This Dad of mine

Papa, papi, dada, daddy, whatever their names, this episode of Odyans gives a voice to the darlings. Testimonials from fathers from all walks of life.

Listen to the episode:

Translated transcript

"There's nothing like it! Skin-to-skin was just sick! That's when you realize it's yours."

"It's like continual speed dating. You're always adapting to a new personality, a new person."

"I didn't want to come across as the strict guy [...] No, do what you want, I just want you to love me."

"Life as a couple? I'd say you have to be a lot more intentional. You can lose yourself really easily."

Papa, papi, baba, daddy... whatever their names, today at Odyans, we're giving voice to our old men. Testimonials from fathers from all walks of life. 

For many guys, the experience begins months before the birth of their child. Sometimes, in a dimly lit room, alone with the mother of their unborn child and a medical professional.

"The moment I heard the first heartbeat, I cried."

This is Hervé, 37, father of two. You see, Hervé is a gwo neg that I can't remember seeing get emotional in 20 years of friendship. And now he's telling me how he burst into tears at the ultrasound for his 1st child.

"As soon as I heard the first heartbeat, I had a moment of: "wow! I've created something with my wife!""

For Kenny, another dad in his thirties, it was much the same.

"It got real for me when I first heard the heartbeat. That's when it really hit me [...] I'd watch the movements on the screen and I'd be like 'Wow, OK, there's someone in there, in my wife's belly." That's when it hit me. And that's when right away, the sense of responsibility went to another level."

After the emotion of the first heartbeats, there's the rest of the pregnancy. With all the support for the mother, the preparation for the baby's arrival, the prenatal courses. Then one day, it's time for childbirth, something that can bring a lot of emotions. Just ask Jonathan, a young father in his thirties. He tells us about the feeling of holding his baby for the first time.

"The feeling was insane! I don't even know how to describe it for real. I even tell my friends who had kids after me or are going to have kids. I'm like, 'This is incomparable. But skin-to-skin was just sick! That's when you realize it's yours, like. And that it's not some kid you're going to bring home or anything. Your involvement is him, from that moment on. His mother was in recovery, so I was the first one with him. He didn't cry, there was nothing. It's not like I was caught off guard, but it's just that I thought, "Okay, this is your responsibility. No matter what happens, it's your responsibility, it's your world'."

Sometimes, childbirth is all about complex and contradictory emotions. That's what it was like for Kenny and his wife, when their daughter was born, during COVID-19 lockdown.

"After three hours, baby finally came out, we're happy, but my wife's like, "why isn't she screaming?" So right away, they hit the red button, "baby's not breathing," situation, they take her into the next room, my wife panics, I go with them, then there's like 30 nurses coming into the room, they're saying all kinds of stuff, I'm hearing numbers left and right. Yo, I'm like "what's going on?" Then at that point, I thought, "Okay, I'm a father. My role is really to protect this child." That was the first few seconds with baby. I couldn't hold her. It was really a crisis situation. She wasn't breathing, so we had to do everything we could to get her to breathe. After maybe a minute, I don't know, I can't remember, she let out a cry and started breathing. After that, we did skin-to-skin with Mom and everything. Then, afterwards, precisely because of that incident, she was taken to another room. For three hours, she was under observation, alone with me. My wife was alone in her room because of all the COVID-19 protocols and because it took maybe two hours to sew her up. So, I was alone with baby and again, the sense of protection. When the doctors came and touched her, I would ask what they were doing, why they were doing it, why she was reacting like that, why she was crying. It was... special. If we had to do it all over again, we wouldn't want it to be like that, but that's how it was. It just gave me the sense that I had to protect this child."

Once baby's here and the new family is back home, how do you build a routine? How do you divide up the tasks? Hervé shares his experience. 

"In the beginning, especially, I asked myself, 'Does the child really need me? All she needs is to be fed, and that's with breastmilk.tThen to have her diaper changed, to sleep, that's all she did. I really felt a little useless because her mother could give her all of these things. So I started to be more useful around the house by doing more housework, more cooking, more dishes, more laundry, running baths for my wife, whatever she needed. I really listened to the needs around the house."

Taking care of a child is an apprenticeship. An apprenticeship that never ends. Hervé:

"I'd say you always have to adapt, because being a parent is always an evolving situation. At each phase, your child changes, evolves and shows more and more traits of their personality. It's like having a date with a new person every time. Because you have to relearn why she cries: is it because she has gas? Because she's hungry? Why does she react like that? It's always evolving. And the older the child gets, the more ways they'll explore to see how you'll react. There are always moments of adaptation. Things are never set in stone. Even five years later as a father, I'm still learning. I'm learning how to interact with my daughter."

Sometimes, life is such that it takes longer to meet your child after they're born. And in those instances, there is a learning curve for everyone involved. That's what Jérémie, a young father in his twenties, experienced with his first child.

"When I got out and he saw that I'd come to stay for the first time, he liked me because we'd seen each other during visitation, but he was like, "Who's coming to steal my mom?" It was weird. I was trying to be nice, super chill and bond with him. I was stressed, I didn't want to scold him when he was acting up. I didn't want to come across as the bad, strict guy. "No, do what you want, I want you to just love me, become attached to me." It took a while. Other than his great-grandfather, he hadn't really seen a male figure, just female. I think there was that too, like, "A man's here." It's so weird. He didn't want to take a bath with me, he didn't want to do anything, but at the same time, he'd get close sometimes. I had to give him chips and sweets. It was a bit weird, I was stressed. I was trying to be perfect."

Luckily for Jeremie, a few years after missing the birth of his first son, he was able to experience his wife's second pregnancy to the fullest.

"No lie, it's really nice because I got to see everything I had missed with the first one. I was there for everything, I saw everything: how the woman felt, the evolution, her belly, her feelings. I saw the birth, the contractions. I saw all of it. You have to see it. And I'm lucky to have seen it with my second child. That makes up for everything. Now I can also see the impact. I used to hear my first one during video calls: he would scream, yell, and look full of rage. But now, it's like the fact that I'm here, he's really calm. I don't know if that's a coincidence or just the fact that there is a difference when the father's around. I don't know, but it's nice."

Is a father really there to maintain law and order? Well, yes and no. Yes, our dads believe in the importance of discipline. But there isn't just one way to do it, and that's okay. In fact, that's the beauty of it. Take Jeremie, our youngest dad:

"I'm a mix of everything. I'm strict, but at the same time, I'm really cool. That's a bit of a tricky question because it depends. Oftentimes, I'm strict, then I think I shouldn't have done it that way. I try something different. My son throws a lot of fits. He throws fits, he hits things. I put him in his room. But often, I wonder if I'm doing it right and I'll try something else. I'm strict, but I don't consider myself strict. I try to be, or I try to adjust my parenting. I'm just trying to adjust. There's nothing fixed. Let's say I just go with the vibe."

As for Hervé, let's just say he's a strict father, but one who explains himself. And that's thanks to a great deal of introspection. 

"I'd tell you maybe I'm strict, maybe sometimes a little often strict because [...] I already knew I had problems, no anger, I'm not the type to hit the walls, but I raised my voice maybe more often than I should. On kids who aren't aware they've made a mistake, I often have to pull myself together, then tell my kids I'm sorry I reacted a certain way, because I see it in their eyes, they're surprised, because they don't understand why. As a father, yes, I can be strict, but I'm going to be strict, then pull myself together, then teach them why it's wrong. "Look, Grandpa got mad because I've told you three times now and it's dangerous to do that. Look what it can do if you do that". It's just a matter of taking the time to explain to your children, then showing them that yes, you're an authority figure, but you're not an absolute master. You're not someone who's there to bully them. On the contrary, I'm there to give them love. I consider myself a strict father, but I think I'm a strict father who can understand what impact it can have to have a father who's emotionless or impatient or angry."

Jonathan, on the other hand, is an self-proclaimed dictator. BUT one with a soft spot.

"You know my mom, I'm a dictator. But I'm soft. Big time, big time. I'm very much like a mother hen when my child is sick. Like, my child can't be sick. In the sense that if he's sick, I'm sick with him: I feel sorry for him, I wonder what to do. You asked me earlier if I've always been comfortable as a parent. Well, there were times when I wasn't comfortable because there were certain things I'd never seen or didn't understand. And I was like what's going on? Then there you are trying to comfort him, but you too have some fear or grief because you don't know what's going on. I'm not talking about a baby burp that won't come out. I mean weird stuff you've never seen, like night terrors. You don't know what it is, you try to wake him up or whatever, you see that it doesn't work, so you get worried. Or weird little illnesses that can happen. But otherwise, discipline on deck! I don't play that. It's important to me because I was raised like that. My mom was really like tac, tac, tac. In fact, that's something that was for me. Taking your shoes off when you at someone's house, washing your hands if you have to, sitting down once you're in, asking someone if you need anything, saying please. saying thank you. It's like a drill. Yes, it may sound, how should I say, military, but growing up, if people said Jonathan is acting bad, my mother would say that it's a lie. That stuff is in my head, that's how it is. If someone would say that Josh is acting bad, that's impossible, not my son, it doesn't work. Okay at this age, it's different. But I want that discipline to come in so that when he's out on the street, he's respectful. For example, that may sound random, but I'd want him to hold the door for older people and be polite to them. Things like that. That may seem harsh at first, but that's what we all want from a child: one that is well-behaved, with good manners. That's what I want from mine.

As for Kenny, he insists on discipline regarding screen time. For his daughter AND for himself...

"For me, the most important thing is discipline. It's really important. I don't play with that. But otherwise, I really let her do what she wants. Not what she wants, but I let her have fun, discover. I don't really put any restrictions, but if, say, I say we're going to play for an hour, we're going to play for an hour. I try very hard to instill discipline, because I think that's extremely important in life. But otherwise, I also try as much as possible to play with her, to avoid anything electronic, but really more human contact, to take a sheet of paper and draw, to develop that side a lot. I really try to keep everything electronic away from my daughter. She watches TV only occasionally. Otherwise, no TV, the TV is closed. Also, when I'm alone with her, I really try to put my phone away and really play with her. I find that makes a huge difference. When, let's say, I'm on my phone, then she'll want to watch TV and everything, but when I really concentrate on her, then we take a sheet of paper, then we draw, or jump, or whatever, I find she has a lot of fun. She's having a lot more fun, unlike if she's doing something else that's stimulated by something electronic. That's what it is. I'm a mixture of all that, but I really try to get her to be disciplined as much as possible, to develop her creative side, to see what she likes."

It's no secret that being a parent is very demanding. And it's easy to get lost in the routine, to forget yourself as a lover. Jérémie tells us all about it. 

"Like you let two weeks go by and only took care of the kids, without talking to each other. Then you put something in the wrong place and they react like "whoa! What's the matter with you?" We don't talk, we don't do anything. We have to do something.

Jonathan adds.

"It's challenging because you mustn't forget your partner, but sometimes, you're so caught up in the routine, in the day-to-day, that you forget about your relationship a little. That's where there has to be a joint effort. It's not easy, that's for sure, there are ups and downs, but I know it goes both ways. For her too, the priority is the child. Especially as in our case, our child is two and a half, soon to be three: He can't express all his needs and desires all the time. Our focus is often on him, while we have some of our own.

Jonathan is trying to be more proactive in prioritizing his relationship.

Jo: "That's where we try to find solutions, outings, activities, having him babysat, things like that, or taking days off and leaving him at daycare. So, we try to come up with little ideas like that to enable us not necessarily just to keep the flame, but harmony in the couple too. We're parents, but we're also a couple. " 

Kenny, for his part, believes that a couple must work together to achieve a level of intimacy, to create an environment conducive to love.

"I'd say you have to be a lot more intentional. You can get lost really easily. really, really easily. My wife and I always try to make time for each other. It really has to be a priority, in fact. Otherwise, we'll go three months without going on a date. We try to be very, very, very intentional about it. One of the things we used to do that's non-negotiable is go on trips. It's expensive, it can be a challenge with the child, but it's non-negotiable. We always try to go at least once a year. That doesn't change. You have to be intentional. Maybe it's just a matter of saying you're going out on a date every 10th of the month, for example. Because otherwise, with life, it goes by extremely quickly. We're two very busy people. You have to be careful. "

In addition to married life, your social life is turned upside down when you become a parent. The dads shared one important detail with us: time with the boys.

"A guy's friends are extremely important. Some women make the mistake of trying to cut that out for child management. But you shouldn't. It's something we guys need. It's extremely important. It's something I've been communicating with my wife for quite some time. Do I go out every day? Of course not, but sometimes I have my time. Often, on Sunday evenings, I'm with theboys, watching football. That's every week. But otherwise, once in a while, if I have an outing, I do it. But it's really about communicating in advance."

No matter who the dad is, Odyans has noticed that they all have something in common on their journey to parenthood. Whether it's the birth, the return home and the adjustment to everyday life, or maintaining a healthy relationship, every effort is appreciated. Is the dad we become defined by the dad we had? Find out in the next episode of Odyans.

Legal deposit, Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec, 2024