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July 27, 2005

from the middle of something else I wrote

In resonse to this from Erin
Fathers and mothers have different roles, absolutely. I think that one of the earliest steps to the confusion of these roles was that mothers voluntarily gave up their God-given gift of breastfeeding. Anyone (male, female, adult child, relative or total stranger) can give a baby a bottle. Bottle feeding was the earliest stage of the scientification of motherhood. Mothers no longed learned their craft from other mothers, and eventually came to rely upon 'scientific' methods for everything from infant feeding to toilet training and a whole lot more. The care of the infant and the child was there upon turned over to others besides the mother, leaving her to be simply a servant to the chores of the household. Her unique role was lost.

Don't get me wrong - I do recognize that for some rare circumstances, artificial infant feeding is a necessity and that the research into preparing adequate substitute foods has saved many lives. But in general, the first step to turning child care away from the mother starts with the baby bottle. The popes, throughout history, have always encouraged Catholic mothers to nurse their infants themselves if it were at all possible. (Father William Virtue did his dissertation on Catholic motherhood, it is a fascinating read and I wonder how much more he would have put in there if the TOTB had been more fully developed).

Fathers start taking on mothering when they feed the baby with a bottle. This has been going on for at least 80 years of which I am aware (I have both fiction and non-fiction from the 1920s where this is commonplace). Fathers started to encroach on motherhood by taking on first the 'fun' stuff - and eventually mothers reasoned that if they can do the fun stuff they should also do the drudgery stuff.

Fathers can nurture babies and children in some pretty unique ways that mothers can't. My dh was an excellent burp the baby guy, and he walked fussy babies so that I could get in a shower or a few bites to eat. My husband took all our children to work with him at various times - he has taught all of them how to handle one set of tools while I taught them to handle others. Both the boys and the girls have been taught to cook and to care for themselves and their environment. I don't think that it's unreasonable to expect that both men and women should be able to care for themselves in case of need.

Most jobs have a fair degree of drudgery involved. My days at work I spend much of my time doing the same basic physical exam on one woman after another. It would be pretty boring if I couldn't engage them in conversation and do some health teaching. Sweeping and mopping the kitchen floor, chasing a toddler out of the cupboards for the nth time, doing 7 loads of laundry, those are pretty exhausting and boring.
The big differences between paid employment outside the home and being a stay at home mom are pretty big. Two that come to mind are:
1) the concept of PAID! Our culture doesn't value the unpaid work done by anyone, be it the volunteers at church or the work of moms.
2) the opportunity to interact with adults. as a kid, I would see moms talking to each other over the back fence as they were hanging laundry - 3 dozen diapers a day and so on. the interaction was built in to the way things were done, but now we don't hang laundry and most households have no one at home daytimes

Posted by alicia at July 27, 2005 11:48 PM

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Fathers can nurture babies and children in some pretty unique ways that mothers can't.

I could throw them higher in the air, and was an expert at dancing them to sleep.

Posted by: William Luse at July 29, 2005 3:23 AM

smockdaddy loves to play cirque de soliel with our babies. something i never dare to try at home.

Posted by: smockmomma at July 29, 2005 8:39 PM

I would also walk them back and forth for hours to let my wife sleep. What is it about us guys that loves to hear the kids giggle as they are tossed into the air. We trust ourselves to catch them. They learn to trust us in what might be considered "risky".

I will also comment that I learned several positive things about being a dad from my Dad. (RIP) There is nothing wrong with changing daipers, walking the floor with a screaming or restless child on my shoulder. That I'm washable and so are my clothes. That the burp back of mama's milk is perfectly normal. They get from me their tendency to be greedy for being fed.

We all have to learn some things the hard way. (yuck or giggle warning) One of my brothers learned not to play "lay back and bench press the excitable small chld" shortly after they have been fed. He was laughing with his mouth open when his nephew urped.

We do it for the joy of it. Some of us complain at times. Sometimes there is resignation. For me it was a chance to learn who this new person was. The beginning of years of watching them grow. Unlike Scott Hahn, I have never told my kids that they owe me big time for chosing the best possible mom for them. But that is a wonderful sentiment for a dad to have. I've been blessed to be to the point with most of mine where I can say, "What a neat adult they have turned into. They are really neat persons".

I praise God for all of them. I learned from both my parents that I must still pray for them. That is a part of my obligation as a parent. Praise them or correct them when they are here. Pray for them always.

Posted by: John Huntley at July 30, 2005 12:35 AM

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