenging as there are about men.

"At least half the guys and dads that I know would love this option, yet it's not been made available to any of them."

Really?

It's usually grandstanding when men say things like this. They don't really want to take it all on. They just want to stop getting up at 6.30 am for the train and have forgotten (or have never perceived) all the shit that goes with doing the job properly.

I know a lot of families who operate slightly unconventional practices wrt to the sex of the parent and WOH / childcare arrangements. I do not know a single one where the father genuinely pulls his weight as a mothers generally do. I know many families where mothers WOH full time and come home to find that absolutely as much domestic responsibility as possible has been saved for their return. They all get on and do it as they feel they have no choice.

If one of those mothers, or some other woman who knows those mothers, gets the opportunity to say "you know what, darling? I think I would prefer you at least bringing in a full time salary as I'll be doing all this shit anyway" I don't blame her. And I don't think it equates to some massive conspiracy against allowing fathers to be parents.

I am not my childs primary care giver. Her dad is a stay at home day and I work 4 12 hour shifts Monday - Thursday. He works as a DJ every weekend but actually I think times are changing. People find it wrong that I have to ask him 'What is she asking me for?' because he knows and I don't, his family think its wrong, my dad secretly thinks its wrong but we are happy the way we are and my relationship with my child is not effected. I could not be a stay at home mum as I couldn't handle the stress, whereas he has the patience involved to be a great parent 7 days a week. I have been known to have palpations from the stress in my household, sometimes I offer to stay late at work and if I could work more I could possibly do it. I love my daughter and she is happy and we have a great relationship but I can't be a stay at home parent.

I think its great for a man to be a stay at home dad considering I saw my dad for half an hour a day for my whole childhood because he was always at work, he didn't know anything about me and took me every Sunday and that was it.

No I don't say things like this either as my example would let you guess.

But these are all examples heard on the school playground, said by other mums whilst waiting for the dcs to come out.
I've actually raised the fact that it was crap.
Just to get tutted, raised eyebrows etc.. I actually had someone telling me I had no idea what I was talking about!
The thing is, it can easier to think that these men can't help it than to think they can but won't.

So all women my age (between 30 and 45yo).

Of course me aren't crying out to have their promotion prospects diminished or their pension slashed- any more than women are crying out to spend all their earnings on childcare, or having the pressure of meeting tough work deadlines when they've been up half the night with a wakeful baby. But that's cherry picking the tough aspects of those scenarios.
Surely it's more realistic to talk in terms of mums and dads wanting a better balance in their lives. Is it really so surprising in the 21st century that many couples simply don't want the role of sole earner or full time SAHP? Not that's there's anything the slightest bit wrong if those roles work for certain couples, but id be really surprised if it suits most any more. As has been pointed out many times on here, once we're past the initial giving birth and exclusive breast feeding (periods which are easily covered by existing maternity rights already) then mums and dads are equally capable of looking after the children or earning a living.

I'm not the default caregiver for my (primary-aged) children. I have a busy, busy job and I travel a lot. DH also works but he is the one who packs the lunches, makes sure they have whatever costume he finds out they need for school at short notice, is there to put them to bed in the evenings and signs them up to clubs etc.

But it is hard. It's hard not because this arrangement doesn't work for us. It does. But it doesn't work for other people: from my (male) colleagues who tell me how 'amazing' I am to manage it all; to the school teacher who insists on sending whole class emails to all the mums (and once brilliantly replied to an email DH sent her, addressing her reply to me instead of him); to the doctors that get suspicious when DH is there and say he needs permission from me for e.g. vaccinations. It's all eye opening and rather depressing.

Lovely Boots you are NOT part of the problem!

Well, the reason I say this is because our household arrangements are borne more of instinct than practicality. I am not filled with self-loathing by any means, but I'm cognizant of the fact that I've not done much to "agitate" the system.

The feminist solution is NOT for women to take on traditionally 'male' roles, it's for all of society to become fair, inclusive and equal for all.

YY to that!!

But it is hard. It's hard not because this arrangement doesn't work for us. It does. But it doesn't work for other people: from my (male) colleagues who tell me how 'amazing' I am to manage it all; to the school teacher who insists on sending whole class emails to all the mums (and once brilliantly replied to an email DH sent her, addressing her reply to me instead of him); to the doctors that get suspicious when DH is there and say he needs permission from me for e.g. vaccinations. It's all eye opening and rather depressing.

This is shocking.

But beyond the first year or so when the baby is possibly dependant on breastfeeding, why have a primary carer? I was primary carer for both our dds for the first year, but since then dp and I both work a four day week and do equal childcare. It probably took about 6 months before the dds were equally happy with either of us, but they are now.

I like this set up because it protects us as a family from unexpected redundancy or death of a parent (both in terms of our income and the kids emotional security).