Fathers taking an active role

Press, 4 January 1988, Page 10

Fathers taking an active role

New Zealand society has always been one of clearly defined male and female roles — and nowhere more than in family life. Men have spent their weeks at work, and their weekends doing "men’s" work around the home, perhaps taking relaxation on the sports field or in drinking with their mates. Women, on the other hand, have been the undisputed homemakers and child rearer — the nappy washers, floor moppers, the buyers of family gifts, stalwarts of the local kindy or play centre and the taxi

service to music and ballet lessons. Their weekends have sometimes differed from their weeks only in having one more person around the house to look after. So where are we in 1988? Has the women’s movement — and the men’s movement — brought significant changes? Now that more women have careers of their own, are the awesome responsibilities of family life shared more equally? GLENYS WALKER talks to four Christchurch men about their fathering and home roles.

David Penman vividly remembers the father-to-be who persistently sat at the back of the Parents’ Centre ante-natal class reading a book — apparently bored by the whole business. Then, during a “fathers only” evening, led by David, he suddenly asked: “What’s a birth really like? Is it as exciting as winning a rugby match?” David grasped the teaching opportunity and enlarged on the analogy. He compared the role of the midwife to that of the coach, talked of the hard physical effort needed and the build-up of tension to the final moment of triumph. And the drinks with the mates afterwards! The man nodded. At last it was starting to make sense. David, Wayne Priest, John Roberts, and Philip Sewell have all been "speaker” at Parents’ Centre ante-natal classes. All were present at the birth of their children, and since then have tried

to take a fair share in their upbringing. Yet while describing themselves as "involved” fathers, none lays claim to being an expert or a role model. They see themselves as normal, middleclass fathers. Closer to their children than their own fathers were to them, yet still struggling against their male conditioning. “For me, it’s a continual effort to be involved with my children. It would be very easy to take the traditional option and leave most of it to my wife. But because I make the effort I understand how she feels when the children make demands on her and she’d rather be doing something else,”

says John, whose children are aged seven and three. Wayne, whose children are five, three, and one, agrees that it would be easy to slip back into the “old role playing.” “I didn’t realise how selfish I was until I had children. Adapting to family life takes a whole new approach. You go from being lovers to becoming a baby factory,” he says. All four men went to ante-natal classes at Parents’ Centre before the birth of their first baby — because their wives wanted them to and because they felt they should learn how to be supportive during the birth. All benefited from the courses, and recommend them to all wouldbe fathers.

“The classes are very informal. They pay attention to the emotional side of things, like how to encourage your wife during labour,” explains Wayne. Says Phil, who has a five and a one-year-old: "One of the interesting things was hearing other men’s concerns — and realising they were just like yours!” All men say the births of their children have been one of the most important events in their lives. They feel that taking an active role in the birth process is the best possible start to fathering. “It was an incredibly exhilarating experience. I’ll never forget the sight of my child during that first hour, his eyes were open wide and he was looking at us as if to say, ‘Do I want you or not?’ ” recalls David, whose second child is due next month.

Says John: “I found it utterly fascinating. In fact, the hospital was so short staffed I don’t know how they would have coped without me. When the foetal heart monitor stopped I was the one who got it going again.” Although Philip’s life had both babies by caesarian section, he was

able to stay. “It was very exciting to be there. I’m not squeamish so I could watch the whole thing. When my wife was being stitched up immediately afterwards, I was given Nicholas to hold. I walked around the room with him. I think he and I area close because of that.” Exhilaration over, the men then had to knuckle down to the nitty gritty of parenting — the constant broken nights, the bouts of crying, the nappy changing, the exhaustion “After going to the ante-natal classes I couldn’t sleep through night feeds. I couldn’t claim ignorance, although

it would have been easy to be lazy,” confesses John.

“With my first child I used to get up and check to see if he was still breathing. Now, when my wife feeds our youngest I find I’m more tuned into the older ones,” reflects Wayne. When David’s son James began waking regularly at 2 a.m. — probably with a food allergy — David was the only one who could comfort him. “It went on for months, but it felt forever. I would sit with him for up to an hour until he went back to sleep. Then I would have trouble sleeping. I became fatigued. I really thought I was on the way out until I

realised I just needed a few good nights’ sleep to feel okay again.” Demands change as the children grow, Instead of night feeds there are

messy daytime meals, with splattered yoghurt and banana squashed into the carpet. There are trips to the doctor or to creche, noisy bathtimes, and stories to be read. The hardest times are the evenings — “parents’ meltdown” as Wayne describes them. “The children are feeling scratchy and you’re tired. All hands are needed on deck,” he says. “Being an involved father means coming home from work and dropping everything to help with tea and the bath. There’s no grabbing a beer from the fridge and putting your feet up,” declares David. Says John: “At work

you make plans for what to do with your evening. Then you come home and the world changes. For two to three hours it’s all go. By the time everything’s done you don’t have any energy left.” Mornings, especially in the week-ends, can be another trouble spot, as sometimes desperately tired parents long to have a lie in. "On Sunday mornings in winter I would get the children up, put the baby in a back pack and take the other by the hand. We’d go to the park, by the river. Sometimes it was freezing,” says Philip. The men find their careers and their fathering commitments inevitably clash sometimes. “My wife and I both have careers, so we’ve had to become very organised. I’ve arranged my work so I have a shorter-than-normal day and of course, get paid less. This means I can be there in the mornings when my daughter catches the bus to school. “I sometimes take my younger child to creche, or else pick him up. We share most of the parenting, but not equally. My wife still does more,” John says. John approached his employer with his request to work shorter hours with some trepidation. “It still feels strange to walk in late, when everyone else is there. I know it’s not the done thing.” Says Wayne: “In the who-does-what situation, I win by default. I can walk out of the door to work. But someone’s got to do it. “I’m on flexible time, so I can start later to give my wife a lie-in — but then I have to tack the time on to the end of the day. Apart from winning Lotto, I don’t know what else I can do.” Philip can take time off when it’s needed — as he did recently to hear his son playing in a violin recital. But he, too, finds it uncomfortable working different hours from his colleagues. “And if we have office drinks at the end of the day, I’m always the first to leave,” he adds. “Society makes it very hard for the average Kiwi man to be involved with his children. Most guys have to work rigid hours, take short holidays and low pay. I can only afford to work shorter hours because my wife and I have two incomes. It’s not an option available to many.”

comments John. David’s Lincoln College lecturing job allows him little flexibility in working hours. But recently, when ■ his wife was sitting her law examinations, he took time off for full-time par? enting. “I did the whole thing right through. It made me realise what an incredibly demanding occupation looking after a toddler can be,” he says. Is it all worth it? Says David: “There are costs. You’ve got to give up some things, but you get other things back in return. There’s still not equality with our wives in terms of input. With our work system, there can’t be. But we do the best we can.” “We have friends of our own age who don’t have children, and while they lead full lives, I feel they’re missing out. You' can’t be selfish when you have children. If I didn’t have any I think I’d be incredibly self-centred,” adds John. “My father-in-law envies me my experience with my children, going through. everything right from the beginning. He didn’t have that bond with his children. In retrospect he realises what he missed out on.” When Wayne was small* his father was busy trying to build up his business. "He took an interest in me, but he worked at nights and at week-ends, so there wasn’t much time. I’ll try to avoid that; You feel more complete with children. It’s some kind of unwritten law.” “I’m a bit of a rat bag. I don’t always spend, the time with my children I should. It’s hard at 7 p.m. when they want me to read them a story, and I don’t want to. But when you make an effort you can look back and feel those times were special,” says Philip.

Making it happen