Get A Load Of These Dads Who Started A Stay-At-Home-Dad Support Group

HuffPo- While our culture still often treats dads like bumbling babysitters, American fathers are taking a larger role in parenting responsibilities. 

In 2008, [Lance Somerfeld and Matt Schneider] started City Dads Group, an online community that offers meet-ups, education and support for expectant fathers and dads in cities across the country.

The impetus to create such a community evolved out of Matt and Lance’s personal experience. Both were former teachers at P.S. 86, the largest elementary school in the Bronx. When Matt’s wife got pregnant with their first child, Matt decided to take advantage of the Child Care Leave Of Absence, which enables teachers to take up to five years off with a guarantee that they can return to a position. Lance followed suit two years later.

“Really, it just made the most sense,” Lance recalls. “I love working with children. What better person to be a role model and mentor, and to really kind of hone my time, than with my very own child.”

It’s been 9 years since Lance has been out of the traditional workforce. But he’s truly been working his tail off ever since.

Oh for the love of God. A stay-at-home-dad support group? Now I’m actually concerned about North Korea. While they’re busy lighting off nuclear bombs under mountains and losing hundreds of men under collapsing tunnels, we’re losing men to daytime soap operas and park bench détentes over the proper temperature for reheating breast milk.

Two insufferable pioneers, Matt and Lance, are leading the charge thanks to the Child Care Leave of Absence–a law that permits teachers to take FIVE YEARS OFF?! A HALF-DECADE SABBATICAL TO PLAY LASER TAG WITH YOUR KIDS? Get the fuck out of here. How is that a thing? By the time they come back to their jobs, the kids they were teaching will have their own kids. In all likelihood, the school will no longer be there, replaced by a planned parenthood clinic full of expectant fathers wondering what to do with all their free time. It’s the end of days, folks!!

Look, I’m not saying men shouldn’t be as involved as women when it comes to raising children. My real issue with “Matt and Lance,” who most certainly aren’t having an affair, is their proselytizing a doctrine of fatherly woes. These guys want you to think they’re victims of some sort of man-parent-information deficiency:

“New dads have very few resources. The expectant dad has nearly none.”

“Things that moms’ groups talk about all the time but – with no community – dads hunger for… There’s a whole army to help the new mom.” 

These poor men face a harsh, desolate landscape devoid of any resources to tell them how to change a diaper. Here’s a solution: buy the books for mommies and in your brain, replace every “mommy” with “daddy.” That should move the chains, right? Not to mention, these guys have 5 years to figure it out. I could get drafted by the Browns if I had 5 years to focus on my 3-cone drill technique, let alone discover the best way to connect with my child.

“It’s perpetually living with the idea that you are imperfect. My ego took a lot of hits.”

Hey man, we’ve all been there. Every day at my job–which, mind you, is nothing compared to the trials of raising one child at home–my imperfections are highlighted for the entertainment of  millions of unique site visitors. My ego has taken a LOT of hits too. I cope with it by checking the reddit threads after I’ve dropped an undeniable video (Eminem parody, George Brett, Quigley bros at the Zoo, Fronnie Does Chinatown Pt. 3… You know, the hits). It’s a great place to build yourself back up after a demoralizing character assassination at the hands of Dave/Nate.

Does Lance have a reddit forum that will infuse him with positive reinforcement when he’s struggling to put his child to bed? Probably. But luckily, he also has Matt!

“We would get together once a week and it was cathartic to speak to someone who wasn’t an ‘expert’ but more of a ‘veteran’… Just to be able to get those perspectives…

Sounds lovely. Strap the kid to your chest and head to Le Pain Quotidien for a mixed berry tart and some fatherhood counseling. It’s caloric but who cares–the kid hides the gut!

I’ll end with this: it’s great that these guys are taking a bigger role in raising their kids. I presume this enables their wives to return to their jobs more quickly after having a child if the husband is looking after the baby. That’s a win for those trying to break down the old “man works, woman raises kids” patriarchal thinking of the past. But for these new dads, don’t make it seem like you’re navigating treacherous, uncharted waters; this concept only works if you have a wife who makes enough money to support the family, and the reality is that most families don’t have that luxury. If you do have a breadwinning woman in your life, enjoy your subsidized 5-year vacation with your kids, you poor dad you.

PS- this, but for dads