I’ve lived in several countries, and when I meet someone new I never get asked, “Are you a dad?” I’m queried about what I do for work eons before I’m asked about my diaper duties.
Love this. Fellow girl dad here. Two additional things I have been thinking about for strengthening fatherhood identity: 1) making fatherhood a transformational experience and 2) having circles of dads to reinforce fatherly life. For transformation, viewing fatherhood not as something tacked onto to an already busy life, but something one becomes and that becoming is not an instantaneous process but occurs in tandem with our children. Related to circles of strength/reinforcement spaces for dads to be reinforced for all the daily suck that we get no reinforcement elsewhere. In other words our jobs etc have tons of reinforcement, but our lives with children lack this and for me this key.
I couldn’t agree more. Being a dad is most definitely not an add-on. We need an infinite loop of wonderful dad circles of support and healing and laughing (cuz some days it’s hard!!)
Eric and Jeff, I never really thought of fatherhood as an identity, but boy, you both couldn't be more spot on!
I am a girl dad trying to figure out the best I can how to nurturey daughters to be graceful, passionate, caring people...and I fall short often in feeling as if I am doing this effectively.
Community of other dads has been the biggest driver of my learning...community with people like you who wrote and share online, as well as a small group of dads that I meet with in person regularly and have a text thread with where we talk about fatherhood, husbandhood (is that a word?), as well as praises and needs...
Community has been so essential in my growth as a dad (I have a lot more growing to do)!
By the way, I think feeling like we fall short is the worst feeling. I feel it often too. Selfishly, interviewing other dads has helped a lot with this.
Community is so important and unfortunately rarer than it should be. You’re lucky you’ve found some good ones. Many of the Ambitious Dads I’ve interviewed so far do not have this and I imagine that is true for far too many of us.
Love this. Fellow girl dad here. Two additional things I have been thinking about for strengthening fatherhood identity: 1) making fatherhood a transformational experience and 2) having circles of dads to reinforce fatherly life. For transformation, viewing fatherhood not as something tacked onto to an already busy life, but something one becomes and that becoming is not an instantaneous process but occurs in tandem with our children. Related to circles of strength/reinforcement spaces for dads to be reinforced for all the daily suck that we get no reinforcement elsewhere. In other words our jobs etc have tons of reinforcement, but our lives with children lack this and for me this key.
I couldn’t agree more. Being a dad is most definitely not an add-on. We need an infinite loop of wonderful dad circles of support and healing and laughing (cuz some days it’s hard!!)
Eric and Jeff, I never really thought of fatherhood as an identity, but boy, you both couldn't be more spot on!
I am a girl dad trying to figure out the best I can how to nurturey daughters to be graceful, passionate, caring people...and I fall short often in feeling as if I am doing this effectively.
Community of other dads has been the biggest driver of my learning...community with people like you who wrote and share online, as well as a small group of dads that I meet with in person regularly and have a text thread with where we talk about fatherhood, husbandhood (is that a word?), as well as praises and needs...
Community has been so essential in my growth as a dad (I have a lot more growing to do)!
By the way, I think feeling like we fall short is the worst feeling. I feel it often too. Selfishly, interviewing other dads has helped a lot with this.
Community is so important and unfortunately rarer than it should be. You’re lucky you’ve found some good ones. Many of the Ambitious Dads I’ve interviewed so far do not have this and I imagine that is true for far too many of us.