Although the actual date has been lost in the haze of 4:30
AM wake-ups, vomit avoidance strategies, and small-scale railroad construction,
I believe that this week will mark the end of my fourth year as a Stay-At-Home
Dad. This morning I found myself perusing old entries in my journal and
stumbled across a date which was heavily underlined, 6/8/09. A few months after
the birth of our first son I found myself in a difficult employment situation.
Two years earlier I had left what once was a near dream job to branch out into
something completely new. I found myself working for one of the kindest and
most patient men I have ever had the honor to meet. He was exceedingly gracious
to this young man who was as out-of-depth as he was brash and arrogant. He led
our organization with a quiet humility that I would only truly appreciate years
later. Unfortunately, there were others in the organization seemingly bent on
watching it all burn. Trapped between bottomless patience and endless
viciousness, I writhed like a caged animal with no way out. It was a time of
spiritual crisis where I simultaneously begged God for both victory and escape.
For months I struggled and squirmed and whined until one day, 6/8/09, when I
made the following journal entry:
Today is the day. I have been set free. This is not my
struggle. It is not my fight. There is something else. Out There.
Little did I know that I was only two months, and an entire
world, away from a life of diapers and bottles. If I had even a suspicion, I
certainly had no idea how distant “Out There” truly was or how far I
would be stretched beyond any previous understanding or experience. How far
beyond “hard” I was about to travel. So, in August of 2009 I left the “working”
world to be a Dad, only a Dad.
Our culture is trapped in a transition between two lies
about parental roles. The first lie says that a man’s worth is tied up in the
size of his paycheck, his ability to provide for his family. A woman is defined
by her ability to bear and raise children. I had never been paid exceedingly
well for any of my previous work, but the inability to quantify my full-time
occupation with a number haunted me for months. It left the nagging question of
what defines a man. Had I simply become a woman with a penis?
My little internal struggle was interrupted by a much more
important crisis. Our eldest son, Jacob, was born with an enlarged left kidney.
As we later learned, the ureter on that side was kinked where it left the
kidney, preventing urine from flowing into his bladder. The backlog of urine
would cause the kidney to swell until the pressure became great enough to push
past the kink. As Jacob grew it was only a matter of time until the swelling
became great enough to cause him pain. That time came when he turned one. Jacob
would wake up in the middle of the night screaming with pain. There was nothing
we could do to help the poor tiny child as his back arched in agony until the
urine pressed past the obstruction. Jacob was scheduled for surgery, which went
well, but there were problems with his recovery which led to the most difficult
and perhaps most enlightening week of my life. Months later I wrote my
thoughts on the experience:
Back in March I was driving home from the hospital at
midnight. Nicole was at home with Jacob. His surgery earlier in the week to
clear a blocked kidney hadn’t gone well. Urine had been leaking out of a hole
in his side for days. The bags we had been given to collect the urine didn’t
work – kept falling off. Thus the midnight trip for more supplies. I was
exhausted, stressed, angry, and knew my son was headed for another surgery if
he didn’t stop pissing out of his side. But then I realized something. This
“family thing” is the greatest thing I’ve ever done. Nicole and I were given
this challenge because we can handle it. To set aside yourself to care for a
child who needs help, to be strong and love my wife while she loves and is
strong for me is a gift more valuable than all the gold in all the world. This
is why we say that God is good. 8/30/10
I had found my response to the first lie. Manliness isn’t
found in a paycheck. It lies in the midst of the struggle to set aside
yourself, abandon your own wants, desires, even hopes, to try your very best to
be a blessing in the life of another person. Manliness lies in the broken and
bloodied body of a man nailed to a cross for no crime other than love. In that
one horrible week I had found a picture of manhood which I could pursue as a
Stay-At-Home Dad. Am I just a woman with a penis? Maybe. But there is no shame
in it. If this is the path I am called to travel, the cross to which I will be
nailed, than it is the most manly of things to travel that road and hang on
that cross.
The second lie our culture tells us is that whether man or
woman, you can have it all. Being a parent doesn’t mean sacrificing careers, or
even hobbies. You can pursue your dreams while outsourcing child care and still
be a wonderful parent. Recognizing the realities of time and space reveals this
lie as impossible. We are given a finite, unknown, amount of time in this life
and every moment we choose to spend in one location is a moment we cannot spend
in another. The basic reality is obvious, but I still fell for the lie.
I’m blessed with a mother who gives each of her children one
day of free childcare every week. When I first began staying home I chose to
use that day to pursue my master’s degree. With a baby who napped well, I was
able to attend school almost full-time. Then the second son came. Caleb is a
blessing sometimes disguised as a crazed chimpanzee. School slowed to a trickle
and missed opportunities began to accumulate, and sting. Potential publications
remained potential. Employment offers were turned down. Fascinating volunteer
opportunities had to be ignored. My beloved bicycle sat in the garage,
neglected. Anger and resentment began to build. It seemed so unfair that I
sacrificed so much while friends went on to achieve success and my wife got to
have a career. I loved those two little boys very much. But on many days I
would have traded them for a career if I could have.
One day, obsessed with myself, I had a chance encounter with
a man a Wal-Mart, a man who can only be described as an angel. In a few short
moments of interaction he changed my entire perspective. I came to realize that
this job I do means giving up any ambition I have of doing anything for myself.
This goes far beyond surrendering my desire to have it all. It means
surrendering even my expectation to plan my day when I wake up in the morning.
It means that, to soothe an awakened child, I must set aside this writing right
now . . . and not take it up again for hours, or days, or years, or perhaps
leave it unfinished forever. And this is not only acceptable, it is the job and
the job is exceedingly good.
It sounds insane, a grown man abandoning employment and
ambition in order to change diapers, a lot of diapers, but it remains the
greatest thing I have ever done. The opportunity to set aside whatever dreams I
once had to allow my wife to pursue her own dreams is an opportunity to love
which I had never imagined possible. The chance to raise three little boys, our
third came just last month, is a challenge imbued with a goodness and depth of
meaning beyond any rigor I could have anticipated. It is a challenge that is
not about me, yet defines me. It is the role I was made for but never imagined.
How do you raise a man to love both others and the truth? How do you teach him
to be respectful but not deferential? How do you train him to be chivalrous but
not condescending? And the biggest question, will I dare for baby #4 without
hanging myself with my shoelaces? I can’t wait to find out.
