Working Too Hard And Being A Parent. A Father's Struggle

[Dimi]

haha Well not me of course. Got ways to go before I decide to even become one.

Anyways, I was bored and I stumbled across this article that caught my interest when I was searching around the house. Its called "Double Daddy" and its talks about the struggle of fathers wanting to provide for their family financially but its costing them the time they want to spend with their kids. But at the same time they want to spend time with their kids but he might worry about his family's income. Follow? Here's a bit of the article....

They struggle between the responsibilities of work and the needs of their families. They have demanding jobs; they have children.

In some cases, they go to work before dawn, or take work home.

They race home to make it in time for their child's game, concert, or play.

They worry that a business trip might take them awat on their son's or daughter's birthday.

And surprise: they're men.

The Super Mom syndrome has jumped genders. Now it's working men who also want to be great fathers.

What has changed to make the working dad's life more stressful?

More is expected of fathers at home these days-and they expect more of themselves-but the demands of the workplace have, if anything, increased in recent years.

The phenomenon of "daddy stress"-as Forbes magazine dubbed it in a recent cover story-affects men from the executive office to the rank and file, and while a growing number of single dads may feel it most, married fathers are hardly immune.

"It's a familiar theme to women and not to men, and not to men's employers," said Linda Dunlap, chairwoman of the psychology department at Martist College in Poughpkeepsie, N.Y., and an expert on families. "These men are sayin, 'I'm working my tail off to get ahead, for the most part of the family, but I'm not spending time with my family. This doesn't make sense.'"

Ryan Streeter, a research fellow in the Welfare Policy Center at Hudson Insititute in Indianapolis, calls the growing trend of men examining their roles as fathers "a national movement."

"There's been an increasing amount of literature, events, commercials, and public service announcements around the country in the last five years that have targeted the need for fathers to be engaged in their children's lives," Streeter said. "A group of largely men said it's time to take responsibility for their children not only economically, but emotionally and spiritually. Ther'es a nation consciousness around this matter."

The next step has to be a shift in the workplace mentality that says it's OK for a woman to take time off to stay home with a sick child or attend a child's football game, but it's not OK for a dad to do the same thing.

"It's popular to say there needs to be workplace flexibility for men," Steeter said, "but in genral, corporations have the expectation for men to put business over family."

So my questions on the article are this...

1) Do you agree with what the message this article is trying to put out about fathers?

2) Do you believe that men should put work over family? Why or why not?

3) Do you think that for parents, should there be equal parenting roles or should one role be higher then the other meaning for one to care for their children while the other one works and tries to earn the income?