Kiddipedia
When it comes to being a dad, I was what you might call ‘a late starter’, as my first son born when I was 44 and my second at 50. In my previous relationship of 17 years with my high school sweetheart, children were off the agenda since she discovered she carried a rare genetic condition that moved from generation to generation, male to female to male etc, so had we conceived a son, chances are he would have had the condition. I was also ambivalent to fatherhood, so, together, we agreed: no children.
That was until I met the woman who would become the mother of our children. As her biological clock ticked away, in 2000 we seriously discussed parenthood, conceived in September 2001, and in late June 2002, our first son was born.
A Deep Insight
I remember about 6 weeks into the pregnancy, while in the shower (I tend to do some of my best thinking there), I was pondering a simple question: what’s this child here to teach me? Quick as a flash, the word that formed in my head was, “Selflessness.”
What a premonition that was!
I remember the week before the birth, a close friend who was already a parent, giving me a good kick up the butt, as she could see I wasn’t being as present as I would need to be, for the birth and beyond. It certainly was a necessary wake-up call. And then it happened. From first contractions to birth, some 6 hours, I became a dad, or as Frederick Buechner commented, “When a child is born, a father is born.”
I know it’s the same for a mother that she suddenly has an actual baby to take care of, but she’s also had 9-months to become acquainted and connected with the life growing in her womb, and I’ve spoken to mothers who felt that birth was a transition from one state of the mother-child relationship, to another, whereas for fathers, the dyad of the couple, becomes a triad, in just a matter of hours.
This is where men can feel literally like the third wheel, as mother and baby continue to connect and bond, due to oxytocin flowing between them, especially if the mother is breastfeeding. Meanwhile, dads can struggle to find their place, emotionally, mentally and physically, so they need the support of others and especially good mates at this important and often tumultuous time.
How It Affected Me
To explain how this dramatically influenced my personal growth and self-discovery, we had a home water-birth supported with two exceptional midwives. Two hours after our son was born, a friend was cooking up a fabulously healthy meal in our kitchen for post-birth nourishment. As I brought my son down the hallway to introduce this new life, the friend looked at the newborn in my arms, touched his forehead to my son’s in a gesture of respect, looked me straight in the eye and remarked, “He is the paper. You are the pen. Write whatever story you wish.”
Wake Up Call!
In that moment, the gravity and immensity of my responsibly for this blank slate, ‘tabula rasa’, hit me like a freight train, as I realised, in the true sense of the word, that I could, indeed, write whatever story I/we wished. I could ‘make’ my son bigoted, racist, homophobic, xenophobic, fear-filled … a myriad of beliefs to carry, that would not serve his humanity or his future. Or, I could demonstrate kindness, care, tenderness, peace, harmony, safety, a respectful home environment, all of which would serve him into his future, without me.
Over the next six weeks, as mother and son continued their bonding journey, I spent many hours between sleeps, in a warmed room, him on my chest, skin-to-skin, even snoozing together, and I’m certain this was the way we bonded, father and son.
Finding My Stride As A Father
As the years progressed, I learned what selflessness really meant, as I chose every opportunity I could to ‘be’ with him. As he grew to school age, I prioritised plays, award nights, holidays, sport, being a ‘dad coach’, all the while revelling in my new role as a dad. It also improved my relationship with my own father, who elected to call himself “Poppy”, and a Poppy he was, doting on his first grandchild.
The requirements to ‘provide and protect’, the personal growth I needed to undertake, and the speed of my personal development, felt like it was on steroids, as each day presented new insights, opportunities and challenges, like standing on an ever-growing responsibility that regularly tested my limits, especially patience!
Six years later, our second child came along, another boy, and although I believed my previous experience would carry me through, I learned quickly that this was not the case. He became another avenue, a stretch, a challenge to grow my edges in his own right as a completely different personality. Anyone who has been a parent will tell you that each child brings their own joys and challenges, even though they’re raised in the same home by the same parents.
I learned that I wasn’t my child’s friend, but their parent. That ‘No’ had to mean ‘No’. That I needed solid boundaries that they could push against, so they could find theirs. That at times they might tell me they hated me. That they, too, would have their growing pains and insecurities, no matter how much I loved them. That they would experience pain and grief, and would know suffering, and I couldn’t protect them from it. That they, and me, are imperfectly human.
The Greatest Gift
I truly believe that our children are our teachers, who mirror back to us the places where me might not be ‘at home’ within ourselves, as this poem wonderfully articulates:
“What we feel we can heal,
what we resist, persists,
and what we suppress,
our children will express.”
As the years have progressed, I’ve come to understand that the greatest gift we can give our children is the one they’ll never receive, and that is, to do our own ‘inner work’ to ensure our children do not inherit our ancestral and often dysfunctional, hand-me-down psychology, or what I call, The Tribal Cycle.
For me, becoming a father was my most urgent impetus to deep self-discovery, to dig deep, find and address my psychological wounds, and heal them for myself … so they wouldn’t have to.
John Broadbent, author of Man Unplugged, is a specialist coach, mentor, retreat creator, and facilitator with nearly 30 years of experience in men’s personal development. He has witnessed first-hand the profound impact societal stereotypes have on boys and men, including his own sons, and leads rite-of-passage programs for men navigating significant life transitions. Find out more at https://manunplugged.com.au/
