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Looking back, I wish I’d replied, “Oh, I just left her some frozen meals and a map showing the route to daycare,” to hold a mirror to their ridiculous question. Though doing so might have made light of a serious – and seriously troubling – issue. In actuality, I don’t remember what I said, but the interaction stayed with me for days.
My husband also travels for work, and far more frequently than I do. I am willing to bet no one asks him who has our daughter (it’s assumed the answer is me), or how I will cope with his being away (it’s not easy, but we figure it out). Yet almost every time I leave the house for more than a few hours, I get asked these questions by friends, colleagues and strangers.
These questions are no doubt benign in their intention. But they implicitly presuppose that women, and women alone, do the “important” parenting, while the bumbling (male) father or father-figure burns toast and doesn’t know how to tie a ponytail.
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Although most men and women approach parenting as a shared undertaking, in reality they encounter entrenched barriers to reach that goal. As Georgie Dent of parenting network and childcare advocacy group The Parenthood said when I asked her why are women still encountering these questions, Australia is “wedded” to gender stereotypes, as evidenced by its lack of progress on measures such as the length of legislated paid parental leave compared with other OECD countries.
The latest National Working Families Study, which surveyed 6000 families, set to be released in full this week, found the stress on parents in balancing work and care has increased. Families, and in particular working mothers, are already feeling mixed emotions – guilt, anxiety, inadequacy, ambition, exhaustion. Why make us feel worse by asking where our kids are, or who is looking after them?
In asking these questions, we’re also “gatekeeping” men – and anyone else who could step up on the caregiving front – from taking more responsibility, which reinforces the idea that they can’t, shouldn’t or needn’t, says Marg Rogers, a senior lecturer in early childhood at the University of New England.
“It does men a lot of disservice as well,” she says. “If we cast them in this light as men not being capable of primary caregiving … Then they get away with not doing it, and they miss out.”
University of Melbourne professor of sociology and host of the MissPerceived podcast, Leah Ruppener agrees: “There’s this misperception that dads are bumbling caregivers, and that no one can do it as well as mum.”
It’s true that I am the one who carries more of the mental load in our family. I am the one frantically firing off emails on Sunday night to let daycare know our daughter is on antibiotics, and the one who was up at dawn the day kindergarten applications opened. I do the grocery shopping and cook most of the meals.
But that’s not to say my husband doesn’t do his fair share, including swimming lessons, and alternating carers’ days when our daughter is sick. Why can’t people just assume that although he may do things differently to me, he is more than capable of looking after our daughter for a few days? Besides, he ties a pretty mean ponytail.
Melissa Singer is national fashion editor.
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