“What do you mean ‘call him first?“
A common question, often said with surprise, underpinned by thinly veiled judgement.
My partner is my son’s first emergency contact at his day-care, the GP’s office, even his swimming lesson centre.
This is not the norm, I realise that. However it was a decision we made, as a family, because I needed to dedicate myself to my career as much as possible for this year. Whilst the arrival of my son was filled with surprise and happiness, his timing in regards to my career progression…left a lot of be desired.
Turns out… I just can’t be everything to everyone all at once.
The process of this decision took a lot of work, and constant effort on my part, to be able to let go of the control.
Can I Be Everything To Everyone?
Before I continue to delve into the topic, it’s important to be said that my experience is intrinsically shaped and supported by the fact I have a dedicated partner sharing this parenting journey with me. Not all mothers do, whilst I’m unable to relate to that through my own personal circumstance, I can try to empathise that this is not as easy for those mums out there doing it on their own.
I was trying to do it all; being a new Mum, AND an Army Officer who is innately dedicated to the service of my Country. I was struggling. Struggling to balance being both the default parent and achieving what I needed to each day at work. However, I was in the position where I had fabulous mentors (and mothers) who had been through this before me. They offered both an ear and some hard truths. It wasn’t possible, at least not for me, to be everything to everyone all at once.
I needed to be real with myself, I wasn’t able to do both. I needed to accept the mum guilt of not being able to. I needed to accept that despite the fact society kept telling me I should be the default parent, maybe my partner would be more suited to do this at this stage of our family life?
Why is it, do you think, we assume the mother is the default parent? Why is it consider so modern for the dad, or non-birthing parent, to be the one who is essentially in charge? Am I any less of a good mum for delegating some of this responsibility?
The Default Parent
My partner is no less capable than I at raising our child, ensuring he eats and sleeps, organising his appointments, or choosing his clothes for the day based on the weather. I must be said that whilst weather appropriate, usually there’s a lot of pattern clashing going on. That being said, my partner is very capable of achieving these things.
Making this choice for my family has brought up the term ‘default parent’, or ‘default parent syndrome’ quite frequently. What is a default parent? Is this concept new? How can we work toward sharing that load?
Psychological forums define this as:
“A default parent is typically one who is “first in line” when it comes to caring for children, child-related responsibilities, or home-related tasks. Assuming that there are two parents present, the default parent is more likely to carry the bigger load in parenting”.
Facing The Bias
There is a traditional perception that women in the household hold the role of caregiver. Mothers continue to conduct the majority of home-related, family-related and child rearing tasks.
Despite its modern presentation or circumstance, this bias comes from decades of patriarchy. Challenging your own existing gender bias is a loaded topic, and deserves its own article of focus – however, challenge yourself to do so. Just because it is considered ‘normal’ for women to be the default parent, it does not mean there is no other way.
This space is ever evolving, and also unquestionably worth talking about. At present, two in-service partners are unable to swap and adjust parental leave; despite the fact that the Australian Federal Government does support this. I only point this out so to show that bias is everywhere.
Choosing Child or Career?
Okay, back to the topic…my battle with seeing my husband be the ‘default’ parent, or the ‘primary caregiver’.
Firstly, I had to examine my own thoughts on this. Was it fair for one parent to shoulder more responsibly than the other? Isn’t one of my fundamental values that we should be equal? But wait, we aren’t equal – at least in this area. My career had to take a backseat to grow our son, and now I have to fight my way back to being competitive; whereas my husband had no such qualms. Ok…so it’s not necessarily equality that’s needed, but equity.
I needed to dedicate the time and energy to my work, and to do that I had to admit defeat (well what I considered it to be at the time); I could not be everything to everyone all at once.
Let’s be real for a minute – does this ring a bell with you as a mum? Do you shoulder the load, the decisions and the planning but also want to be able to focus on your career (despite the fact you’ve been unceremoniously thrown into the deep end of raising a child)? Do you find yourself stretched thin?
I understand. It was me (and still is, if I don’t catch myself). This issue is complex, and cannot be organised and moulded into a perfectly compartmentalised solution. How can we, as mothers, help ourselves here? The answer seemingly is similar to one many military members, across all levels of leadership, collide with; How to delegate, and feel comfortable to allow someone else to have control.
How To Delegate
I am by no means an expert at this, but you’ve got to start somewhere. By engaging the help of some psychologist colleagues, the following steps were identified – and I have tried to implement the following in my own life (with varied levels of success). They may seem simple, but often simple solutions create measurable success.
Step One, Identify the struggle (this is easier said than done). Identify that not only are you not delegating or sharing the parenting load, but also that the entire load is not sustainable and that everyone would benefit from it being shared.
Step Two, Discuss it with your people, in whatever capacity they may be. Why are you feeling that you can’t share the load? What are the others perspectives and suggestion?
Step Three, Communicate effectively. Lay down the expectations and requirements so everyone is on the same page.
Step Four, Break down the mountain into mole hills. Break up the aspects, allocate troops to task if you will. What is going to be yours to deal with and what is going to be your partners, your grandparents, your best friends (and anyone else who is a part of your village raising this child) responsibility?
Step Five, Let them do it! Do not be the micromanager that everyone has had at some point. You have to be able to let go, have confidence in your team’s abilities – you’ve chosen them well.
Step Six, Be kind to yourself. This is hard! It’s hard to let go and it’s hard let someone else take the lead. It’s okay to take it slowly.
It’s remarkable how many similarities there are between delegation as an Army officer, or solider, and delegation in a family or motherhood. We can learn lessons in both. Allowing yourself to let people support you is key. Accept that parenting doesn’t need to be all or nothing, you can have certain things you are responsible for and others your partner is. Perhaps your split is more 50/50, or 60/40, whatever works for your family and circumstance. The point is that it doesn’t need to be 100% you, 100% of the time.
I don’t need to be the primary care giver right now in order to be a good mum to my son. I can focus on my career and let my partner flourish in that role, we can share this load. It is not all being up to me to keep the ship afloat. Although, I’ll never understand why he thinks dressing the child in spots and stripes at the same time is okay!
About the Author: Lucy Chambers is a Nursing Officer in the ADF. She is passionate about women’s representation and being able to carve out a work-life balance in the modern military. Lucy hopes to contribute to Defence Capability and workforce planning. She is a strong advocate for making it ok to have your cake and eat it too.