What's Even Sexier Than A Man Wanting To Care For a Child?
Universal paid leave.
It is June of 1988. My boyfriend Dan and I are driving from California to the East Coast on I-40, the southern route, in an old BMW that once belonged to his father. We get long stares when we pull into a roadside motel to stay for the night. We're not sure if it's our interraciality that throws them, or the car.
Dan and I met when the school year began the prior September, and we started dating this past January. He painted me a bouquet of roses for Valentine's Day (yes, you read that right) which I found a little extra as we might say today, but also intriguing, like, Woah this guy is different. By April, we were a thing. He would gaze at me with the hint of a wry smile on his lips, and I'd melt.
The school year is now over and he and I are headed east for our very own Meet the Parents moment. We're somewhere in Oklahoma, and it's my turn to drive. We're chatting about one thing and another. Listening to a mixed tape. Dan glances out his side window, looks back over at me, and turns down the knob on the music. "If I ever have kids I think I want to be home with them," he tells me. Then he looks away.
I lose my fucking mind. We've been together for a whole five months already and it feels like it's going to last. I'm thinking If YOU ever have kids? What about US? Don't you mean if WE ever have kids? Is this just some fling you think we're having? Do your long-term plans not include me? Can you not even entertain the hypothetical possibility? I stare straight ahead, hands in a firm ten-two on the wheel. It takes him a few moments to notice that I'm giving him the silent treatment, which only pisses me off even more. I take a passive stance. "I can't believe what you just said." I say. He has no clue what I'm even talking about. Why it's problematic. This turns into a full blown argument about what he said and what he meant and how it makes me feel. I barrel down I-40. At some point we both retreat into silence. Dan looks out his side window again, looks back over at me and says, "I guess I've been having a hard time admitting to myself that this could conceivably last forever."
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Remember that line in Jerry McGuire when Jerry shows up at Dorothy's door and goes through an extensive apology, and she says, "You had me at hello?" Well, that day in June of 1988 in the car with Dan was my "you had me at" moment. Once I knew that he did think there might conceivably be a long-term "us," I was able to put down my armor of defensiveness, which was there to protect my wound of not being enough, and I felt safe again. I was able to finally hear the remarkable thing that this nineteen-year-old dude had just said: If I ever have kids I think I want to be home with them.
After all, it was 1988, a time when women were told we could and should "have it all" yet every woman I saw on the path up ahead of me seemed to be struggling or frazzled or both. Here was a man who wanted to be not a breadwinner but a care-taker. A man who would not only "let" his wife work (a term people used in those days) but who would champion and cherish me being in that role so that he could be a nurturer.
Dan was way ahead of his time. I cannot tell you how he came to be the man who uttered this phrase that day in 1988. That's for him to say. (Although, I will give a shoutout to my mother-in-law!) What I can share is the impact that his words had on me then, and now. And on our kids. And why I believe in my bones that if you're raising kids with someone, how you navigate that tricky dance of who works and who is home and when things may need to be switched up is nobody's business but YOURS.
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Back in the car in 1988, after weathering the unkind eyes of strangers at a nondescript motel in Oklahoma, we get a pizza and make up the old fashioned way. Our long drive east ends with meeting all the parents, which goes fine. I go off to study abroad in England for the entire summer, and Dan woos me fully to him with hand-written love notes mailed daily.
In 1989, we move in together. In 1990, he designs rings for us and proposes to me on bended knee where the Pacific meets the sand in Half Moon Bay, California. In 1992, we marry on the banks of the Hudson River. In 1994, we begin our careers: me in law and him in design.
In 1996, we decide to stop using birth control and try to get pregnant which turns out to be harder than we expect. But in June of 1999, we finally welcome a perfect healthy baby boy, Sawyer, into our arms. By this time, my mom has moved to California to help us raise kids, and I've left my career in law for higher ed administration. I stay home for 12 weeks which is the maximum leave allowed in California at the time, and which I cover financially by combining my "disability leave" (a not-so-accurate term for child birth and recovery) and "sick time" (another problematic phrase).
On the eve of my return to full-time work at Stanford where I am now a senior level administrator, Dan, Sawyer and I go to the beach at Half Moon Bay to mark an ending and a beginning. We've dressed Sawyer in a tiny Stanford sweatshirt, and when Dan poses me and Sawyer for a photo, Sawyer cannot not yet hold his head up completely. Looking at that photo years hence I see my baby staring out at the world, adorable and completely helpless, and also completely trusting us to get it right. The next day I drive off to my full-time job at Stanford, breast pump in tow, with complete confidence that between Dan and my mother, my child is in terrific hands. Our daughter Avery is born in 2001 and I have another 12-week-maximum-allowable leave, then go back to work full-time.
These 22 years later, I can tell you with pride and awe that my man Dan became the stay-at-home Dad he always dreamed of being, while my mother continued to support us two afternoons a week. Dan was the primary parent in nursery school. The one the kids praised on volunteer appreciation day in elementary school. He knew the schedules. Packed most of their lunches. Did most of the pickups and drop offs and dance carpool. He supervised most of the homework. And the playdates.
2002
2019
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Children are a benefit to society. We have a vested interest in them being cared for en route to adulthood and yet most couples are two-income earners, often by choice but also because the cost of living requires it. Yet, America is the only so-called 'developed country' that lacks paid parental leave for parents of newborns. As I look at the resistance to the concept in our country, I can't help but wonder, Where are all the pro life folk when it comes to supporting babies in thriving outside of the womb? Why is there such disdain for the notion that people might need a little support?
As Congress here in 2021 debates an enormous spending package designed to improve the lives of all Americans, I am taken aback that "paid parental leave" is on the brink of being axed simply because one senator – seventy-four-year-old Joe Manchin (D-WV), whose net worth is reportedly $5 Million – refuses to get on board.
And within this context of paid time off to care for children, I'm also saddened by the vitriol some men receive when they take parental leave, such as what happened to Pete Buttigieg. Pundits and radio hosts and blowhards pile on. Tech bro Joe Lonsdale adds fuel to the fire when he tweets that men in important positions who take 6 months leave for a newborn are "losers."
I can't help but think of my incredible Dan in the midst of all of this. Loser? Hardly. And what a gendered and heteronormative mindset Lonsdale represents. "The correct masculine response"? Give me a break. I want to say OK Boomer, but this dude is only thirty-nine! Don't we all know by now that the ability to nurture another human being is not tied to gender? And if men want to be the primary parent, for always or even for a few months, it's no one's business to tell them otherwise.
My sources tell me that there's still time to rescue universal paid leave if enough public pressure ensues. If you're on Twitter, consider this wonderful list of sample tweets and re-tweets that make it super easy to express your opinion. And all of us can contact our members of congress NOW to express our outrage.
Infants ought to be cared for by their parents when it's financially feasible to do so. This is the point of universal paid leave. Neither the state nor employers have any business decreeing which parent is best suited to provide care for infants or for older children for that matter. These are deeply intimate and personal choices that should be left up to families, just as Dan and I chose the path that was right for us.
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The close relationship that Dan has forged with our kids as a result of all of those years spent together is one that many men yearn for, even envy, as I told the reporter who wanted my opinion on what Lonsdale had just said. It's been so good for the kids. And it's good for us, too.
To be frank, I find Dan's decision to be a stay-at-home dad not just useful, helpful, and practical, but incredibly sexy, actually. I'm with a guy who knows how to nurture not just me, but also our children. This is what he wants to do. He is fully himself in this identity. And there is nothing more attractive than a person who is 100% comfortable with who they are, and knows it.
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I'll admit that Dan and I are not the most conventional of couples. We invented a partnership that rejects traditional roles and instead calls upon each of us to do what we're best at while continuing to have the other's back. We've worked hard to meet each other where we are, to see each other clearly and with grace. Every relationship is different, and what works for us will not work for others. Still, I think there are some universal truths to what makes love work over time, no matter who you are. If you're interested in that story please check out my November 14 class titled "Five Things I've Learned About How To Make Love Work" where if all goes well, the amazing father of my children will make a cameo. For more on Dan, you can follow him on Instagram.
If you left a comment on any post before today, I've probably responded. The comments are always thoughtful and fantastic. Please feel welcome to join the conversation. I am particularly heartened by the overwhelming response I've received a recent piece about how over accommodating childhood fears and needs (such as by preparing food for your child to take places) is correlated with anxiety in children. If that resonates, check out that post. I hope you won't feel judged by it–I hope you'll feel seen and supported. You'll get tips for the way forward.
If you're interested in my work more broadly, definitely check out my website and I'm everywhere social media happens @jlythcotthaims.
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*Disclaimer: I am not a physician, psychologist, or counselor, nor am I licensed to offer therapy or medical advice of any kind. What you get from me is a fellow human with a lot of thoughts and opinions based solely on my lived experience. If you are having an emergency or are in crisis please call 911 or the National Suicide Prevention Line (800-273-8255) or text the Crisis Text Line at 741741.
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