I’ve recently realized that I took this blog and ran with it without ever taking the time to define selfish. Also, while I’ve offered some advice on how to combat selfish leanings, I think that creating self-awareness is some of the best medicine I can offer, and I’ve chosen to do this in an easy-to-remember list form. This list will be kind of all over the place as I’ve been thinking about my own selfishness for some time now and I’ve been able to decipher just how deep it runs—basically into every aspect of my life. I’ve broken this into 4 categories and, after each, I’ll offer some advice about spinning these behaviors into positive behaviors, making the selfish father involved and participatory rather than distant and absent.
First, there are the obvious signs of selfishness.
The selfish father may
1. Become angry when he must give up time to help his wife or kids.
2. Neglect chores to watch television or sit on the computer.
3. Not go to gatherings with his wife and kids.
4. Choose what the family does, versus letting it be a collaborative choice.
5. Talk/browse on the phone/laptop during family time.
6. Use childcare resources more than necessary.
7. Look for unneeded things to do.
8. Sleep/lounge longer than necessary.
9. Not take the time to fix wear and tear on the household.
10. Spend too much time with friends.
The Onion had a great article about how many of us think we have no time. It’s funny and satirical, but, like the Onion tends to be, quite accurate. Time is precious, I’ve talked about this before, but the biggest thing that the selfish father has to realize is that there’s always a way to prioritize time correctly and eliminate unneeded chrono-clutter. Eliminating this clutter ensures the selfish father can spend an adequate amount of time with his children, and it also ensures that his significant other doesn’t feel burdened by undone housework. I’ll get to how the selfish father controls his environment in the third category, but this category has everything to do with how the selfish father attempts to make his environment how it was before he had kids or before he was married using negative emotions, unneeded responsibilities, and distractions.
Next, this category is the longest, for it includes more specific actions that affect the wellbeing and growth of children; things that stem from the above behaviors.
The selfish father may
11. Not encourage or become involved in imaginative or solo play because it means he gets some alone time.
12. Discourage destructive play because it means he must clean it up.
13. Not encourage his kids to use new words, or refrain from asking them open-ended questions such as “What color is that?” or more elaborate questions as they grow older.
14. Not take his kid’s temperature, or perform some other basic health assessment, fearing he’ll have to take them to the doctor.
15. Distract his children in the store, restaurant, car, or at home with television/video games.
16. Not read to his kids, even when they’re on the floor looking through books.
17. Not buy new toys based on his kid’s needs, preferences, or developmental level.
18. Simply parent how he “believes” he should parent, rather than actively consult books and reliable online sources.
19. Not take the time to plan healthy meals for his family, and instead go with frozen, or restaurant prepared meals.
20. Spank rather than use timeout/grounding/restriction as a main source of punishment.
21. Send his kid to bed earlier than necessary for no reason.
22. Not allow his kids to have sleepovers because of the added responsibility.
23. Not allow kids to make their own decisions because of the added time.
24. Put his kid on a leash.
25. Say, “I’ll give you something to cry about.”
26. Not get involved with his kid’s school functions.
27. Not promote healthy homework habits or offer assistance.
28. Refrain from involving his kids in his hobbies.
29. Not encourage his kids to take up hobbies.
30. Not plan regular family vacations away from the house.
No one said parenting was going to be easy, yet the selfish father makes many decisions with his kids that, with a little effort, could have been better for them, and for his family in general. The selfish father, to avoid being selfish, can prepare healthy meals for the week and freeze them, put down “Playtime” in his weekly planner, sit with his kids in timeout reminding them why they’re in timeout, and find his kids an active rather than a passive form of entertainment while in the car. It just takes a little more effort to reassess and research the best option rather than going for the immediate solutions, which are usually wrong. The selfish father has time to do this, everyone does. If you’re not sure how to find the time, Zen Habits is just one of the many sources that can help carve out that little bit of time you need to spend more time with and make the best decisions for your kids.
Kids act out largely because they want to be in control of their environment. They throw sand at the beach, pull things off of tables, and make messes for seemingly no reason at all. The selfish father is the same way, though he’s learned to control some of these tell-tale signs, he still desires to control almost every aspect of his environment.
The selfish father may
31. Decide to buy expensive things for himself, but fail to do so for the rest of his family.
32. Not consult proper sources before making such a purchase.
33. Yell constantly and unjustifiably.
34. Spend most of his time in a closed off place he calls a “mancave” or “dudeville” which usually contains a pool table and various liquor signs, and probably at least one neon sign.
35. Buy too much alcohol when his friends come over.
36. Host football night every Sunday in the fall.
37. Get upset when his wife hasn’t bought his favorite snacks.
38. Have the final say in disciplinary decisions.
39. Have the final say in picking out house accessories.
40. Not clean and claim his wife is “too clean.”
Gender has been erased, at least theoretically. However, intellectuals can talk all day long about how gender is nothing but a social construction, but many still see marriage as solely between a man and a woman, where, once the ritual has been performed, there are certain previously conceived roles for the man and woman to play. The selfish father loves his previously conceived role as it allows him to do some of the above. It’s interesting because it’s almost as if the selfish father feels he is supposed to do these things and his wife is supposed to accept them. It’s this same notion of ritual and previously conceived roles that make some selfish fathers respond negatively to gay marriage. It threatens his role, and threatens to change the definition of marriage. My advice for the selfish father finding himself in this category is to seriously examine how he acts, asking himself if he acts according to what he knows is right, or according to what he believes is right. It’s discovering this difference that is crucial in becoming a better father and husband alike.
Finally, this category is something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently. When I’m speaking of the selfish father, I’m not only talking of the father who is self-absorbed, and preoccupied to the point where he becomes distant, but I’m also talking about the father who doesn’t accept fathering advice, who thinks that he has learned everything there is to know about raising a child from his parents and from the sources he’s consulted.
The selfish father may
41. Make fun of other people’s parenting decisions.
42. Find fault in parents too quickly when a child acts strangely or acts out.
43. Choose not to implement anything anyone says into his parenting style.
44. Only trust a few choice books and websites.
45. Scare rather than teach his children.
46. Adopt truly bizarre and backward parenting rituals just to be different.
47. Blindly follow unhealthy trends/fads.
48. Brag about his kids.
49. Refuse to admit his kids’ behavior is unsatisfactory.
50. Ignore advice from doctors.
I think it is most important that the selfish father realizes he should always be open to what is working and what isn’t, by which I mean constantly being aware of what he is doing that is causing hardship or damage to someone else, most importantly his kids. He should also be quick to compromise and quick to offer assistance and companionship to his wife, kids and even those he doesn’t know. Not doing these things can result in not only an unhappy marriage, but in perpetuating these behaviors and these bogus previously conceived marriage roles.
Last week, and this week as well, I’ve talked quite a bit about passive entertainment, television, and more importantly, advertising. Join me next week for a brief look at how advertisements affect our lives, our kids, and our parenting.
I LOVE your blog, as a lot of this describes my husband. He, just this morning, suggested a separation because I want more from him than just his thinking working FT is adequate for being a husband and father.
PLEASE continue this blog. I need to know I am not asking to much from my husband.
Kimberly, as the post mentions, many fathers believe that working full-time, as well as providing benefits, is their contribution to the family, and the rest should be left up to their wives. Of course, if the husband is the sole breadwinner and works many many hours and travels then his job around the house will flex down and his wife’s will flex up, but he still should have some household responsibilities, and besides this isn’t the case for the majority of Americans. Yet many husbands still think working 40-50 hours is enough. This is antiquated and absurd. Negotiation is the key here, I believe, and anyone that loves and respects you should be willing to negotiate on this issue. If not, then there’s a larger problem that needs solving. Remember, on average, we’re awake 112 hours a week. I, like most folks, work 50 hours a week, which still isn’t half of my awake time. Like I said, there’s always a way to find the time to get the right things done, it just takes eliminating the wrong things.
Justin is probably too modest to admit it, but it should be known where this man’s credentials, to speak on subjects like this, come from. At the moment he is finishing up his graduate degree in English, working full time, tutoring part time, and working on his book of short stories. He is the head writer for an online sketch comedy show, co-creator of a poetry/prose event series in Wilmington, healthy eater, sane mind, owner of this blog and a goddamn good father and husband.
He is the definition of “steadfast”, unwavering in the act of “walking the walk.” He is not a superhuman or different species, only someone who desires to pursue responsibility and does just that.
wow justin! such interesting insight from you. it’s refreshing to hear your voice in this, acknowledging the full range of important parenthood qualities– it’s not enough to go to one extreme or the other. i see soooo many people providing financially for their kids, but starving them emotionally. they fail to see their responsibility, their opportunity– really the ultimate OPPORTUNITY– as parents to invest in other human beings on the planet. there are many other observations i could make, but all in all, just wanted to say there are lots of wise words here. thank you for articulating all of that. good good stuff.