What I shared at a recent panel speaking engagement

On June 18th, I was invited to be a guest speaker on a panel comprising five parents. Three were full-time working parents (including a new mom at the age of 40), while the remaining two were stay-at-home parents (including yours truly)

This event, attended by more than 50 participants, took place on a weekday after office hours. It targeted working young adults who were either single or newlywed. Most were in their 20s, with some in their 30s and 40s.

It was a meaningful experience for me and a chance to flex my speaking muscles in a brand-new setting. While speaking to a crowd is par for the course in my work as a part-time lecturer, I believe this is the first time I’ve participated in a panel line-up with an audience older than those I typically address in class.

I was also curious to understand what young people today were wrestling with about modern society, marriage, and parenting.

So I decided to accept the invitation in hopes of finding out.

What the panel was about

As part of a series of monthly talks tackling social and relationship issues for young adults, event organizer HTHT (Heart-To-Heart Talk), reached out to me in May to ask if I would like to be in their panel line-up to offer a unique perspective about being a stay-at-home dad. The other parents in the panel were invited to share their perspectives too: a stay-at-home mom, and three full-time parents of whom one came into parenting late in life.

Below are excerpts of my sharing from the organizer’s write-up recently published, with the support of co-organizer S.H.E (SG Her Empowerment). As the organizer did not quite accurately record what I said and meant (nor took time to fact-check with me before publishing), I’ve taken some pains to edit these excerpts here to reflect better the thoughts I shared that evening, as well as round off some key points I couldn’t elaborate on that night due to time constraint.

#1 To be or not to be a stay-at-home parent depends on what’s a “Present Parent”

For K (yours truly), the impact of his emotionally distant father (throughout his childhood and teenage years) motivated him to reverse his family legacy. After discussing with his wife, K transitioned himself into a stay-at-home father role in 2018. To show up for his kids in the ways his own father did not. 

For K, being a present and involved parent is a conscious choice. It means being available to his family and children more than to a job or a career.

Such a decision means K gets to choose how he “shows up” for his family. According to him, adjusting work schedules and off-days, and which daily routines (eg meal times, bedtimes, etc) to show up consistently for can all help to foster a stronger family bond.

“It is extremely important for children to have a present father to model healthy masculinity to them. This helps them form secure attachments later in society and in life. For kids, LOVE is always spelled T-I-M-E. I did not have that kind of upbringing when I was young, so I wanted to break the cycle and find solutions to being an intentional and involved father,” said K.

#2 To be or not to be a stay-at-home parent depends on your comfort with breaking stereotypes

During the panel discussion, K emphasized that staying home or earning less as a man does not dilute one’s masculinity nor reduce one’s worth as a contributing member of society.

K learned shortly after becoming a stay-at-home dad that society had certain unspoken stereotypes about men who chose to stay home rather than work — a louse, an incompetent, a poor/non-provider, and a disgrace to hardworking men everywhere.

But he was able to ignore, challenge, and reconcile these traditional gender stereotypes (men/career vs women/home) with the priority he places on his parenting role as a father.

K was motivated by his belief that sons need their fathers as role models in many areas of life. These included helping with his children’s education and appropriately navigating different social trends and issues. To do all of that will necessarily take the kind of protracted time that isn’t available if the father is at work more than at home.

Ultimately, taking on this role will challenge one’s gender identity and self-worth, so it might not be for the faint-hearted.

#3 To be or not to be a stay-at-home parent depends on understanding the limits of planned decisions.

K, who has a special needs child, shared that a lot of times these questions and discussions about whether to stay home or not come down to one thing: how much control we think we have over our lives and futures.

Truth is, one can only control what one is doing right now and maybe one’s plans for the next few years at best.

“We all want some level of control, but ironically, it may not bring us the peace and satisfaction we expect”.

So for the day-to-day, letting go and trusting the journey can actually bring more contentment. In many ways, the days can be long (especially on days when caregiving kids can be very stressful) but the years can be short (they grow up so fast!).

And life, after all, is full of choices, and reality is always changing. Wanting and trying to maintain too much control can lead to feeling depressed or frustrated when things don’t go as planned.

Therefore, it’s important to have a balance. Life’s changes are the only constants, and trying to control everything may end up being an exercise in futility. This is where parenting can help us learn to let go of expectations and instead, make us focus on the best of each situation and be prepared to adapt. To be flexible enough to recover and pivot quickly.

“We just never know what opportunities we might miss if we’re too focused on controlling everything. Which is exactly what many parents quickly learn is an impossibility!”

Panel post-mortem

While I did manage to talk to a couple of young folks that night after the panel session ended (including one who was an ex-student of mine!), I realized that with such a crowd, and the fact that it was nearly 10 pm when we wrapped up, I really couldn’t get what I came for. To deep dive and understand what the young set today are grappling with.

Also, typically with such events, everyone is always saying polite and positive stuff. What I would have liked was to engage in a smaller, more intimate space where we can unpack more deeply the things that keep us awake at night.

Then perhaps my sharing as a panelist would have been more targeted and might better help them in their own struggles.