A Father Who Cares For His Baby Is Not Just "Helping"
A father who attends to the cries of his baby, rocks him, changes his diapers and teaches him his first words — he isn’t “helping” the mother. He is performing the most wonderful and responsible role of his life: fatherhood. These are undoubtedly the nuances of a language that we often fall into, and which we need to change.
Nowadays, and to our surprise, we still hear many people say classic phrases. “My spouse helps me around the house” or “I help my wife take care of the kids”. It’s as if the tasks and responsibilities of a household and a family were inherited. As if they had a distinctive seal associated to gender, which we haven’t quite shaken from our thought patterns.
“A father is not he who gives his life, a father is he who educates us with love.”
A father figure is just as relevant as a mother. Nonetheless, it’s obvious that the first bond of attachment the newborn makes during its first few months is focused on the maternal figure. However, nowadays, the classic image of the progenitor that was focused on iron authority and the basic sustenance of the home must be invalidated.
Because a father “doesn’t help“. He isn’t someone that goes around the home and alleviates his spouse’s workload from time to time. A father is someone who knows how to be present, who loves, who cares for and accepts the responsibility of that which gives his life meaning: his family.
