Comments on: Fatherhood Made Easy(ish)

By: lionemom

lionemom — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 21:48:13 +0000

Jon,
I have always felt, since I was a teenager, that when you have children it’s a lifetime committment. To clarify that, I believe that you make a committment to support that child for the rest of THEIR life (if you are around, at least.) You don’t know if they will be healthy, disabled, autistic, learning disabled, physically disabled, etc. So in my eyes, you take on the responsibility to provide for that child until they say they don’t need you to do so. Ideally, your kid grows up, moves out and makes a life for themself and no longer relies on you as their primary support (emotionally or financially). But even then, I feel like a person should always be prepared in case “disaster” strikes.

There are a million things that could cause a child to come home to their parents - divorce, bankruptcy, injury, alcohol or drug problems….the list goes on. Excepting a situation where a family has to protect itself from being taken advantage of by a manipulating child, I think that as a parent, I take on the responsibility for that life that I CHOSE to bring into this world. Children don’t ASK to be born - that’s the bottom line.

Accordingly, I also feel that if you do your job well as a parent, your children will feel that THEY OWE YOU for everything you did for them (unless they just have a damned attitude problem and a sense of entitlement!)
IMO, a parent should never feel like their children owe THEM something, be it taking care of them when they are old, getting them expensive holiday gifts…whatever! I just don’t feel that way about parenting.

So I think I understand how you feel. I feel like when you have kids, they take precedence. I WANT to be like that. Which is why I have not yet had children. I am not ready to put myself after everyone else yet.

Never doubt that you are a fantastic husband and father. You clearly try your hardest to be the best that you can at both of those and there is NOTHING better than that!!

By: Annejelynn

Annejelynn — Fri, 29 Sep 2006 01:41:19 +0000

one of my most favorite posts of yours yet

By: nobledesign

nobledesign — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 06:52:34 +0000

Oh my God, Jon. You are a Real Man. Halleluiah! Your choices are the unselfish ones, the dignified ones, the ones that make you a noble, honorable, admirable person. Thank God you are there.

By: breathlss79

breathlss79 — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 09:53:38 +0000

Jon,
While I think it’s really important to consider your family’s needs, I also think that seeing that my parents had interests besides just parenting me taught me something. I may not have liked hiking when I was a kid, but I started to love it as a teenager and now have my own relationship to it. I love it now because partly because it connects me to my parents, to my past. Every parent has to strike a balance, obviously, between the necessary sacrifice and compromise, the kind that even feels good, and being enough of your own person.

By: Creatrix

Creatrix — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 23:14:01 +0000

It means a lot to me to hear about men who really commit to fatherhood. My childhood was a nightmare of abuse at the hands of a child-hating, vicious, sadistic father. I need to hear more from dads like you who actually love their kids. That’s an alien concept to me.

By: Lala

Lala — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 16:22:47 +0000

that was very eloquent, beautiful even. I wish I could mean the same to my husband……

By: Stacey

Stacey — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 02:05:44 +0000

Jon,

Great post. I just wish we didn’t have to call them sacrifices - these choices we make for the enrichment of our families. I gladly put my ‘new clothes’ allowance on the table to pay for a movie with my son or skip the Starbucks on the way to my part-time job just to hear him tell me for the ten millionth time about the ‘funny cartoon he watched’. I especially appreciated your response to Nicole - pointing out that you are INcluding your family and not EXcluding them. Making the CHOICE to start a family means that you make changes. Be they financial or otherwise, they will happen. I can’t fathom telling my son he can’t try something just because it’s something I don’t or didn’t normally do. Who knows? I may find that I like it!
Glad you’re feeling better, too.

By: Onc Doc

Onc Doc — Fri, 08 Sep 2006 20:18:51 +0000

Jon’s post reminded me of all of the calculated risks we take in our lives and how having a family certainly amplifies the consequences of those risks. In my work I see families coping with the losing family members and have had to harden myself a bit.

But there are always the patients who haunt you for some inexplicable reason, the ones who remind you that “you and I are no different other than the fact that you wake up every morning in a different house in the same city and that you happen to have a fatal disease that I do not have.” These are the people who remind me that luck has EVERYTHING to do with it, but that little sacrifices for the sake of our family may just tip the balance in our favor. These are the patients that helped me quit smoking- I just can’t afford to do it anymore.

By: mdwhittaker

mdwhittaker — Fri, 08 Sep 2006 01:12:44 +0000

what a lovely post. i do believe that the online adventures and musings of the family armstrong make me melt into tears more frequently than anything else i read. (that’s meant to compliment you, not to make me sound like a wimp.)

By: uppahand

uppahand — Thu, 07 Sep 2006 21:22:32 +0000

I’ll bet if there were more fathers like you out there, the world would be a happier, more peaceful place. Your daughter is lucky to have you!