Ben Patterson was just an ordinary dad taking care of his kids so that his wife could enjoy a night out with friends. But when his toddler vomited during the car trip home, Ben became the subject of ‘parenting comedy gold’.
Having pulled over, Ben took a photo of the vomit covered tot and sent it to his wife along with the message ‘so this just happened.’
He then continues to provide his wife with a detailed running commentary of his clean up attempts, including several pleas for her to “ANSWER [HER] PHONE”.
Anyone who has ever had to deal with a vomit-in-car situation will understand Ben’s pain. The vomit smells “SO bad!” he is a “sympathetic vomiter”.
Things go from bad to worse. The vomit smell is so intense that Ben has to “puke on some lady’s lawn”. And of course this is followed by the’ lady’ coming out to ask if Ben is drunk.
Inevitably the police then show at the scene and he is breathalysed.
There is no denying that Ben’s puke inspired crisis is pretty funny from the outside. But while it’s easy to enjoy a laugh at his expense, there is one element to his plight that irks me: the text messaging.
We don’t know much about Ben and Stephanie and their usual childcare arrangements. But from Ben’s preamble we can assume that he has agreed to ‘watch the kids’ so that she can have a night out.
But when things go wrong his first thought is to call his wife.
When stories like this appear in the media they conjure up an image of a hopeless dad who hasn’t got a clue what he’s doing. It’s just another way of reinforcing the out-dated idea that dads can’t cope with being left in charge of their own offspring.
While in the majority of households mothers remain the primary carer, modern dads are sharing more of the parenting load. But despite it being 2016, dads often find themselves being praised for taking an active role in their kids’ lives.
This is something that Al Ferguson from The Dad Network feels passionately about. He sparked a conversation about the role of the modern dad when he posted a photo of himself wearing a t-shirt with the slogan ‘dads don’t babysit, it’s called parenting’ on social media.
“I’ve had people ask me ‘Are you looking after the kids today?’ Or ‘I can tell you’ve dressed the baby today,'” he told the BBC.
“It’s just out of date. The modern dad is more active in their family life than they were historically. It’s out of date to assume the mum is the primary caregiver.”
This type of gendered stereotyping isn’t good for anyone.
So have a laugh about Ben Patterson’s puke fest nightmare, but don’t feel too sorry for him. He was just being a dad; let’s not make him a martyr.
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