Men have it tougher than women… I even found childbirth more traumatic than my wife
Dad-of-three Jon Axworthy, 46, from Plymouth, says blokes these days are expected to be hands-on birth partners, multitasker dads and Michelin home cooks
JON Axworthy is a father-of-three to children Eddie, 14, Sammy, nine, and Annie, seven.
And he has a few things to say about author Sir Salman Rushdie's claim that it's more difficult to be a woman in the modern world than a man...
So novelist Sir Salman Rushdie has told men to stop "bleating" because women’s lives are much tougher.
“All this bleating about how hard it is for men, I don’t have time for. It’s much more difficult to be a woman,” he said.
But all that "tougher for women" stuff is really getting my goat.
Okay, in some situations I agree, but there are others where I’m pretty sure it’s much more difficult to be a man.
The first of these, admittedly, I’ve only encountered three times in my entire life… when my wife went into labour.
While my dad’s generation would be encamped in the hospital waiting room (or maybe even the nearest pub) ready to light up the celebratory cigars, men of my generation are expected to be present at the birth.
In fact, not only are we expected to be present, we are also expected to be useful, right down to being on hand with the sterilised scissors ready to cut the cord.
As if I wasn’t traumatised enough at being down at the business end for the last few hours, imagine my surprise when I was also asked if I wanted to cut the cord.
Of course I didn’t want to cut the cord. I wasn’t qualified to do that kind of thing - I was barely qualified to be a father.
Obviously, I understand that my wife was in some considerable pain but she also had access to a considerable amount of quality pain relief.
While she was left to bond with the new life she had brought into the world, I was left to bond with the sterilized scissors and wonder if I could sue the midwife for PTSD.
Mr Rushdie is also sure that men have nothing to bleat about because “the patriarchy is alive and well”, which is very true but where is the patriarchy when I enter the kitchen these days?
Thanks to Jamie, Gordon, Gino, Hugh and the never-ending parade of capable male chefs that end up on my TV I’m expected to produce Michelin star quality food every time my wife (who enjoys cooking and is very good at it) is caught up with work and I have to pick up the apron.
The pressure that I feel when I see my children’s expectant and hungry faces as I enter the kitchen is nothing compared to the soul destroying depression that I feel when those looks are replaced by the horror of seeing the inedible, blackened goo that I’m dishing up.
It’s not like I was overreaching either and going for filet mignon – it was just supposed to be sausage and mash.
If I did ever feel the need to bleat about the state of modern man, I would say that it’s because I’m trying to write this while all my kids are home for half term.
My eldest wants to go mountain biking with me, my middle one wants to play footy up the park and my youngest wants to make a replica Shard out of the contents of the recycling bin.
Meanwhile, my employers still need me to do my job. I’m pretty sure that this is a new phenomenon that hasn’t troubled previous generations of Axworthy bloke.
Maybe this is why the number of dads choosing to stay at home and look after the kids is, currently, at its lowest level for five years.
Commentators have suggested that the dramatic reversal of stay at home dads is because men have become disillusioned with the thankless task of raising a brood.
It’s not that raising children is a thankless task as much as raising children and trying to stay in work at the same time is.
If that sounded like a bleat, then, yeah, I suppose it was. It just slipped out, but I’m sure my granddads bleated. My dad too.
It was just confined to pubs after they’d finished work and just before they came home for dinner.
Let’s face it, the man’s role in the family unit is unrecognisable from what it was a couple of generations ago.
And if that sounded like another bleat then that’s because, I believe, in some ways, men’s lives have got much harder.
The struggles are different and non-life threatening but they have made being a man tougher.
And when the going gets tough, the tough have a bit of a bleat.
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Jon previously told why he prefers watching Love Island to the World Cup.
Earlier this week we told how working mums and dads spend a whole extra day a week just getting the kids ready for school.
And here three working mums reveal what it’s like to have a stay-at-home husband.