I printed a copy of the NY Times Magazine's When Mom and Dad Share It All because I read about it on a fellow blogger's website and wasn't home to get a Times on Sunday. The story's on one particular approach to equal parenting (or co-parenting or shared parenting), which involves parents keeping a computerized chart of who does what, when---basically, you take out the garbage and I'll put the dishes away, etc. If this really is about equal and I deliver her and breastfeed her, shouldn't he do EVERYTHING ELSE? Just saying.
I didn't really want to read the article. I was afraid that it would put more pressure on me to DO IT ALL, just like everything else I pick up and read these days. INFORMATION OVERLOAD. And I don't mean the pressure to raise children, work, climb mountains, make good coffee, be green, etc. (although there certainly is THAT). I mean the pressure to balance, too (so that I am not working too much, not spending too much time doting on my daughter, not neglecting my spouse, not neglecting myself, catching up on sleep, you know?).
And that's basically what it did, though the headline on the front of the magazine (Will Dad Ever Do His Share?) would have you think that it was all about pointing out dads' shortcomings.
Actually, the NYT's headline choice was probably a bad idea (from a marketing standpoint). I imagine a lot of dads, themselves exhausted and overworked, too, purposefully avoided the article. Dads are doing more than ever these days, for sure. But if a dad is not doing his fair share of the at-home work, is he going to pick up this article and say, "Hmmmm....this looks like a great idea. Let's get that chart and figure things out so that things are more shared around here."? See? More pressure on mom.
Just whose job is it to make sure that everything is broken down equally? The parents in the article sound quite capable, but let's not ignore the reality: They've worked long and hard to move against the grain. It isn't easy for a woman to say to her husband (and kids), "I'm working full time. You stay home with the kids." And for a husband to be OK with that? Be happy with that? Just saying. Not something you see every day. And that is certainly something to be considered. But maybe this is about evolving social norms.
The whole article reminded me a lot of the way I feel about women who choose to keep their maiden names when they marry but then give their children their husband's name. Is is equal, then?
Which brings me to my next point, which comes to me at least once a day is worth a mention here: This is all bigger than us. All of it, really. I was raised by baby boomers (who were, in turn, raised by The Greatest Generation, right? And don't even get me started on THAT). I don't think in equal terms, not because I don't think it would be great to split things evenly, but because I have never seen the even split done. And if I haven't seen it done, then I haven't seen it done well.
Even in my marriage, where my husband cooks every day and co-manages the TM (Oh! And pays the bills and remembers organizational things and does car-ish stuff), I am driven crazy by the constant need to organize or clean. Like I'd be failing us if the sheets went two whole weeks without being washed. Yes! I get sickly satisfaction out of vacuum marks in the carpet. Ugh. I hate me now. Add to that the general messiness of this family's life (summers away from home, tenure-track, graduate school, new childcare arrangements) and the icky feeling I get when I think of rigidity and monotony and how that really takes the fun out of things. What if I don't want to commit to being the person who folds underwear at 7:30 AM every morning?
Suddenly tired. Blink. Blink.
I think the article says a lot about what our society values. Work. Money. Prestige (And there isn't prestige in sleeplessness and baggy bras. Apparently). But what is happier than a TM stretched out over a sleeping hubby? See? SEE?.
I cringed when I read, "They [parents] weren’t born in those jobs; they chose them,” Deutsch says. What decision tree, planted decades earlier and steeped in unspoken assumption, she wonders, led him to be a surgeon and her to be a social worker? What led her to work in a field where four-day weeks are common and him to work where they are unheard of?"
Yeah, so that's part of it, of course. Social workers tend to work fewer hours than surgeons, but that is certainly not why I chose social work as a profession. It's part of the larger stuff, yes. But the core issue behind THAT decision (the one to pursue psychotherapy as a career) has to do with the woman as caretaker phenomenon. Not fewer hours (I never even considered flexibility). And woman as caretaker wasn't specifically addressed by the author, who FOR SURE lost credibility there (in my eyes). And if you really think about it, doesn't the example of surgeon-as-male really perpetuate the unfortunate stereotypes? Are they really heartless bastards who work late and have poor bedside manners? I'm certain that this is less and less likely the case.
Some of the quotes really stuck with me. I can't deny there is some legitimacy to the piece.
The article: “It’s a chicken-and-egg thing,” she says. “Even when men and women start off with equal jobs, they make decisions along the way — to emphasize career or not, to trade brutal hours for high salary or not.”
True, sadly, for many women. Most of my mommy friends.
The article: "Messages, loud and soft, direct and oblique, reinforce contextual choice. “A pregnant woman and her husband,” Deutsch says, “how many people have asked her if she is going to go back to work after the baby? How many have asked him?”
True, too. Sick! Worth considering...
I think it was an interesting read. Biased, for sure, but the NY Times is not a peer-reviewed journal THANK GOD and is, thus, still really juicy. I guess I am thankful for the fact that I live now (as opposed to then) and can feel comfortable saying (and hearing), "No, I'm not doing that, you are!" Ultimately, B and I are not "split everything down the middle" kinds of folks. We both have things we like to do and things we don't like to do. Since we've become parents, we've both had to cut back on things we love to do (but are loving that those things are coming back now that TM is a bit older). I guess for us it is more about being aware and responsive to the other person's needs so that they don't get really mean and bite you while you're sleeping at night. 'Cause that's what happens when you aren't getting your needs met.
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