Random Thoughts

[brynndragon]

You know, I would like to be a dad someday, but I don't think I would enjoy being a mom. However, I don't think I'd have much choice in the matter. So not so much with having kids, unless I end up with someone who actively wants to do the mom thing.

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Comments

[etherial.livejournal.com]

So, what you're saying is that you don't want to be a stay-at-home mom. Why abandon the feminine pronoun then?

[benndragon.livejournal.com]

There are differences that go above and beyond staying at home vs. working. The life of the working moms that I know (including the moms my mom does daycare for) is no more appealing to me than being a stay-at-home mom - I don't want to be the first person who gets called home when my kid gets sick, or the one who has to call up the other to explain that there's a noodle stuck up the little one's nose and would you please stop doing your after-work socializing to help me deal with this, or the one whose has to explain the particular habits of the little one to the daycare (although I'd gladly help with any of these things when necessary).

I'm still working on articulating what the difference is between the roles - Catya's comment about primary vs. non-primary parent is the closest I've gotten thus far. But I'm really sure I'd want the dad role and not the mom role.

re: dad role and not the mom role

[etherial.livejournal.com]

But there is no dad role any more than there's a mom role. There's all kinds of dads and moms out there. So, I guess I'm asking, what is the advantage of calling yourself a dad over a mom?

I can see how calling yourself a dad helps challenge people's expectations of your relationship with your children and can force them to open their eyes a little to the fact that the maternal parent doesn't always need to be the primary parent. On the other hand, I can see how calling yourself a mom and refusing to do the stereotypical mom things can also accomplish this.

Re: dad role and not the mom role

[benndragon.livejournal.com]

My words are not satisfying to me either yet, but right now this is the best way I can figure for explaining my feelings and intuition on this subject. It's also likely to be the most minimal, straight-forward way of expressing it - the only improvement I can think to make is adding the word "working" before "mom" to indicate that I'm not just talking about working vs. staying at home.