Stay-At-Home Dad Apologizes for Underestimating the Job

Michael Cavender, aka Daddy Fishkins, and one of his charges. Photo: DaddyFishkins.com
Michael Cavender, aka Daddy Fishkins, and one of his charges. Photo: DaddyFishkins.com

A first-person essay by an amusingly honest stay-at-home-dad is causing some online buzz: “My Apology to Stay-at-Home Moms” is Michael Cavender’s blow-by-blow account of the joys and drudgeries packed into a typical day taking care of three small children.

“A lot of men who think that they are the ‘breadwinners’ of a family have this notion that mothers who stay at home with the kids all day are, in a way, either not pulling their weight or just sitting around, doing nothing the entire day. I’m a bit guilty of this,” Cavender begins in his essay, published Wednesday on the Huffington Post. While he used to be the one who worked at an office all day, he explains, now that the tables have turned and he’s at home with the kids these days, he’s been set straight. “How wrong was I?” he asks. “Dead wrong.”

Cavender originally posted his essay in April on his own Daddy Fishkins blog (which was down on Thursday afternoon, most likely thanks to a spike in visitors as a result of the media coverage), in which he describes himself as a Cub Scout leader who is “bi-polar, tattooed, handsome, funny, super charming, goofy, super intelligent, and modest.” He may have started out excited by the prospect of rearranging cabinets, cleaning out the fridge, and getting dinner on the table nightly, but he soon realized once he started the unpaid gig that he “never factored in the roadblocks and daily challenges that come along with being at home with the kids all day long.”

To illustrate, he launches into a detailed breakdown of a sample day, comprised of getting his older child off to school and then staying at home with his two toddlers while dealing with diaper changes, tantrums, messes, attempts at cleaning, attempts at working, whining, and (alarmingly copious amounts of) TV time. From 12:30 p.m. to 2 p.m., he notes, he gets to “clean the kitchen and do some laundry” and possibly even “pick up some of the 19,000+ toys and blocks laying on the living room floor.” If he’s extra lucky, he can walk through the living room without stepping on a sharp toy. “It's like walking through a landmine, in a house full of hostile terrorists,” he notes.

Moms have been tweeting their praises since Wednesday, calling it “priceless,” “humorous,” and “a nice article to motivate me during one of my low SAHM days.” Cavender’s understanding perspective is reminiscent of other buzzed-about daddy blogs — one by Matt Walsh, who caught all sorts of flak for his passionate defense of stay-at-home moms, and another by Tom Stocky, in which he shared his angst about returning to work at Facebook after a four-month paternity leave.

All three father tales have underlying tensions about “having it all,” a phrase most often reserved for working moms. But according to a spate of surveys released this month, it shouldn’t be at all surprising. According to one poll conducted by Bright Horizons Family Solutions, nearly half of the 1,005 working parents surveyed feared that child-rearing responsibilities could get them fired, while 42 percent of dads reported that work-life balance is stressful. Care.com, meanwhile, found that 75 percent of the 750 parents polled reported feelingoverwhelmed by the cost of childcare, while the Boston College Center for Work & Family discovered a significant desire among dads to have decent paternity leave. And Pew Survey reported a marked rise in the number of stay-at-home dads in the United States.     

As for Cavender, who could not be reached for an interview (perhaps because he was simultaneously changing a diaper while heating up chicken nuggets), he truly gets both sides now. “Most days I'm too exhausted to go into much detail of how the day went, and sometimes I'm so frustrated I eat dinner on the front porch, alone,” he writes regarding 6 p.m. activities, when his wife is home to join them for a meal. And so, he adds, “I sincerely apologize to any and every woman I've ever said anything negative about, or joked about in regards to being a stay-at-home mom. It's not easy. In fact, it's the hardest job I've ever had.”

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