Do you think single parents have to step out of traditional gender roles more often than married parents?
14 December 2009 13 Responses
A Parent asks, Not to say that either parent is held to specifically gender roles in the household, but do you think that a single parent who plays both mom and dad has to make more of an effort to do things generally taken over by the other parent?
For example, a father making crafts with his kids or a mother roughhousing with her kids.
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Yes, definitely. I’ve been a single parent and that meant taking on the role of pretty much everything.
Now that I’m married I’m not stuck with the gross chores anymore. :p
If they want balance, they sure do.
I cringe at the thought of any household, single-parent or not, that is purely traditionally feminine or masculine.
an example: if cooking/ cleaning are traditionally female, but a single dad was raising son(s), who then would do the cooking ?
yea definantly
i also think sometimes step-parents have to step in a lot too
pls answer
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20091103141009AAKmf94
I do, I chase my daughter around the house so much I slammed into the wall the other day. I got a nice bruise on my leg. She can also bat pretty good.
Most definitely. As Judo said, there still has to be balance. Single parents take on quite a bit more as far as the balancing act goes.
My husband is predominately the masculine influence. He has his feminine moments though where he is very tender with the kids and he also takes over some of my roles of cooking, cleaning and such.
I am predominately the feminine influence. I also have my “rough” moments as well to command the same authority as my husband does and I rough around with the kids and play in the dirt
I think sunshine and Judo summed it up best so I have nothing further to add.
i don’t necessarily think so…my daughter’s father will still get down on the floor and play dolls with her and all that other girly stuff. as i definitely still rough house with my son. we both pretty much do everything the other does as some point or another. but they are still little. i’m sure it is different with dad’s when their daughters get older and start going through puberty. where most dads would back off and let mom take over, a single dad can’t. situations like that…
I imagine that’s probably “normally” the case.
I don’t’ think that would apply in our household though…I’ve never been one to stick to the traditional gender roles as a general rule…parenting aside.
I’m the mommy in our house….but in our house…mommy does the grilling and the welding (ya that’s right I said welding) as well as the baking and the bed making…
Daddy’s been known to kick asss at the laundry and the vacuuming and he makes a mean chocolate cream pie.
In a household where you have both parents working full time outside the home…traditional gender roles…kinda have to go out the window and everybody has to do whatever has to happen to keep the family running and happy…
I don’t think parenting is any different.
Yes I do.
both my husband and i do everything with our son. even tho i am married i do plenty of “roughhousing” and he does does things like plant flowers with our son.
Well, naturally, Mothers are the caring ones who look after the kids. Where as Fathers are the playful ones, and not as attentive as the Mom. (Not to say that guys are lazy, this is just a generalization.)
The roles that you are speaking of go back to primitive instincts. Females raise their young, while the Males provide for them. Like how most animals do it.
Women have a hormone in them (that Men don’t have as much of usually) that makes us caring, in order to be a good Mom. You’ve seen those stories where like, a kitten’s Mom dies, and it gets nursed by a dog, well, it is the strive to be the best Mother that you can be. Women were created to be mothers.
Men, on the other hand, generally have more testosterone than us females do, so they don’t have the same type of nurturing instinct like us girls do. In the wild, male animals strive to be the strongest, and most dominate around.
So when you’re a single parent, you now have to play both the caring Mom, and the strong Dad. So yes, single parents would probably step out of their natural roles and instincts to be the best parent that they could be! (Goes back to the whole, instinct thing again!)
Well, not so much step out of a role, but you have to pretty much be both at once. I am a single mom, and I have to be both parents. it was really difficult at first (still can be at times) but you just adapt, and do what needs to be done.
Both parents can do male and female activities. My dad didn’t like to camp but my mom loved it, so she always took us camping. That’s doesn’t mean I saw her as a father-figure.
If a parent is absent, I would advice finding a mature person to fill in that roll for your child. Usually it’s a relative like and aunt/uncle or grandparent.
Yes, for sure. Right now, although we’re fairly conservative, we don’t hold each other to strict gender roles – I do most of the cooking because I love to cook, and frankly, I’m the better cook. But he does laundry sometimes and I change the oil in the car sometimes.
But there are some things that my husband will probably handle – sex and puberty talks for our sons (none yet, but possibly one soon!). I think it would be easier and less embarrassing to a boy to have his father or a father figure be the one to explain things like erections and wet dreams, but if something happened to my husband, I would have to be the one to do that. Likewise, my husband would have to do the same for our daughters if something happened to me.
Also, my husband would have to learn how to french braid : ).
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