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1/ Right. Stay-at-home dads. My full two cents/myth busting thread. Bear with me cos I've never done a Twitter thread before.
2/ I work full-time, as well as filming #eggheads several weeks each year. My husband stopped working in May 2018 to become a full-time dad.
3/ When I say a full-time dad, I mean full-time. I often have to leave the house at 6am to go to London, and the earliest I can then get back after a full working day is 8pm. So he's handling two young kids (5 and 2) alone from wake up to bedtime.
4/ My husband does everything a stay at home mum would do, including taking our 2yo to a lot of activity groups otherwise exclusively populated by mums.
5/ His frequent descriptions of the 'mummies join in now' from group leaders, the initial suspicion from many mums he chats to, the 'are you babysitting?' comments from all and sundry etc etc etc make me think he has it a hell of a lot harder than mums in the same position.
6/ Mums just have the dismissal of their (damn hard) work and the 'nice if you can afford it' jibes to contend with, not this massive raft of casual sexism which I have seen glossed over and brushed under the carpet time and again.
7/ And before you tell me I'm lucky to be able to afford this, I know I am. But I am still (admittedly at my own level) watching pennies and making financial sacrifices for this arrangement. We had to think very carefully about whether this was workable. We're still not sure.
8/ My husband is the ideal 'stay at home'. He loves chatting at school/groups, brokering friendships with other parents. He's not shy about arranging playdates. He's always looking for the next exciting thing for the kids to do. I am too introverted for any of this.
9/ Having said that, my husband also has to be tough as balls to turn up to and integrate into groups where he's often the only adult male. I can only imagine what it's like for stay at home dads who are more like me. At least my breasts are an initial passsport to acceptance.
10/ So please, everyone, try to think of it as 'stay at home parenting'. Not mums and dads. Just one role at work and one at home, both with their drawbacks. We can't complain about a lack of equality for women at work if we neglect equality for men at home. Two cents ends.
