Quote:
Originally posted by fnaqzna
Good parent or good father... as a father, I can say that one of the more difficult things to come to grips with is the sense of sacrifice. As children and later young men, we males aren't generally conditioned for the type of nurturing that we will be doing later. AFAICT, most men spend the first two decades (or more) caring for just one person, themselves.
It's a rough transition and a lot of fathers buckle under the pressure of it. So yeah... committment, sacrifice... The decision to become a father is easy. Living with the decision can be a challenge.
Now... if we're speaking parenting in general and not father specific, I think consistency is key. Very young children absolutely thrive on structure and an ordered lifestyle.
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Well, I figure that since I'm a man, that if I have children I'd be father if I become a parent. I'm a very affectionate person selectively. And very nuturing, I really watch out for all of my friends and esp. my girlfriend. I know that I'm not ready to have kids yet (
anti fishstick, we have enough to deal with now as it is!), but it is certainly something that I do think about. I'm not going to become a father without having a stable life first (job, living arrangements, steady committed relationship, etc); that's something that is important to me.
My father is a big model for this... he has had steady jobs that pay decently well since I was born, and he's been a big help getting me through school. I know that he's done jobs that he didn't like much and worked very hard on them because of me and I don't think I'll ever be able to make that up to him... I only hope that when I'm settled down and ready to have kids that I can be for my family what he was for me. I only wish that I could have appreciated him more when I was in high school. There's a poem that always hits me deep inside when I read it by Robert Hayden:
Quote:
Those Winter Sundays
Sundays too my father got up early
And put his clothes on in the blueback cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he'd call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,
Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices?
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It is so weird how I've changed since high school... I used to have serious problems with the idea of really having a partner, let alone ever having a kid. Now I think that at some point I could actually be a family man. My values have really changed... I know what you mean about just caring about yourself for those first two decades. I doesn't exactly ring totally true to me, but there is a change that I'm going through. Maybe I'm discovering what it really means to be a man?