My husband, a Stay-at-Home Dad, has told me a story or two. Like the time one Mom stumbled upon his dads’ group in a park and purred that she found the idea of men caring for kids “incredibly sexy.”

Then there’s the time when I had dinner with other Wives of Stay-at-Home Dads and a few of them went off on a tirade.

“You’ve got to watch out!” one warned. For what? Well, if your man ever seems uncomfortable around other moms, neighbors, whoever, and you feel something is not right, then Something Probably Isn’t. Watch out!

Maybe it’s the small mental adjustment most people make when they hear of our child care arrangement. When we moved to our street, a new neighbor ran out excitedly. She had a baby too and wanted to know if I was staying home. When I said no, but my husband was, there was a little awkward silence. The obvious next lines — “We can push our strollers to the lake together!” or “We can babysit for each other!” — hung in the air, unsaid.

My husband, of course, thinks I’m completely over-analyzing. Of course moms gravitate toward other moms and dads gravitate toward other dads. As for the “sexy” comment, he says, that was more of a back pedal after the woman said something like “good for you” and was met with silence.

What do you think?

This entry was posted on Friday, September 8th, 2006 at 4:06 pm and is filed under Main. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.