One thing that women own and defend is the fact that they can be moms. That is serious shit, their pride and prehistorical experience on that role is not something you are supposed to mess with.
Anytime a female discovers my role as principal caregiver of 4 babies with the total absence of a female, I feel I have to go through a test. I am not going to denied it, sometimes I put myself in that position and sometimes I can feel the wave of emotions coming my way, it feels like their entire weaponry is pointed at me.
The look of disgust is the less common at least, but most of them are of pity.
I can see how they shake their heads with their eyes. They are too smart to really shake their heads but not enough to hide the real feeling behind their expressions.
I think the real feeling behind is fear and defiance. - Who in hell do you think you are to come and take my place, the role I did so well for thousands of years and nobody else was able to even think about taking?... This is my own nature you are insulting...
And then is when all the unsolicited advice machine starts to shoot my way. And yes they never had triplets but they took care of their cousin's irish twins, and you don't know how hard it gets later, and good for you! you must have your hands full. God BLESS you! (with special accentuation on bless) meaning: ha you don't know how much blessings you are going to need. And the spanish ladies? Oh well that is a whole new post... I don't know if that is because they are hispanic or because we are both latinos or just pure coincidence. But they are specially mean and eye rolling when they learn I am a gay men with children.
I would just hope all these impressions are only in my head and none of these are real but my guts tell me: you are under test, watch out what you do or say. You are walking on sacred territory. Keep walking and don't look back cause they could cut your throat in a blink of an eye.
I think that no matter if your male or female raising children is a wonderful thing and a huge blessing!! Who cares what they think, I have 4 children close in age as well, two of them being multiples and I get the bless your heart you have your hands full, or the omg you need a drink , which I don't find nice at all, they obviously don't know how annoying they sound instead of supportive, also being gay shouldn't define how people should judge others parenting , there is so many heterosexual couples that don't parent as well as gay dads or lesbian moms would, don't let them get to you, I know it's so hard and trust me there's times I have been at tested to the point where I respond with things like "better me than you" or "at least I will have someone that will love me when I'm old" lol I try for them not to get to me even if I fail at that at times, I think you have a beautiful family and your children are obviously happy which says a lot not only about parenting skills but also about the love they receive at home from their daddy's :) keep your head up and I enjoy reading your blog :) keep posting !!
ReplyDeleteI find the politics of parenting so strange. I have two surviving triplets and feel like people assume that I know better how to take care of them than my husband, even though we are both first-time parents. Even my husband assumes that! He defers to my judgment regarding the babies, although there is no other arena in our marriage in which we have unequal say on an important issue. I really don't know why people feel this way. Having been pregnant did not somehow make me a parenting expert. I hope someday I WILL feel like a parenting expert, but if I do, it will be due to spending tons of time with my babies, not because I'm a woman.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, you keep on doing what you are doing...I promise you there are women (like me) who look at you and think you must really know what you are doing!