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越来越多的美国父亲选择在家带孩子

时间:2015-07-02 01:57来源:互联网 提供网友:nan   字体: [ ]
    (单词翻译:双击或拖选)

More American Fathers Stay Home to Raise Kids 越来越多的美国父亲选择在家带孩子

It’s four o’clock on a Wednesday at a private swimming pool in the Washington, D.C. area.

Two fathers talk about getting their kids ready for a baseball-themed birthday party that evening. Both fathers are trying to get their sons dried, dressed and ready to get in the car.

When I ask one of the fathers if is he is a stay-at-home dad, he quickly answers, “no.” But, then he adds that he did lose his job six weeks ago. He says he is temporarily a stay-at-home Dad.

The other father, RJ Respress, has been a stay-at-home dad for the past 10 years. He has a 10-year-old son named Ben and a 7-year-old daughter named Sophie.

Being a stay-at-home dad now, he says, is much different than it was 10 years ago.

“… and so when I first started staying home, there weren’t a lot of dads around. It wasn’t a thing yet. And being home as a dad at that point you definitely stood out. I stood out. But now, I don’t think it makes a lot of difference, honestly. The stay-at-home dad phenomenon, if you will, I think, everyone seems to know about it. It’s not peculiar1. You see them all the time.”

He is right.

Families in the U.S. are changing.

A new study finds that in the U.S. more than two million fathers are staying home to take care of the house and family. This number is twice that of 25 years ago. In 2012, 16 percent of all parents in the U.S. were stay-at-home dads.

Gretchen Livingston is with the Pew Research Center. She says the number of stay-at-home dads is only going to grow.

She says in the last 25 years there have been changes as far as dads taking on more caregiving responsibilities and mothers taking on more bread-winner responsibilities. She adds that the number of hours a day that dads spend caring for their kids has tripled2 in the past decades. That is a huge change.

The study finds that disability, sickness and unemployment are among the reasons that fathers stay home. But, some fathers do so simply to spend more time with their children.

Like RJ, Blake Humphreys has also been a stay-at-home dad for the past ten years. Blake and his partner have two kids – a 10-year-old son named Aiden and a nine-year-old daughter named Camille.

Blake is a big, muscular3 man.  He is well over six feet tall, with a beard and long hair tucked4 under his baseball cap. He looks like the kind of man that would be hard to frighten. But he says he does feel fearful when he counts the years he has been out of the workforce5.

“I am a stay-at-home dad and I have been a stay-at-home dad for ten years since Aiden was born - a decade. And I know that just saying it sounds scary to me right now.”

Blake became a stay-at-home parent for the same reason many women do – he made less money than his partner.

He thought it would be easy. Then he got advice from an expert on the subject – the woman who raised his partner.

She was a stay-at-home mom in the 1970s. She raised three kids until they left for college. Blake says she also turned her stay-at-home situation into a career. She did philanthropic work and served on several boards in her community.

“I was like, ‘I can do this. Yes, that’s easy.’ Paul’s mom came to me and was like, ‘Are you sure this is what you want to do? This is what it’s like …’ and she laid it on the line about how challenging it was for her in the 70s being a stay-at-home parent.”

The isolation6 of being a stay-at-home dad

When asked about the most difficult part of being a stay-at-home dad, RJ and Blake give the same answer – feeling alone, or isolated7.

Both dads say they miss the interactions with co-workers at their former jobs. RJ worked at an investment bank. And Blake worked at a non-profit organization supporting gay rights.

“Being a stay-at-home dad was a lot harder than what I, what I had in my mind would be like.

“Why”

“It became kind of isolating8 and you just have to know how to manage that.”

In the U.S., there are many places for moms to meet. There are breastfeeding classes and other mothers’ groups that teach everything from music to yoga. Moms are likely to reach out to other moms. Not so with the fathers.

For one, there just aren’t as many stay-at-home dads as stay-at-home moms. And, Blake Humphreys says stay at home mothers seem more willing to make friends with other women in their position.

I just remember when the kids were young and going to the playground. I mean, it be would cliques10. And you would feel left out. All the nannies would be together, all the stay-at-home moms would be together. And you’d see the guys on the outskirts11 looking in. And so, that took some getting used to and some skills to figure out how to manage that social situation.”

RJ remembers taking his children to many activities where the fathers would be on one side of the room and the mothers would be on the other. He says they wouldn’t talk to each other.

“So, it was really funny walking into these shows. The dads would sit on one side of the room and the moms would sit on the other side. It was like a junior high school dance. I thought it was so odd. Why aren’t the men talking to the women?”

Even though the number of stay-at-home fathers is growing in the U.S., such men can still face worries about their self-worth. RJ and Blake both shared their feelings of anxiety.

RJ says, in the beginning, the question “What do you do for a living?” made him especially uneasy12.

“But back when I started and I would tell people I was a stay-at-home parent, there was a lot of anxiety because there’s that initial13 shock from the person receiving that information. Say you’re at a party and they say, “What do you do?” – (be)cause that’s always the first question around here – “what do you do?” And to say, “I’m a stay-at-home dad.’ You may project that in your conversation and say, ‘Oh, that person is judging me. And that’s hard.”

Blake volunteers at his children’s school partly, he says, to battle that isolation and to build up his sense of self-worth. Volunteering became like a part-time job. He says it adds value to his life and his family’s life.

”I think because of being a stay-at-home dad I would almost be overly involved. I would try to turn into a part-time job doing volunteer work because I would see value … that it added value to not only my life to but it added value to my kids’ school life.”

RJ Respress feels the same way. He volunteers at his children’s school, coaches his son’s baseball team and organizes all after-school activities. RJ has recently begun a part-time paying job from home.

But he says his job as stay-at-home dad comes first.

“I do work. And I work -- not full time – but I work from home and I’m able to work part-time and that allows my family the ability to coordinate14 with the kids activities.”

Stay-at-home dads may question their self-worth because they are not bringing money into the family directly, a role traditionally connected to fathers. Blake says he began to question his masculinity15.

“You question your masculinity because you’re not bringing money in. You question the value that you’re adding to the family. Even though if you look at it you’re adding the most value to your family because you are taking care of everything – the daily operations of your family.”

“And school is letting out …”

Going back to work is also a question of economics16 for Blake and his family. If he goes back to work, they will have to pay someone to pick up their kids from school, to drive them to sports and other activities, and to babysit when both parents are at work.

And, just spending time with their children is valuable to both men.

In fact, when RJ told his former co-workers that he would be taking time off from work to look after his newborn son, the reaction was not what he expected.

“When I went and told the people that I was working for -- I worked for an investment bank at the time -- and I went and told them almost all of them -- they were older than me, their kids were older -- they all expressed a feeling of, ‘I wish I could’ve done that.’ They never really saw their kids very much. Most of the older guys saying, ‘Really enjoy that time because you don’t get that time back.’ And that’s huge. Hold on one second … ”

Words in This Story

clique9 – n. a small group of people who spend time together and who are sometimes not friendly to other people

philanthropy – n. the practice of giving money and time to help make life better for other people

laid it on the line idiomatic17 expression : to make something very clear; to be very definite about something

masculine18 – adj. having qualities appropriate to or usually associated with a man : masculinity is the noun

anxious – adj. afraid or nervous especially about what may happen : feeling anxiety

volunteer – n. a person who does work without getting paid to do it: volunteer is also a verb

extracurricular – adj. used to describe extra activities (such as sports) that can be done by the students in a school but that are not part of the regular schedule of classes


点击收听单词发音收听单词发音  

1 peculiar cinyo     
adj.古怪的,异常的;特殊的,特有的
参考例句:
  • He walks in a peculiar fashion.他走路的样子很奇特。
  • He looked at me with a very peculiar expression.他用一种很奇怪的表情看着我。
2 tripled aa9220bf1db5a3dc952638fab4d524ef     
v.(使)增至三倍( triple的过去式和过去分词 )
参考例句:
  • The enemy tripled his strength. 敌军把兵力增加到原来的三倍。 来自《简明英汉词典》
  • He tripled his income. 他使他的收入增加两倍[增至三倍]。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
3 muscular l1qyK     
adj.肌肉发达的,强壮的,(有关)肌(肉)的
参考例句:
  • He is a muscular young man.他是个健壮的年轻人。
  • The player is tall and muscular.那名运动员身高力大。
4 tucked 33959fcef78ea8033c2079d9ef67ff32     
塞进( tuck的过去式和过去分词 ); 翻折; 盖住; 卷起
参考例句:
  • She tucked up her skirt and waded into the river. 她撩起裙子蹚水走进河里。
  • She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ears. 她把一缕散发夹到了耳后。
5 workforce workforce     
n.劳动大军,劳动力
参考例句:
  • A large part of the workforce is employed in agriculture.劳动人口中一大部分受雇于农业。
  • A quarter of the local workforce is unemployed.本地劳动力中有四分之一失业。
6 isolation 7qMzTS     
n.隔离,孤立,分解,分离
参考例句:
  • The millionaire lived in complete isolation from the outside world.这位富翁过着与世隔绝的生活。
  • He retired and lived in relative isolation.他退休后,生活比较孤寂。
7 isolated bqmzTd     
adj.与世隔绝的
参考例句:
  • His bad behaviour was just an isolated incident. 他的不良行为只是个别事件。
  • Patients with the disease should be isolated. 这种病的患者应予以隔离。
8 isolating 44778bf8913bd1ed228a8571456b945b     
adj.孤立的,绝缘的v.使隔离( isolate的现在分词 );将…剔出(以便看清和单独处理);使(某物质、细胞等)分离;使离析
参考例句:
  • Colour filters are not very effective in isolating narrow spectral bands. 一些滤色片不能很有效地分离狭窄的光谱带。 来自辞典例句
  • This became known as the streak method for isolating bacteria. 这个方法以后就称为分离细菌的划线法。 来自辞典例句
9 clique tW0yv     
n.朋党派系,小集团
参考例句:
  • The reactionary ruling clique was torn by internal strife.反动统治集团内部勾心斗角,四分五裂。
  • If the renegade clique of that country were in power,it would have meant serious disaster for the people.如果那个国家的叛徒集团一得势,人民就要遭殃。
10 cliques 5c4ad705fea1aae5fc295ede865b8921     
n.小集团,小圈子,派系( clique的名词复数 )
参考例句:
  • All traitorous persons and cliques came to no good end. 所有的叛徒及叛徒集团都没好下场。 来自《简明英汉词典》
  • They formed cliques and carried arms expansion and war preparations. 他们拉帮结派,扩军备战。 来自互联网
11 outskirts gmDz7W     
n.郊外,郊区
参考例句:
  • Our car broke down on the outskirts of the city.我们的汽车在市郊出了故障。
  • They mostly live on the outskirts of a town.他们大多住在近郊。
12 uneasy 8kDwf     
adj.心神不安的,担心的,令人不安的
参考例句:
  • He feels uneasy today.他今天心里感到不安。
  • She had an uneasy feeling that they were still following her.她有一种他们仍在跟踪她的不安感觉。
13 initial r7sxZ     
adj.最初的,开始的,词首的;n.首字母,姓名的开头字母;vt.标注姓名的首字母于
参考例句:
  • After she'd overcome her initial shyness,she became very friendly.她克服了起初的羞怯之后,变得十分友善。
  • The experiments have given initial results eventually.那些试验总算初见成效了。
14 coordinate oohzt     
adj.同等的,协调的;n.同等者;vt.协作,协调
参考例句:
  • You must coordinate what you said with what you did.你必须使你的言行一致。
  • Maybe we can coordinate the relation of them.或许我们可以调和他们之间的关系。
15 masculinity 0wJyc     
n.男子气慨
参考例句:
  • He felt it was a threat to his masculinity.他觉得这对他的男子气概是一种威胁。
  • Football is a bastion of masculinity in this area.在该地区足球是男子汉的天地。
16 economics grzxZ     
n.经济学,经济情况
参考例句:
  • He is studying economics,which subject is very important.他正在学习经济学,该学科是很重要的。
  • One can't separate politics from economics.不能把政治与经济割裂开来。
17 idiomatic ob8xN     
adj.成语的,符合语言习惯的
参考例句:
  • In our reading we should always be alert for idiomatic expressions.我们在阅读过程中应经常注意惯用法。
  • In his lecture,he bore down on the importance of idiomatic usage in a language.他在演讲中着重强调了语言中习惯用法的重要性。
18 masculine Yw3yd     
adj.男性的,男子的,男子气的
参考例句:
  • She has a rather masculine voice.她的声音有点男性化。
  • The ceremony is exclusively masculine.典礼上清一色的全是男人。
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