Silence sets in. The sounds of little voices and happy giggles no longer fill my car. I look in the rearview at their empty car seats and my eyes begin to well up. It’s going to be a long week without them. Saying goodbye to my children for a whole week is the result of choices I’ve made. Questions arise and self-doubt creeps in. “Did I do the right thing by ending it?” “Could I have done anything differently?” “How are my kids handling everything?”  → Read More

In doing a Google search on the word co-parenting, I quickly found that co-parenting is a word we reserve for divorced families, not intact ones. Isn’t it strange that in 2012 we don’t have a word—a common vocabulary—to describe mothers and fathers fully sharing in the care of raising their children? Instead our collective norm has been to become co-parents only after the love relationship has ended and the heartache and expense of divorce have transpired.  → Read More

Like many boys who came of age in the 1980s, I learned that men show their care for others with action. Like generations before me, I was taught to take care of the people in my life, particularly women, by paying for dates, killing bugs that got in the house, being the primary breadwinner, and solving their problems. Caring was defined by doing. But like many men of my generation, I want to be involved in my daughter’s life in a way that’s different from how my dads were involved—or, really, not involved in my emotional life.  → Read More

If our one-year-old could say more than, “dad” or “mum” he would tell you that mum is the same as dad, except she creates better Lego towers. This is not by chance, but by design, and a lot of team work. We love our son more than life itself, but neither of us could imagine giving up our careers to become a stay at home parent. Balance was needed to make sure we were the best parents we could be, but that we also continued driving toward our career goals and pursuing our passions.  → Read More