It’s been more than 15 years since Matt Schneider and I became at-home dads, knowing that we were headed into the most amazing and challenging years of our lives. We were amateur dads then, and even now, we are far from experts. Fortunately, we are surrounded by a large community of fathers of all stripes in our NYC Dads Group and beyond so we have a network to draw upon for some tips and best practices.

We developed these top 10 tips for stay-at-home dads back in 2011 at the request of HealthyWoman website. We sincerely believe these tips can still be a valuable asset to a parent of any gender who chooses to be the primary caregiver to his or her child.

10 At-Home Parenting Tips for Dads

By stay-at-home dads Lance Somerfeld and Matt Schneider

1. Clear communication with your wife/partner on responsibilities
   It is imperative to discuss expectations and responsibilities early and often regarding all aspects of parenting. Discuss expectations about cooking and home care, contributions to parenting at night and on weekends, managing relatives, etc. Setting clear expectations upfront will reduce conflict and resentment.
2. Find time for yourself
   Now that you are an at-home parent, parenting does not have to consume your entire life. It is extremely important to carve out personal “me” time for yourself to still get together with your friends, hit the gym or pursue a hobby.
3. Take your job seriouslyhttps://citydadsgroup.com/at-home-parenting-isolation/
   As with any other job, you should navigate parenthood with the goal of being the best dad you can be, the same way you strive to succeed at any job.
4. Consider the future
   Being an at-home dad may not be your job forever so it is important to continue networking within your field or area of expertise, staying sharp and keeping up on current events.
5. Connect with other parents
   You are not alone in this journey of parenthood although it may feel isolating at times. In fact, isolation is one of the chief complaints of stay-at-home parents. It’s so important to socialize, network and share your tips and frustrations with other dads. Join a dads group (there are so many of them now) or a local parenting group.
6. Establish a routine
   Having your child(ren) on a consistent schedule (eating, napping, bedtime routine) is important for them so they know what to expect every day and for you so you can confidently plan your day.
7. Get out of the house
   It’s easy to feel overwhelmed at home with housework or parenting responsibilities. Getting fresh air is important for you and your child. Make sure you get out once or twice a day (even during winter) to take a walk with the stroller through a park, run a few errands, enroll in a parent and child class, or hit the local library or bookstore.
8. Seek advice or help
   Let’s face it: many dads don’t like to ask for directions or read the manual. We recommend approaching parenting a little differently — you can’t do it all by yourself. Ask for help when you need it whether it’s hiring a cleaning person to help with housework or calling another parent with a challenge regarding child discipline, potty training or sleep wakings.
9. Embrace the experience
   Sometimes it may be hard to realize, but caring for your child during the first few years of his or her life is a wonderful opportunity. You not only get to observe and witness the major milestones, but, you get to share and enjoy the small wondrous moments that happen every day!
10. Shattering stereotypes and informing society
    At-home dads oftentimes get a bad rap based on negative perceptions in media and society at large. You must inform others, as well as demonstrate through parenting, that fathers can be nurturing, competent and caring.

This at-home parenting tips article was first published 2011 on HealthyWomen. Photo: © Wayhome Studio / Adobe Stock.

The January/February issue of The Atlantic magazine has an interesting piece called “The Daddy Track” that discusses how places with liberal paternity leave policies not only help make men more involved, active fathers but also help women in the workplace and at home.

And, of course, it features quotes from a couple of our NYC Dads Group guys: co-founder Lance Somerfeld and member Rich Gallagher.

The article, by Liza Mundy, notes that such workplace policies are helping change business and individual attitudes about the importance of fatherhood: “The brilliance of “daddy days,” as this solution came to be known, is that rather than feeling stigmatized for taking time off from their jobs, many men now feel stigmatized if they don’t,” she writes.

Just as interesting is a follow-up by the magazine’s senior editor Ta-Nehisi Coates, “Why I’m Against ‘Daddy Days,’” which is less inflammatory than it sounds.

Coates, a father, is not against paternity leave but rather against the need to have separate policies and attitudes for men and women when they should be looked upon as equals whether they are at-home or working parents.

Editor’s Note: Our members continue to express their displeasure with a recent Time magazine article in which the female writer claims at-home husbands are an embarrassment to their wives. In this response, Jason S. Grant rightly notes that there is “no such thing anymore as ‘men’s work’ or ‘women’s work,” just love and support of one’s spouse.

My wife is not ashamed of me. Vivia Chen of Time magazine seems to think she should be.In her recent article, “When Stay-at-Home Husbands are Embarrassing to Their Wives” Ms. Chen asserts that “we simply haven’t evolved to the point where a househusband is considered desirable.”

If Ms. Chen or any successful woman in the business world had put her career on hold to raise their kids while their husband “brought home the bacon” would she take kindly to uninformed critics calling her a mere “housewife?” I don’t think so. She would probably call anyone a “sexist” who dared to minimize the role she plays in her family.

I am not the “little man” at home cooking dinner and burping the baby for my wife to return to after a long day behind a desk. I am not some little secret to keep within the confines of the household. I do all of the things my wife did when I worked in an office to earn a living and she was at home. I am doing the same things that thousands of men do every day in 2013 and 2014.

I don’t do it because it is what a mother or a father does. I do it because I love my son and I want my wife to pursue the career she put on hold to bring our him into the world.

Ms. Chen, please don’t misinterpret my comments here. I am not asking for a parade for doing what women have been doing for centuries past. But don’t look down on me for being a man doing what ignorant other men used to get away with calling “women’s work” just a few decades ago.

Before you judge any man who loves his kids and wants to be at home for them, please remember that we are living in the 21st century. Please don’t refer to a man who stays home with his children as an embarrassment to his working wife or something to hide.

There is no such thing anymore as “men’s work” or “women’s work.” I am very desirable. I am a loving, caring responsible parent and husband. My wife is not embarrassed by me and she isn’t afraid for her peers to know about me. But you should ashamed of yourself.

Vivia Chen wrote an article for Time Magazine titled, “When Stay-at-Home Husbands are Embarrassing to Their Wives.” If it’s anything like my life, I assumed it was when these men sang along to Motown songs in the grocery store.

But no!

Apparently, it’s staying at home and taking care of the kids that’s embarrassing their wives. Driving this point home from the get-go, the Time article’s subhead declares, “We simply haven’t evolved to the point where a househusband is considered desirable.”

Ouch.

I’m pretty sure this doesn’t apply to my situation. You see, chicks dig me. Well, my wife does anyway. She has never shied away from telling people what I do. She brags about how great I am with the kids and hardly ever mentions how terrible I am at keeping the house clean. She’s sweet like that. She has always told anyone who thinks staying home with the kids isn’t work that they can go shove it. Even when it’s me, with my own moments of doubt. She has, without question, been my biggest supporter and a huge proponent of our decision.

Our story is our own, though it may share some similarities to others. My wife was making more money than me when I was let go from a job I hated. Before that, I was an attorney (though certainly not like the ladies in Ms. Chen’s Time article, making a mil a year). My wife makes a good income, but also nowhere close to those attorneys or the Wall Street women of the New York Times article. But having someone stay home with the kids was important to us and, luckily, our circumstances made the decision an easy one. Even had things been different, I think we would have ended up in the same place. With me staying at home and her comforted by the fact that the man she loves is caring for the kids she loves.

The so-called rise of the stay-at-dome dads has been in the news for a few years now. Ms. Chen’s article was written in response to a New York Times piece. But there have been countless others online, in print, and on TV. My family and I were actually featured in one of these segments on Good Morning America two years ago.

But I’ve never thought of us as that unusual or newsworthy. Even in the last year, when I started writing my own dad blog, I’ve never been anywhere near the forefront of the “Stay-at-home Dad Movement.” I don’t disagree with the guys who get upset about the media portrayal of dads or about the exclusion of dads when products market just to moms, but it also doesn’t bother me all that much. I didn’t stay home to make a statement. I stayed home because it made sense for my family. My wife and I knew we wanted a parent to be the primary role model for our children and we are willing to make the sacrifices for that to happen. I’m grateful to be with my kids every day, to teach them, love them, and nurture them.

If staying at home with the kids embarrassed my wife and if it was something she couldn’t talk about with her co-workers and friends, then I would know I was failing her and not living up to my end of the marital bargain. In another time, maybe the most important part of my husbandly duties would be to bring home the bacon so my little wifey could fry it up. I don’t think anyone expects that anymore. Because it’s outdated and dumb. Marriage is a partnership – we work together to raise a happy and healthy family, and we do it with love and respect for each other.

Many families have two working parents. Like the women in the recent articles, my wife would not be able to work the hours her job requires if I did not stay home. We’re lucky this possibility is open to us.

Lucky and thankful, but definitely not embarrassed.

A version of this first appeared on Amateur Idiot/Professional Dad.

Fatherhood fundamentally shifted not only in my life – what with increased responsibility, crazy sleep/eat/nap schedules and mountains of diapers – but what I wanted from life.

That made me the target reader for a recent Esquire magazine article, “Why Men Still Can’t Have It All,” about the evolving role shifts between moms and dads pursuing career and family.

My wife and I have a dual-income family with a less defined, non-traditional role system. It’s jury-rigged but quite functional. Most days. Like many family’s juggling multiple balls at all times, we tend to make it up as we go along.

Before I was married and had kids, I focused on my career. I job-jumped all over the country for higher salaries and bigger titles. I attended grad school on the weekends after working 80 hours. I loved every second of it. Then I hit a wall and flamed out quickly, struggling with one big question: “What is the point of all this work?” I wasn’t even 30, yet midlife crisis was in full bloom.

I took a hiatus from the corporate grind and opened a martial arts school – one of the best things I ever did. It was surprisingly hard but amazingly rewarding work though I knew it was not a “forever” thing for me. Once married, having met my wife at my school, I re-entered corporate America and all the pitfalls that accompany it because I thought its more structured schedule eventually would be more conducive to family life even though kids were a distant glimmer.

My first true effort at life-changing priorities came within 6 months of my first daughter’s birth. We moved to New York to eliminate my 5-hour round trip work commute from the suburbs of Philadelphia. The driving force – me wanting to be there “more” for my daughter. I was not then (nor am I now) judging dads who work long days, tuck their kids into bed then don’t see them again until the following night. That life just wasn’t what I wanted.

I wanted to be a father who can play a more active, some may say more maternal, role in the everyday lives of his children. Play dates, school pick-ups, homework, bathing, feeding, storytelling and the list goes one. I saw no reason why, as a father, I couldn’t have every bit the relationship to my kids that traditionally a mother would have.

This is a reality even though I earn about 80% of the income in our dual-income family. Like many people these days, we need every little bit to be able to provide the futures we want for our kids. With the heavier financial burden on my shoulders, I typical work more hours than my wife. However, I keep an extremely flexible work schedule so I never miss the big stuff (or even much of the little stuff) while providing for my family.

Still, not a day goes by that my heart doesn’t rip in two as my 1-year old walks me to the door saying “dada” as she waves goodbye, or my 4-year old says “You have to work AGAIN!” While Esquire suggests, as many have before, that women have a harder time getting ahead in their careers because they have a far more difficult time leaving their family at home to go to work than men possibly due to biological/hormonal differences, I beg to differ. I am not a woman, but I feel the hurt and tremendous guilt.

This, as Esquire points out, is the classic “Cat’s in the Cradle” syndrome that many fathers feel. It repeats in my head throughout every work day, stemming from a desire to be with my kids – possibly the coolest little girls I have ever known. It’s an exhausting joy to be with them.

As a result, I have passed on several opportunities for bigger money and job titles over the years. I don’t regret any of them. I don’t want that anymore and I don’t view that as a sacrifice. That part of me is different now. I sometimes wonder what people who knew the old me think of what I have become. I’m sure it looks odd, or maybe even sad, to some. I’d like to think that they would understand that I wouldn’t trade my life for anything and couldn’t be happier even during the most trying (but fleeting) times when I want toss my 4-year-old out a window.

The notion of having it “all” is really an exercise in perception. The high-powered job that demands 100-hour work weeks and “Father of the Year” may, in fact, be mutually exclusive. Or perhaps it’s just a secret recipe that I have yet to uncover. When you think about it, does anyone really want “all” that? It’s exhausting just thinking about it. Most of us are somewhere in the middle. I’d like to think that my slide on the scale inches toward active fatherhood.

As I sit with my daughter literally hanging on my head as I try to type, I take a minute to revel in my good fortune. I’ll have to differ with Esquire and say, yes, in fact I do have it all.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to eat another piece of cake.

Dads are starting to whisper more loudly than ever about struggling to strike a balance between work and family obligations that mothers have been talking about for years. We know this because as we are meeting up each week with groups of dads in our community – juggling career, family, and personal time – is a frequent topic of discussion.  In fact, work-life balance is a common concern with most expectant fathers that participate in our weekly Boot Camp for New Dad Workshops.  These expectant dads are asking important questions: Do other dads move to a more flexible schedule when they have children?  What are some best practices that other dads use to carve out time with their little ones during the work week?  I plan to take two weeks off when the baby is born, is that enough time? How much time should I be taking off from work for my first child? What do other dads do about reducing travel when they start a family?

Not surprisingly, increased numbers of research studies (mentioned below) are focusing on family and career struggles as well as a microscope on dads as they fit into the equation.  We try to highlight some of the current research on this site, but continually reference The Families and Work Institute national study. Some interesting findings:

• The Families and Work Institute did a national study of the workforce in 2008 and found that for the first time in history, more men reported experiencing work-life conflict than women–60 percent versus 47 percent. 
• fathers average three more hours of work per week than their childless male counterparts!
• Men with working wives felt more stress than those with a stay-at-home partner.

This week, Redbook published a relevant article, “The New Daddy Guilt,” that is based on their recent POLL, phone interviews, and drawing upon the mounds of recent research about family and work balance:

“He works! He nurtures! He’s exhausted. But today’s working dads still don’t feel they’re doing enough, well enough. Sound familiar, moms?… Dads now teeter on the tightrope of work and family obligations that moms have been walking for decades, and it’s stressing them out….In interview after interview, fathers said the same thing: If you’re not disappointing the boss, you’re disappointing the other boss–the one who just lost a tooth.”

Christopher Helman, a 38-year-old journalist from Houston, works from home, divides up parenting tasks with his wife–and clears time for fun: “Some days I’ll drop everything to play or ride bikes, and I’ll get back on my laptop after they go to bed. I remember exactly zero times that my dad or stepdad played with me on a weekday afternoon, and I think I’m closer to my kids because of that.”

Congratulations to Redbook, a magazine that has typically turned me off or sent me running in the other direction in the past with so much of its content written for mom.

With this piece, it provides such an engaging piece about the modern dad and those that love us. We hope to see more frequent articles and content geared for both involved parents in the home! 

Photo for Time Out Kids by Caroline Voagen Nelson

Time Out Kids: New York has a blogger series and we’re excited about the opportunity to share our guest blog post over there today!  Over the weekend, Lance and his family were fortunate to have an exclusive behind-the scenes tour of Symphony Space on the Upper West Side of Manhattan as well as be treated to an awesome glow-in-the dark production of Treasured Stories of Eric Carle by the award-winning Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia.  We look forward to checking out more of the Symphony Space “Just Kidding” family programs!

To read the entire post and visual slide show, click here: NYC Dads Group gives us the scoop on his family’s behind-the-scenes tour of Symphony Space. or read below:

One of my favorite activities as a parent is reading books with my son, Jake, 4. I get incredibly animated, use lots of silly voices and sound effects, and try my best to make the stories to come to life. Consequently, we have an extensive children’s library at home and read together frequently. Two of our favorites are classics by Eric Carle—The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?—so, it’s no surprise that our family was giddy with excitement last weekend when the award-winning Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia brought its epic production Treasured Stories by Eric Carle to the Peter Jay Sharp Theater at Symphony Space on the Upper West Side.

Our family adventure started with an exclusive behind-the scenes tour of Symphony Space—a modern, sleek performing arts facility that was definitely designed with families in mind. As we traversed the different locations in the intimate theater, it was apparent that every seat in Symphony Space is a good one. Our first stop on the whirlwind tour included a discussion with the light technician for the theater. My son loves cause-effect relationships, so of course he enjoyed operating the theater’s light-control panel while sliding the various switches and changing the colors onstage, as well as turning spot lights on and off. Next stop: the stage!

On tage, we got to meet the “hungry caterpillar,” “brown bear” and members of the Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia, who patiently answered the exhausting interrogation by my preschooler. My son fired off countless questions about the texture of the animals, the use of colors, how the animals would talk, how the caterpillar moved, why the caterpillar wasn’t “that big,” how things were connected and why the lightbulbs onstage were purple (shhhhh…we learned that the performance was going to be glow-in the dark!).

Our final stop on the tour was lunch in the Thalia Cafe, located in the lower level of Symphony Space. Rather than take the steps like the rest of the people on the tour, our son opted for a brief detour—a ride in the elevator. This was another highlight as our son is obsessed with elevators and escalators. After taking the elevator up and down several times (our son was checking to make sure it worked properly. Disclosure: It works perfectly well), we joined the others for a kid-friendly lunch. With our stomachs satisfied, we were ready for the show.

We quickly found our seats. One important thing to note was the significant number of booster seats available at the theater entrance, so that every child, our son included, could be seated in a position where they could see above the adults. A few moments later, the lights went out and our family was taken on a mesmerizing journey into the world of Eric Carle. The glow-in-the dark production was clever, engaging, and captured the eyes and ears of my little guy for the entire show. It was a wonderful experience to see how three Eric Carle classic stories could be brought to life in such a creative way.

To our delight, after the performance, it was almost as if the Wizard of Oz stepped out from behind the curtain. The talented team from the Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia spoiled the audience and did something that a good magician never does. They took questions from the children in the audience and revealed some of the tricks they used during the performance. We took these treasured secrets with us, as we are still flying high from our experience at Symphony Space. We look forward to creating future family memories with the Symphony Space “Just Kidding” family programs.

L

Special thanks to Rory at Time Out Kids and talented photographer Caroline Voagen Nelson.