Being a working dad and raising two kids is hard work. Just like being a working mom raising kids is hard work.
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The other day I heard something that really struck me. I’ve always been in awe of single moms, moms in general, and working moms with the challenges they face in working and raising kids. Heck, I have enough trouble running a business and feeding myself! But I haven’t often thought about the dads. My friend Charlie said, “Hey I’m trying to be the best dad I can be, and sometimes that means being a mom too.” I was floored.
Charlie and I were discussing how he approaches his oldest daughter at 13 years old, when they talk about her feelings; something he’s gotten quite good at over the years he’s been raising her alone. He’s making sure to check in on how she’s feeling as much as she’ll let him. “I ask what’s going on, how she is, what she’s feeling…and just hope that’s what she needs. I hope that she understands that I’m always there for her and how much I love her.”
It was the way he acknowledged his dual role, with no expectation of applause or kudos, that impressed me. After all, he’s just a working dad, like so many others, doing whatever is best for his two girls. Right?
Right. But being a working dad and raising two kids is hard work. Just like being a mom raising kids is hard work.
Charlie’s mantra is, “I do whatever has to be done. No one is going to give me a medal for it.” This “whatever” often means leaving work earlier to pick up a kid, cutting his socializing out completely, and being in bed by 8:30pm, or going shopping for dresses and shoes. Ahem, “cool dresses and shoes.” Now that’s one heckuva dad.
Doing whatever needs to be done.
It occurred to me how many wonderful dads I know personally who are doing the same thing, evoking the loving nurturance one might typically equate with … mothers. They are the nurturer, the soft place, the compassionate one, the advisor, and the provider. Maybe they are also the ones that pick up the kids, and the ones that soothe the nightmares.
One father has full-time care of both his 11 and 14 year-old, a boy and a girl respectively. “It’s the activities that really get me! I have to be at work, then get my son to rugby practice over 30 minutes away three times a week. Then games on Saturday. And now my daughter has her own activities and I haven’t been able to convince her to play rugby. Yet.”
And they don’t have to be part of a two-dad couple, or a single father, to play the mom role. Many men may also do it in traditional heteronormative marriages and relationships. Check out the blog post “I Have a Dream.”
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I met with Grant on the issue of nightmares his son was consistently having. Grant wasn’t sure of the best way to help his son, and in his frustration he called on me to get some insight and techniques. After talking and discussing the common themes, I asked his son: “What’s the most powerful superpower you could bring into your dreams with you? What’s one thing that you could use to to banish the monsters? Would you have a sword? A light saber? A shield?” and that ended up being the thing that finally worked.
Grants says it’s been a lesson in how to be a heart-centered dad and the provider. All the while getting the little life things like cooking, cleaning, sewing on buttons, doing laundry AND being the compassionate one to kiss the boo-boo’s.
“I’ve had to learn to be available to my son in ways that push me to access what would normally be considered feminine roles, like nurturing and compassion. Usually a guy would slap his son on the butt when he’s upset, and tell him to ‘buck up’; but I’ve had to dig deeper and take on more of the traditional feminine compassionate and nurturing roles as well.”
GMP writher Doug Zeigler addresses the question of being a divorced dad or a single parent in his article “Single Father, Divorced Dad“.
Stepping into your other half sometimes means doing things that aren’t within the stereotypical wheelhouse of skills that men acquire prior to being a father, especially if those men have girls. Hair, makeup, boys, unique types of laundry (no, we don’t wash everything in hot and dry it in the dryer!); discussing feelings, understanding hormones, soothing hurt feelings, talking about mean girls, liking Barbies or Disney movies, playing a princess (or a queen), or kissing a skinned knee … dads are doing what needs to be done.
For millions of families, the structure of the family has nothing to do with “normal American family,” and this is a shout out to all the dads who are doing their very best to be the best dad (and mom) that they can be. Are they “mothers”? No. Did they give birth? No. But they are doing whatever is needed to be the best they can for their kids.
Whether it’s shared custody, single father households, two dads, working or absent mothers or any number of unique situations here’s a big “thank you” to all those good men doing whatever they have to do for the sake of the kids.
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Related Article: “Ten Reasons Men Are Awesome” by Thomas G. Fiffer
Photo—courtesy of Charlie Groves