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Brendan Wyly is one of an increasing number of men who has traded his tie for a spatula and paperwork for finger paints in order to be a stay-at-home father.
The U.S. Census Bureau reported in 2002 that there were 189,000 children being cared for by stay-at-home fathers, an 18 percent increase from 1994. The bureau also reported that just over 20 percent of preschoolers in married-couple households are cared for by their fathers.
Among many reasons, the increase has been attributed to more women entering the work force, a change in gender roles and a slower economy. Even the entertainment industry has started to recognize the increase with new shows portraying fathers as primary caregivers.
Dads on the Rise
David Eddie, a stay-at-home dad from Canada and author of Housebroken: Confessions of a Stay-at-Home Dad, admits that fathers who are primary caregivers often stand out in a crowd.
"You've probably seen us around: huge, hulking brutes, some of us stubbled, troubled, humbled, baffled and hassled, pushing strollers down the street, shopping carts down the aisle or swings in the park," he wrote in his book.
As gender roles change and an increasing number of women are entering the career world, stay-at-home fathers are becoming more popular.
Wyly, who made the decision to stay at home after his wife, Kristin Grace, took a job at Cornell University, said that living in Ithaca makes it easy to have an "alternative lifestyle."
"Ithaca is a strange place of Appalachia and this progressive community," he said, adding that he is not alone. Wyly and his wife know of other fathers in the area who stay at home with their children while Mom heads off to work each day.
An Alternative to Daycare
Fathering expert and author Armin Brott, written by Time magazine to be "the superdad's superdad," said that economic issues are sometimes the reason for more stay-at-home fathers.
"A lot of couples agree that by the time they finish paying for child care there is no sense in having one of them work," he said.
Harford resident Eric Tennent is saving money on day care by staying at home with his children this summer. After being laid off from his job in February, Tennant started looking for new work, and was temporarily forced to become a stay-at-home father.
Tennent, who says he will resume looking for work when the kids head back to school in the fall, now stays home with his son Greg, 11, and daughter Hannah, 4. Even though he plans to find a job soon, he said that the lack of a second income was worth the extra time spent with his children.
On the other hand, Wyly and his wife always planned to have one parent stay at home when they had a child.
"I was, especially, adamantly committed that she didn't go to day care," he said of Kathryn.
Wyly worked from home for a company based in Boston during Kathryn's first few months of life. Now an independent consultant, he often works in his home office while his daughter plays by herself. Wyly describes his lifestyle as "frugal" and said having one primary income is not a large financial burden on his family.
Brott said that, while many fathers still feel the need to take on the masculine role in the family, it is getting easier to accept stay-at-home fathers.
"I think a generation or two ago the definition of an actively involved father was a guy who worked a lot and brought home a paycheck and that was all that was really required of him, but now that's changed," the "superdad" said.
But according to Eddie, most men still do not think of being a stay-at-home father as a full-time job.
"I cannot personally imagine a man thinking of it as his career, but I'm sure they're out there. It's actually a noble calling," he said.
Eddie, an accomplished author, found it very hard to continue his writing while staying at home with his children.
"I fought and struggled and sometimes felt like a spider in a toilet that had already been flushed to maintain a hold on my writing career," he said.
Ithaca resident Aron Gutman said he is not the typical stay-at-home parent. His wife works part time for the Ithaca City School District while he stays at home full time. Gutman also works out of his home to organize events and concerts at local venues.
The "relatively low cost of living in Ithaca" is why his family can afford for him to stay home, he said.
It Isn't Like Hollywood
Brott said that commercials and magazines have always been biased against fathers. Slogans like "Choosy moms choose Jif" and "Recommended by Mom" give very strong mother messages but forget about the other parent.
"It really shows the children that there's really no sense in having an involved father around," he said.
Even the entertainment industries have jumped on the dad wagon. NBC's Daddio, a show about a father who leaves his job to stay at home with his children, aired for seven months and CBS's Two and a Half Men follows two men's adventures in raising a 10-year-old boy.
Movies have also been putting the spotlight on fathers. Kevin Smith's Jersey Girl is about a widower who is forced to make a choice of either taking a high profile public relations job or taking time out to raise his daughter. Cheaper by the Dozen is about a father's difficulty in raising his children while his wife is on a book tour.
The music industry has also taken a look at the stay-at-home father trend. Lonestar's new song, Mr. Mom, is about a father who loses his job and becomes a stay-at-home dad for about a day before deciding that going out into the working world each day is far easier than staying at home.
"There's bubble gum in the baby's hair, sweet potatoes in my lazy chair. Been crazy all day long, oh been crazy all day long and it's only Monday Mr. Mom," the jingle goes. In the end, the husband expresses appreciation to his wife for the work she's done as a stay-at-home mom previously.
"Now I know how you feel
What I don't know is how you do it," say the lyrics.
Brott said that the media have a long history of portraying fathers negatively.
On The Cosby Show, Bill Cosby was looked at as a father role model. But Brott argued, he was not a positive influence as a father.
"He was an idiot in the show. The kids never regarded him for any sort of advice and his wife treated him as one of the kids," he said.
Eddie agrees that men are portrayed badly in the media and said his book tries to show the reality of the job.
"You're always tempted to paint a picture of how things were," he said. "My job as a writer is to write how things are."
Dads Around the World
The growing trend of stay-at-home fathers is not just in the United States. Places all around the world have started recognizing stay-at-home fathers.
In England, June 14-20, 2004 was declared National Homedad Week to raise awareness of fathers who stay home to care for their children and The Christian Science Monitor reported that The Association of Househusbands in Italy has more than 4,000 members.
International SAHD Meetup Day was May 18, 2004. More than 33 fathers signed up to meet in locations ranging from Sydney, Australia, to Manhattan Beach, Calif., to Kalamazoo, Mich. Slowlane.com also offers advice for stay-at-home fathers and features a list of stay-at-home dad chapters across the country.
What the Children Teach the Dads
As fathers teach their children new and exciting things, children often are teaching the fathers just as much.
Wyly said raising his daughter is like a scientific experiment, and he is learning new things about the psyche every day as she grows up. His wife, who received her PhD at Cornell, doesn't get to learn and experience what he does first hand.
"She's missing out," he said. "She's missing out on a lot."
Eddie agrees that staying home with his children helped him to gain a different perspective on the world. He said that one of the most important things his children have taught him is to slow down.
"Kids prolong your life in a double-edged way," he said. "You kind of think of [life] when you get to be an adult in terms of weeks and months, but it's also broken into days and you need to make as much out of it as you can and enjoy it."
Staying at home with his children also made Eddie a stronger person, he said.
"I felt like I kind of was taken apart like you take apart a car and I had to rebuild myself into a little bit more of an armored tank," he said.
Leaving Work
Eddie said that, while she may have been more suitable to stay at home with the children, his wife didn't have the desire to do so.
"She really likes her job and she wouldn't want to give it up just to be a stay-at-home mom," he said.
Eddie's wife is a local television news anchor in Toronto.
But at times, Eddie also missed his own job. When he returned to work as a television producer after taking care of his children full-time for three or four years, Eddie was relieved.
"It was a real relief to put on nice clothes, go into an office and have something to do all day," he said.
But Eddie also cautions that the working world can be more tedious than staying at home.
"Office politics, I think, are even dumber than sandbox politics," he said.
But Tennent said that his experience at home is also work, just of a different variety.
"Staying home and looking after the kids in the house is not easy work," he said.
Hannah Tennent, while swinging at the Sciencenter, said that she liked having her father at home this summer. She likes going swimming, on hikes and to parks with him. She said her friend's mothers are usually the ones to stay home, but that doesn't seem to matter to her - spending time with her dad is just as important as time with her mom.
"It's good," she said as she begged her father to push her on a swing at the Sciencenter.
Gutman said he enjoys home-based activities like taking care of the house and cooking, but adds that staying at home "can be isolating sometimes."
Gutman doesn't join in on local play groups because the crowd is mostly mothers and he would be the only male.
But Gutman said that the difference between a stay-at-home mother and a stay-at-home father is irrelevant and that it is a lot easier now to have parents share responsibilities in staying home with the children, than falling to social "norms."
"Things are a lot more flexible than just one or the other," he said.
Wyly said that the differences were slight between having his wife stay at home or him. His daughter has received a more "get up and move on with it," attitude under his upbringing and is less gender-defined than if she were raised in a more traditional setting, he said.
As Kathryn requests a closer look at the giant caterpillar in the library and books are piled onto Daddy's lap, Brendan Wyly looks forward to another day of parenting.
"The best part is the common, raw, emotional love of it," he said. "This is not a job. This is life. This is as good as it gets," he said.
