Parenting Basics: “Wait Until Your Father Gets Home”

Grandma was right! There is an easy way and a hard way to raise kids. By and large, today’s parents are choosing the hard way. This series of blogs will tackle familiar phrases that used to be commonplace but fell out of favor during the last few decades of the 20th century—and why parents should not be afraid to follow the sentiment expressed in the phrases.

What role does Dad have in your family’s life? Is he regulated to a supporting role, a parenting aide to Mom? Does he share in the discipline? Is he merely a buddy, someone to clown around with while Mom does the heavy lifting?

Part of the confusion today over the role of a father has its roots in the idealized view of the 1950s nuclear family. Dad brought home the bacon, Mom fried it up in a pan, and the kids were pretty much seen but not heard. As part of the backlash against what many saw as a distant, cold father figure, Dads have move out of the background and into the foreground—but not exactly into a co-parenting role.

Photo Credit: Photos.com/Stock Photos/Photos.com

Most husbands and wives, when they become Mother and Father, move into a lopsided arrangement whereas the wives/mothers become the head of the child-rearing department and the husbands/fathers float into a buddy/pal relationship with the child. If today’s typical mother were to tell her kids, “Wait until your father gets home!,” in response to misbehavior, most kids would not worry one iota. In fact, they would look forward to Dad coming home to play with them.

This shift into turning Dad into a mere play-pal hasn’t done any favors to the average American marriage, either. Most parents forget that they should be spending more time in the role of husband and wife instead of mother/father. Our job is to help our spouse see his or her role is not to be the world’s greatest dad or mom, but to be the world’s greatest husband or wife.

By concentrating more on the marriage relationship, you will actually be a better mother and father. Might sound counterintuitive, but numerous studies have shown that children are happier and feel more secure when they know their parents’ marriage is strong. Instead of encouraging your husband or wife to be the world’s greatest dad or mom, say you want him or her to be the world’s greatest husband or wife.

Once you make that change—a more focus on husband/wife than mom/dad roles—moving Dad from the fringes of parenting should be easier. A father shouldn’t be a mere parenting aide, but a full participant in parenting decisions and discipline. A good rule of thumb is that the parent with the most hands-on interaction with the children should be the primary discipliner. But that doesn’t mean the Dad (in most cases) can’t mete out consequences when needed or to back up Mom by delivering punishments when requested by Mom.

In October, Sarah will be giving a series of talks on The Well-Behaved Child: Discipline that Really Works through the City of Fairfax Parks and Recreation Department. Coming in early 2014, Sarah and Mary Elizabeth Peritti will speak on Parenting With Love & Leadership in a four-part webinar series. Contact Sarah through her website for more information.

Letting Go

As mothers, we have a tendency to want things done our way. And let’s face it—most of the time, our way is the best way. But that doesn’t mean that other ways are not as good.

Speaking personally, that’s hard for me to swallow at times, this idea that my way might be the best way, but it’s not the only way something can be accomplished. From cleaning to cooking, from diapering to dressing, we mothers can be pretty imperial when it comes to modifications to our way of doing things.

Sometimes this spills over to our husbands, those wonderful men who want to shoulder the burden of raising our delightful children. Now men in general are a bit clueless when it comes to the niceties of life. They don’t generally notice that the ribbons in our daughter’s hair should match the socks, which match the jumper, which matches the shirt. No, there are some things that fall off the radar when it comes to men.

But that doesn’t mean their way of parenting isn’t a good way of doing things. You’d think we as women would be grateful to have help with the diapering and the washing and the feeding, but the way some of us act when our husbands do take a shift with the kids, you would think they were incapable nincompoops who shouldn’t be left alone with the wee ones.

I remember the first time my husband held our firstborn bundle of joy. Yes, he was awkward and terrified, but instead of adjusting his tenuous hold on her, I encouraged him. I bit my lip and smiled at the sight of her clothes on backwards and her diaper sagging after Daddy had dressed her. I kept on smiling when he fed the kids non-nutritionally balanced meals and kept them up past naptime or bedtime when he took them on outings without me.

Now, don’t think I was grinning and bearing it—no, I was learning to let go and let my husband, the father of our children, take the lead and do things his way. Yes, it wasn’t the way I would have done things, but the kids were always okay and having a fabulous time with Dad.

Rather than berate our husbands for not being us, let’s celebrate their different ways of doing things. The more we can encourage and let go, the more our husbands will step up to the plate and shoulder some of the responsibility of raising our children. 

So what if he lets them wear their church clothes to the ballpark or he forgets to put rain boots on the toddler? Exercise your sense of humor, and find laughter and love in the way he operates. Above all, simply enjoy your differences and relax.

Until next time,

Sarah