Parenting: Why Aren't More People Worried?

For some reason right now, I’m more worried about parenting than about the actual childbirth process (maybe that has to do with the fact that I’m not the one actually carrying the baby.) Regardless, why aren’t more people worried about parenting? I mean, if you think about it, parenting is a job. A 24/7 job that never ends. I know nothing of parenting, yet I am going to be a parent, and therefore I am going to have to do some “parenting.” There is no training – okay, there are some books that I’m going to read (actually a lot, you’ll hear about that later) and the hospital offers classes, although usually most people take the childbirth classes which we’ve signed up for, but not the post-birth classes.

Back to parenting being a job. Think about this: If I told you that I decided to quit my job in accounting and I’m going to be your nanny for your kid for the rest of his life, what would you say? Something probably along the lines of “you don’t know a thing about taking care of a kid, I’m not going to hire you!” But then why is it okay for me to take care of my own kid then? I wouldn’t even hire myself to take care of my own kid, but then why is it okay for me to be a parent?

I can understand that raising a family is a right given to anyone. Some will say that parenting comes naturally, that there is an intuition that is genetically encoded in us, that we already know how to take care of a kid and therefore no class is needed. That’s nice and all, I’m sure I can wing it and still do okay, but is doing just okay good enough? I mean, look at how crazy our dog is. Humans (in some form) have been working and living with dogs for ages, back when they roamed the lands, yet that genetic coding for taking care of dogs seems to be missing in many people. Why wouldn’t it be the same for the genetic coding for parenting? As another example, we must be genetically encoded to hunt for our own food, but the best that I do is get a grocery shopping list over e-mail from Kari and head on over to QFC, and that is the extent of my hunter/gatherer instincts.