I once read in a Penelope Leach book that if a mother ‘must’ work out of the home and hence have others care for her infant some of the time, that it is better for the carer/carers to get the daily routines out of the way so that, in the main, mother-infant time is playtime interaction rather than ablutions and such. In this way, mother-infant bonding can continue at the best ‘quality’.
In my considered opinion, that is complete bullshit.
I mean, if I was working away from home more than the few hours a week I do, I’ve no doubt the parts of the day I’d miss least would be nappy changes and having a carefully prepared meal spat all over me. But actually, it is in those daily interactions; the thousands of little ways I care for Bean bodily most days, that the foundations of our bond have been laid. When she was newly born, all she wanted was to feed and sleep and shit in warm, supported peace, and the actions The Fireman and I took to make those things possible for her made up the bulk of our days and nights. It wasn’t always fun and it wasn’t always pretty but it was… always.
Those early animalistic weeks don’t last forever but the principles remain. Loving Bean is an action (actually, millions of tiny actions.)
In our culture most infants have one primary care-giver and for that person, daily care like nappy changes (or potty visits, if nappy-free is your thing) is a given. But what about the other family members? For most people I know, the traditional mother-at-home/father-at-work structure remains the norm. And in our house, that means that Bean’s father is more often than not on nappy/bath/teethbrushing/facewiping detail in the hours that he is at home. This isn’t just because I’m lazy, or because of an ideological position we take about shared parenting, although those two are factors. It’s also because through muddling our way through we’ve worked out that the more of the boring but intimate caretaking The Fireman does, the closer he and Bean become. Sure, playtime is special and they have a particular bond involving plastic blocks that my non-spatially oriented brain can’t really appreciate. But there is something even more special about fostering closeness, trust and yes, reliance, through essential care. The more Bean seeks out her father - as well as me – for simple things like a drink of water, the more connected we all feel.
Not everyone has the time or the ability to devote to round-the-clock parenting. And there is nothing wrong with a bit of outsourcing. But parents ( in my acquaintance, always fathers) who opt out of the ‘boring bits’ as much as possible even when they are at home, are missing out in a myriad of ways. It’s not just about ‘giving the mother a break’, as many parenting books and advice columns would suggest. It’s about creating a bond and showing love in ways that kicking a ball around the backyard can never quite match.
Exactly. For a kid to really trust you, to not be just a little on edge when they’re with you, they need to know you can handle the basics. I just don’t believe my son would be quite so relaxed about his Saturday morning outings with his father if he thought I was the only one who could be relied on to feed him or make sure he had a hat.
Incidentally, my partner doing some of the boring stuff means our son sees that nurturing and being responsible domestically aren’t just women’s work.
Yes. I describe my parenting not as attachment parenting (my girls are all at school now), but present parenting. I’m here doing quantity time things with them, like housework, and walking to and from school, and just being with them. It gets a bit frayed at the edges during semester when I’m working part-time, but mostly, I’m just present with them.
Having said that, I’m able to do it because my partner earns a good income. He doesn’t do the present parenting nearly as much, but he tries to. However, he spend six months as the primary caregiver when our eldest was about 1, and he did a lot of the routine care work with all of our girls. And I think it has helped us both to be better parents.
I so like this post.
I couldn’t agree more. It’s the daily feeding/changing/clothing/wiping snotty noses, that is the essence of parenting. Play is extremely important, but anyone can take a kid out to the park and play catch for an hour.
Children need to see their fathers taking a share in the basic care too. The traditional male role of playmate/disciplinarian just means, like you say, that everybody misses out.
My ex partner believes that caring for children is a womans job. He neglected to tell me this untill I was pregnant and financially dependent on him! He said I was ‘weird’ and ‘unnatural’ because I insisted he sometimes put his son to bed. Could go a long way towards explaining why I am now a single mother!
Interesting thoughts! I think there’s something in the idea that you have more of an effective relationship with your child if you’ve done the nappy changes, bathing, settling, etc. I wonder if it is just a matter of time spent, or whether there is something “qualitative” about this as well. For instance, that it’s skin-to-skin contact, or where a power relationship is being established (you will do the things that I want you to do now, etc.), or if it is impressing parental presence within a routine.
Andrew I think it’s about showing kids you know what they need. You know their routine, you know how to cover the basics. When I think about my own Dad, who is fabulous but wasn’t around much, and my friends’ dads, there was definitely a feeling that dads were clueless. There for a good time, or a telling off, but largely peripheral to daily life when we were kids. Obviously for a lot of dads that happens because they’re out working for money to support everyone, and I don’t want to diminish that contribution to families, but it’s work that kids don’t see (or understand in the case of many professions). Kids just see a dad who comes home and doesn’t know where things are, how they work or what the deal is. Like a manager who’s never worked on the shop floor, those dads dont earn a lot of trust.
My husband used to ‘do his share’ by coming in from work and cooking (out of tins) or putting the laundry in (without checking for tissues in pockets), leaving me to sit/walk holding the baby i’d sat/walked holding all day. He never saw that it (a) wasn’t really relieving me at my post, and (b) was avoiding closeness with the baby. Now that baby’s nearly ten, he wonders why he can’t comfort / communicate / control* him as i can. He never got to know him in-depth.
* I don’t mean control, but it alliterated.
Sorry to whinge. :0|
William Sears somewhere says something about part of the father’s role being to help the baby understand that (s)he can be comforted without being fed. What an important life lesson, and one that the mother can’t begin to help the baby learn until quite a lot later in the child’s life. (Of course that point also encourages the fathers whose wish to share the feeding may make them less supportive of breastfeeding.)
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Thank you so much for writing this. I’m one of those lucky Dads who does get to spend time with the kids during the week, and its always been a source of envy and worry to me that the kids seem so much happier when others come and ‘play’ with them than when we’re just getting on with stuff. It’s lovely to be reminded that those routiney times are also so critical to them both (I feel this very strongly becasue my newborn fell seriously ill when I was looking after him, and the wisdom of taking the decision to do so has always worried me).
I would also add, not that anything needs adding to this at all, that they are also the times when my kids (well, my eldest) are most themselves, because it’s the routines of life they first pick up on and start to order their world around: first non-verbally (grabbing a pan to make porridge or a cup for a drink) then verbally (bossing me about and telling me what to do when). However infuriating it is to have a child who now not only wants to choose his nappy, but the nappy bag and the way its hung when changing him, it’s here he’s at his most human, here we at present engage in the little negotitaions and renegotiations that adults have so often with each other, but which come so slowly with children. After a week of upsetting people while doing what is unimportant, it’s lovely to be reminded that some of what I do might matter.
Thank you so much.
Ewan, that is an absolutely beautiful testament to the glory (big word, yeah, i know) of the ‘drudgery’ part of having kids. It’s beautiful in its own right, and the fact that you’re a man saying it adds a little something too.
It also gives me a wonderful picture of your nappy bag arguments! ;0)
I hope the baby’s illness turned out all right in the end.
Glad you enjoyed my post Ewan.
And that’s a really good point about when little ones first start to assert themselves – having a ‘safe’ base from which to launch is very important and so if there are routines in place, they can start to tweak them to their own specifications!
Well said. I have recently come to appreciate the value of time together that is not burdened with the responsibility of being “quality time” … I did not realize there was already quite a bit of literature on “quantity time” dating back to Doonesbury 30 years ago, and even Harvard Magazine more recently. Found this post along the way and I like the point that you make – even if you have limited time together, routine activities are equally if not more valuable than Kodak moments.