As I write this, my boys are howling from their cribs at nap time. It has taken over a year to admit it, but I’m ready. I can’t explain exactly why it has taken so long. Was it the social stigma or the blur of confusion that children add to everyday life? Pride? Machismo? I’m not sure. But I am ready regardless. Deep breath…Hello all, I am a Stay at Home Dad.

Maybe it was my past that made it so difficult. In the years B.C., (before children), I’d been a park ranger in the Arizona deserts, the front man in a couple rock bands, a bachelor until nearly forty. I followed the Grateful Dead selling bagels during college summer break.  I  backpacked from Mexico to Utah in one straight shot. I loved to pick up and go. I never wanted a dog since they couldn’t fend for themselves. Children were nowhere near my radar.

Then I met my wife Kathy.  Stable, adventurous, playful, athletic. Just what I wanted.   Perfecto. But she dropped a bombshell… She didn’t want a dog, no, but she did want kids. We talked about it before we married and she convinced me.  I knew she would be a great mom. My job? Mine was to play backup. I was thrilled when our twin boys came into our life.

Kathy and I made our decision based on what we believed was best for our boys. There could only be one outcome if we wanted to stay where we live and have one of us at home with our children.  Equal opportunity legislation like the recent Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act brings this same decision and opportunity to parents across the country. Today, one in four women earn more money than their spouse. In the 2004 Federal Census, there were 98,000 stay at home fathers in the United States. I suspect this number to be much higher when the current census is tallied.

Of course none of my transient lifestyles screamed, “I’ll stay home with the kids!”, but sometimes these things choose themselves.  For the first year I wouldn’t admit I was a Stay at Home Dad. Despite all the positive comments and car horns while pushing the double stroller, I continued to deny it. Strangers and friends alike would say, “It’s so great what you’re doing!” and I would get irritated. Being called “Mr. Mom” sent me into a tirade.

No, I described myself as a writer that also happened to help with the children. I simply changed my career to give us a more flexible schedule, you know? The reality was I was a writer interrupted. A friendly question of  “What are you working on now?” sent me fumbling over all the projects I’d been frantically trying to start. No matter how early I woke up or locked myself in my office on the weekend, there was little time where the boys weren’t able to creep in.

Since then, I have learned to accept my new job description. I was never personally embarrassed by my role. I don’t consider parenting a gender based job. I think it is what you have to give up in the trade that affected me. Man or woman, the first truth is that you have to give up a bit of yourself. Who you were and who you wanted to be changes and not necessarily because you want it to. Career aspirations are replaced by your child’s aspirations of ABC flash card mastery. I think men take a little longer to come to terms with this, to find the personal reward in these quiet little steps.  There are few pats on the back for diaper changes and no opportunity for promotion. Instead it has to be treated like a construction project. It is only when you realize that you are building something from the ground up that it begins to make sense.

So, I am a stay at home dad that happens to write a little on the side.  It is an opportunity to experience something that most men don’t. It is a chance to examine what mothers have told us for years and tell it from a male perspective. Certainly Hollywood has cast us as incompetent.  But is it really the hardest job you’ll ever have? Does the reward match up to having a career? What does the outside world think about a man stepping into this role? Are we built for this? We are going to find out.