Stay-at-Home Dads Forge New Identities, Roles

More Fathers Than Ever Are Primary Caregivers

It could have been any play group in the Washington area, except for the diaper bags. No Vera Bradley flowers, no pastel polka dots. The bags lying around Matt Vossler's Rockville living room Tuesday afternoon were dark Eddie Bauer canvas. One was red but, as its owner quickly pointed out, "very metrosexual."

"Potty training was a lot of angst for me," Vossler, 43, a onetime paralegal, told the group.

"Bottle feeding was my angst," said Matt Trebon, 36, a former Capitol Hill staffer, as his 3-year-old daughter nuzzled his side.

"And trying to get them to eat well," Vossler continued, bringing up his 6-year-old. "Martin is all carbs."

"Eight days -- no diapers!" Trebon suddenly announced, thrusting his fists into the air.

With their wives as breadwinners, the fathers are part of a small but growing group of men who are quitting or retooling their careers to stay home with their children.

This from the Washington Post.

‘Momblocked’ mothers feel edged out by dads

Caregivers can clash

when stay-at-home fathers step up their game

Two months after giving birth to her daughter, Jen McClure-Metz received a phenomenal job offer. If she wanted to become a producer on a hit television show, she’d have to start in a month.

McClure-Metz and her husband talked it over and made the same decision many families are making: Dad would stay home full time and take care of their daughter.

“While I never thought that I would end up staying home with Sarah, I knew that I was fully capable of doing so,” says Brian Metz, McClure-Metz’s husband.

But almost four years into it, McClure-Metz began to feel her husband was maybe too capable. He had become more competent and assertive in the child-care arena and it showed in small ways. Metz took over when his wife struggled with the car seat, or put the kibosh on plans when he thought their daughter needed down time.

“Basically, he was the parent in charge and I often felt trumped,” says McClure-Metz.
More and more dads like Metz have become so confident in taking care of the kids that moms can feel edged out, or "momblocked."

Dr. Craig Garfield, a pediatrician and researcher at Chicago's Northwestern University who specializes in the role of men in child-rearing, says it's still the norm for moms to act as the gatekeepers to fathers' involvement with their kids. “I’d still say it would be a unique father who is so confident in his approach to parenting as to block his partner,” Garfield says.

But the growing number of primary-care dads could be reversing this notion.

This from MSNBC, Art by Kim Carney.