Now, I'm not a mom so I will readily admit that I don't know what it's like to try to balance climbing and motherhood.

I'm really hopeful though that my husband and I will be like Don and Phyl Munday, who had a kid and still managed to do tons of first ascents in B.C., and that other people won't judge me saying that I'm making my kids miserable.

It pisses me off that you would never see an article like this written by a man.

Anyway, any thoughts? Especially from climbing dads and climbing moms...

About male vs. female with general care... I think there is some correlation with a woman's thinking process and that they tend to end up taking charge even in these days of ....equality.

I read a book once...

I had a guy friend and we were discussing this difference(before I had read this book). The guy says "You know, when you ask a guy what he's thinking about something? Imagine a little cartoon thought bubble coming from his head, and it's empty."

What I am getting at is - guys(in general) just don't connect the dots sometimes, when it comes to their kids. They don't realize WHY the errand needs to get done now and that he needs to have (whatever) along for his 2-year old and that he needs to get back home (by whatever time) so the kid can get fed and his nap or else - well, we all know what happens then!

The women connects the dots between risky behavior, all the way down to not being available for her child should she be hurt or injured. All without so much as tying in. Whereas the guy....is more apt to realize he's got trouble handling the child care about....the day he wakes up in the hospital after an accident, or gets home 6 hours past the time he said he would and now mom can't do what she had planned.

I did see it as defeatist. But I didn't think she was painting the future. She was doing a snapshot of things as they are NOW for many women. If people she polled felt that way, you cannot really argue with it, can you?

I did see it as defeatist. But I didn't think she was painting the future. She was doing a snapshot of things as they are NOW for many women. If people she polled felt that way, you cannot really argue with it, can you?

I am not sure who she polled. Why is that climbing moms I know seem to manage just fine? There is you, Lena, and at my gym there is one mom who climbs hard and takes trips (last major one being to Thailand), at least one mom who told me she is stronger now after having a baby (and you should see this woman boulder), and another 2 that bring their brand new babies to the gym that I see regularly.

rob - I am glad you have the experiences you have, and that you shared. Perhaps a little more on being a climbing dad, when your kids were all in the under 16 age range would be helpful.

About the comments you questioned which I made - I know plenty of mothers who have been in partnerships, and that is where I based the things I wrote on. Never once declared myself an expert.....

No insult to dads who care well for their kids. There's no need to suggest anyone is lumping you AND every other dad on this forum in any such category. If you were insulted, that's on you.

There's no need to suggest anyone is lumping you AND every other dad on this forum in any such category. If you were insulted, that's on you.

The husbands come from the same stock, but who is taking time off to come and read a story to a bunch of kindergarteners and help out with the field trip? Not the people with the Y chromosome!

I had a guy friend and we were discussing this difference(before I had read this book). The guy says "You know, when you ask a guy what he's thinking about something? Imagine a little cartoon thought bubble coming from his head, and it's empty."

What I am getting at is - guys(in general) just don't connect the dots sometimes, when it comes to their kids. They don't realize WHY the errand needs to get done now and that he needs to have (whatever) along for his 2-year old and that he needs to get back home (by whatever time) so the kid can get fed and his nap or else - well, we all know what happens then!

Maybe by means of refusing to climb with her spouse any longer, the author inadvertently took on more of the parental responsibilities. That sets her up for the 'motherhood being incompatible with climbing' scenario. It's self-imposed. But as long as she is happy with her life, that is what matters.

Oh for the love of Dinojesus. 3 pages of lumping every dad into the category of a dumbass with no freaking clue as to what his kids need and no responsibility to care for them and blah blah

to be fair, i realize you were talking to happiegrrl, but not everyone in this thread is lumping all men into the "idiots" category. and lena has been talking mostly in specifics about her situation.

some of us have, in fact, been lumping guys into the "perfectly fucking competent to split stuff" category.

Great expectation!

Yes, of course, when the note says "parents coordinate" that means theoretically parents of both genders. However, if you did a poll of the parents in my kids' classroom, or did a poll of parents I work with, and asked them what notes came home from school in the past couple weeks, I can guarantee you that Moms will tell you exactly what those notes said, and describe how they are planning to deal with it, and most Dads would say:"Huh? what note? there is a birthday celebration at school? which project is due? Nobody told me!"


A somewhat comical example from couple of weeks ago.

K. called me on Wednesday, frantic b/c Daniel didn't come home from school. He called the after-care, and Daniel wasn't there, either, so he needed someone (that would be me) to tell him what to do next.

Meanwhile, on the board right above the kitchen table there was a BIG bright-neon-pink sign that said in large black letters: GREENHOUSE CLUB DATES. Yes, that Wednesday was listed right there on that neon-pink sheet.

Did K. know that Daniel was participating in Greenhouse club? Theoretically he should have known.
--When the description of the clubs came home in the fall, he saw it.
--When Daniel signed up for it, there was a discussion which club he wanted to choose, complete with the discussion about the late bus, the time the late bus showed up, etc..
--When the schedule of club meeting dates came home, he saw it, too, theoretically. And then the Schedule went up on a board in a very visible place in the kitchen, so we would all remember it.
--This being a regular event, there have been multiple meetings (always on Wednesdays) before now.
--Moreover, on the very morning of the day he panicked b/c his child was missing, he was right there at the table during breakfast, when I had reminded Daniel that he had a greenhouse club after school, reminded him of the time the late bus left the school, and asked him to check that he still had his home key in his backpack.

Nothing wrong with my husband's brain. he will tell you exactly when he climbed his first 5.12, after how many tries, and what the crux sequence was. He is also very good at trivia games...

People remember things that they find important... concluision?

OH COME ON!!! At least he noticed that the kid was missing!!!

Are all men/fathers hapless losers who don't spend any time taking care of their kids? No.

Do women/mothers still perform the majority of home and childcare responsibilities? Yes. Surveys and research from many social science disciplines consistently show an imbalance. Does this mean that in every household, the women does more of the work? No.

I would also suggest that childless-women do have some experience from which to speak about parental roles: their own childhoods. Of course, times are changing (the imbalance in responsibilities is certainly less pronounced than it used to be). But, at the risk of speaking for others, I'm sure at least some of us grew up in homes where it was our mothers who picked us up from school, made treats for the class, arranged playdates, drove us to and from various activities, cooked meals, cleaned the house, etc. I certainly did, and this was with a father who was by no means a Neaderthal in his attitudes towards females--I was the son he never had, and we constantly bonded over sports (playing and watching). But still--the closest he ever came to "cooking" was mixing up tuna for a sandwich. Oh yeah, and both of my parents worked full-time. Maybe, just maybe, those of us without children of our own have had our images shaped by our childhoods, by watching our friends' families, by TV and movies, and so on.

Some take those experiences and assume that's the way it always is and always will be; some won't stand for it continuing; and some do recognize that it isn't always like that.

Basically, my life with my mom and stepfather was one where neither really gave a shit unless I or my sisters did something to disrupt them. They may have attended about 2 or 3 games / events / etc from the time I entered school until I left the house to live with my dad after 8th grade. I was pulled from the class play in the 5th grade because they didn't want to give me rides, and this was repeated for my karate classes and one year of baseball.

I'll throw in my thoughts on my upbringing in here. My parents were divorced when I was young (2yo, maybe?) and my mother remarried when I was about four.

Basically, my life with my mom and stepfather was one where neither really gave a shit unless I or my sisters did something to disrupt them. They may have attended about 2 or 3 games / events / etc from the time I entered school until I left the house to live with my dad after 8th grade. I was pulled from the class play in the 5th grade because they didn't want to give me rides, and this was repeated for my karate classes and one year of baseball.

I went to live with my dad for the start of high school. He was single, living alone, and working very long hours (he had about a 1.5hr commute each way every day on top). I'm not going to say that he picked me up every day or even came to all my games, because he didn't, but there was definitely something different in how he missed my events. To be clear, he came to about half of my extra-cirricular actitivities. He even helped me make cookies for class once (a rugged construction worker he was - and my mom was stay at home - to be fair, she baked cookies, too). Whenever my Dad did miss events, he always seemed to be trying to make up for it elsewhere. Whether he was always succesful or not is irrelevant - he tried and my mom and stepfather made me feel as if I was a burden on them.

This carried with me for a very long time. I started to paint a clear picture of who was important in my life based on how they treated me. At the top were my father and grandmother (because she was always so warm and loving - I did live with her for several years, too, and she was always there with my grandfather for me - she holds my highest respect and admiration). But the thing that kept coming back to me was how divorced mothers were much more likely to get custody and alimoney from the fathers and not the other way around. My own experience told me that this wasn't necessarily the best decision. Later in life I even made small adjustments to Mass state law pertaining to child support checks to strip the language from saying "Father pays Mother" to say "non-custodial parent pays custodial parent." Do the stats show that most custodial parents are women? Yes, but that doesn't mean it is right.

I guess what I'm saying is that while there are a lot stereotypes about how men do nothing in the child-rearing world, there's also a lot of unspoken material about how some moms don't make the best parents despite everyone thinking they should be. My dad is my hero. My mom, while we've certainly reconciled and moved on, couldn't hold a stick to him. It's not even close.

I'd like to shake your dad's hand. he and I could share some stories. No good deed goes unpunished.

Some of the 'traditional' family roles really piss me off. For instance, when I bring my daughter to the doctor and tell them that I am the 'step-mother' there is a general pause and look of concern. And sometimes they ask (in front of her) 'Well, where is her real mom?'.

Or when Josh finalized his divorce, after Dakotah had been living with him all of her life, the judge asks 'Why is the child not going to live with the mother?'.

Or even on my daily commute to take Dakotah to school on the train, we get these fawning 'Oh, isn't that cute - a mother taking her daughter to school' sort of looks from people. I find it really bizarre.

Obviously, that's the one that gets me. But I have to admit that the part about taking her to school is also weird. I went out on a date with someone once and she noted how hot she thought her neighbor was for how much attention he paid to his daughter (she was four or five years old). So the mother gets "she's doing her job" and the father gets "he's hot."

[Drumming fingers]...shit, I need to get me a kid...