An anachronism against Mumsnet!

I've been quiet for a while. That's partly because raising the child and doing the day job have both taken up a vast chunck of my time recently. It's also because I've been thinking through my online presence as a dad in light of the recent clash with the denizens of mumsnet.

For those of you reading this from overseas, mumsnet needs a bit of explaining. From a user perspective its like Reddit for permanently aggrieved matriarchs who feel that just because they've given birth, they're entitled to vent collectively on subjects ranging from foreign policy through to school dinners. People post about everything from their partner's sexual preferences (I think he'd prefer someone who wasn't spending every waking moment gossiping over a digital hedge about his lack of enthusiasm in the bedroom since she's had a kid and started spending 5 hours a day talking about their sex-life in online forums), their children's problems at school (If little Barry isn't being bullied yet, he certainly will be when they realise his mum posts as ParanoidNutcase1990), and what they're having for dinner (you're ordering from a takeaway... your dinner has burnt whilst you've been online!).

As you know, dear reader, I joined mumsnet as a way to have some kind of voice... not for the prissy, slightly cowed metro-dad who gives a damn about what the world thinks, but for the type of dad who's aim in life is his son's happiness... after I started posting on mumsnet I lasted about a month until I got a rather snooty email and a ban (interestingly, mumsnet is a digital security nightmare, it would be possible to bot-spam the place into submission as random email addresses can be used to register with no further checking). So what were my crimes? Well, I managed to upset people... I'm not really that sorry, so I'll tell you what I said, to who, albeit with comical overtones:

Little Mz Breadline

"I'm so poor, my son's father had to buy him a coat!"

"I buy all my kid's coats, what's so bad about that?"

"I'm a single mother {sniff}"

"Yes, but not the Virgin Mary... it's still normal for dad's to buy coats... get over it.

Trying to conceive

"I really want to conceive, but my husband hasn't agreed to do the deed again"

"When you asked, were you (a) fully clothed and staring at the computer? or (b) naked and staring at his crotch? Because if it's (a) then his reasons for refusing are the same ones you give for refusing to perform fellatio during match of the day!"

The Management

"We read your blog."

"That's nice... didn't you do that months ago, before approving me?

"Not really, blog approval is all about metrics, so we'd approve anything that contained enough uses of the word "child" "parent" and "hormones" initially. The thing is, we've had a couple of complaints, and we don't think it's right that you're part of the mumsnet community?

"Any particular reason? Is it my lack of self-pity and sense of entitlement? Or perhaps I haven't clicked enough revenue generating ads?"

"Well... both!"

So there we have it, a parting of the ways. Mumsnet will always be sadly ironic... they've decided that they're going to protest against the bounty packs being given out in hospitals, whilst simultaneously attempting to monopolise the online and spending patterns of thousands of parents who "just want the best for their child". They host content generated by a variety of less than child- or liver-friendly product promotions (at the moment it's Gin!) following a marketing strategy devised by the nice people at EngageSciences who explain exactly how mumsnet work in a clever little flowchart on their website entitled "Social Marketing's Secret Sauce". Mumsnet are not an advocacy group, they're not a parenting club, they're not a social conscience. They're an ingenious way to turn slightly vulnerable mothers into readily profiled fish in a barrel for marketers to exploit, and by targeting bounty, they're not helping mums, they're eliminating the competition.

DAD

Guest-star

I’ve just written a guest post at kiddycharts. So if you’re missing your blog fix head on over there.

Kiddycharts is run by Helen Neale and I think she might be onto something... when we were kids the dog would sometimes manage to get fed twice buy pulling a hungry face at whoever was late home after she’d licked her bowl clean. Kids are even more devious so having some way to keep score whilst you’re focused on the rest of your life is massively important if you don’t want to be conned by your own kids, just remember to keep the stickers up high.

DAD

Salt pillars

Life is full of dilemmas. I don't mean the choice between two evils we get taught about in school, but the binary choices we make that have exclusive outcomes. For example, it's possible to travel to London or Edinburgh for the weekend and both are nice places, but you can't be in two places at the same time.

One of my favourite poems touches on this theme perfectly, The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

The step into parenthood is like this, it's a road that you can walk down where there's no going back. It's why people who loose their kids to tragedy take on a listless, broken quality, because the ground really has opened up right under them. Most of us will never have to suffer like that, but should still be mindful that there is no going back, after all who wants to become a pillar of salt (occasionally the theology degree comes back to haunt me!). My past of derring-do and colourful adventures becomes the stories that will entertain and inspire Harris.

I've seen snow in a desert, flown a fighter jet, been awarded a medal, won a knife fight (there was one knife, and the other guy had it to start with), saved a couple of lives, and perhaps most importantly, been willing time and time again to travel to far away places with only my somewhat distended baggage allowance (I travelled often enough to perfect a wardrobe that gave me an extra 30kg!) for extended periods of time to face the unknown or, in the case of some former students, the unknowledgeable which in a strange way is far more challenging). Honestly, being a dad is so much better and I wouldn't go back even if I could. After all, as someone who's always tried to live like an action hero, this is my chance to train a sidekick.

DAD

The right amount of worry

I have this friend who’s recently become a dad. Our kids are about the same age and I guess we’ve got an awful lot in common, even down to the way our kids were dragged into the world (bonding over forceps conjures an interesting mental image, but I digress!)

The thing is with this dude is that he’s a worrier; part of me thinks that his adventures are more somber because he worries, and part of me thinks that maybe it’s the other way round... he worries because he’s one of those unfortunate individuals to whom bad things happen as a matter of course.

Take our attitudes to caring for a baby. My personal philosophy is that a baby will survive most things with a minimal of fuss, and this is borne out by the fact that whilst I’ve been dizzy and out of action for three days with a seasonal bug, the net effect of the same bug on the baby is that he’s learnt to enjoy gurgling snot-bubbles of various hues out of his nose. Meanwhile my friend panics that the child will somehow contract Ebola from a swallow-borne coconut (an African swallow obviously!) and when looking at a kid from his perspective the child suddenly appears far less robust.

The problem I often face is when dealing with questions. Recently we’ve had the following exchanges and I feel my responses haven’t really lived up to his angst-driven expectations:

“My baby wakes me up every night. He grunts whilst breast feeding!”

“He probably wont pull more than once at Glastonbury!”

“My baby shows signs of autism.”

“Well, looks like you’re holidaying in Vegas in matching suits!”

“I don’t have any time to relax.”

“Let me show you how to cradle a sleeping baby and play xbox at the same time!”

This is the usual pattern of our exchanges, and I often play the voice-of-reason in his more pathetic metro-sexual moments. The last exchange has been rather more worrying and my usual humour doesn’t seem to be cutting it... he said:

“I walked into the room, and the baby was laughing but my wife was in tears, what should I do?”

To which I wanted to reply:

“I saw this in a movie once. Get an exorcist, the baby’s clearly possessed!”

On reflection I really wasn’t the best person to go to for advice in this kind of situation. If I ever encountered a moment like that with my own wife and child, I would probably check the room for sharp objects and then try to make up my mind whether the wife or demon-child posed more of a threat to my person and sanity before calling the ghost busters. For once my somewhat lumbering friend got it right, he gave everyone a big hug, told them he loved them and is just keeping a quiet eye on them both.

It would appear that when it comes to dealing with upset and depression in a family being more of a man means being less of a lad. I think I learnt something and would like to throw the blog open to comments from anyone feeling they’re shouldering it all some days, because you’re not alone.

DAD