Leaving for University First and Being a Stay at Home Dad
About Dave Williams
Dave Williams is a dad with two girls aged 8 and 13. You will find him in Kilchberg, Zurich driving his daughters to school and working with computers. He is usually wearing t-shirts and shorts and is ready to help his daughters with their homework. It might come as a surprise that he was the first of his family to go to university and he has now chosen to be a stay at home dad.
What was it like leaving your family to go to university?
“It was very different, so it’s not like I saw older brothers and sisters go to university before and knew what to expect. I didn’t really know anyone that had been to university. It was a very much unknown experience but very exciting at the same time… I went to do maths and I really enjoyed the subject. It was exciting to be able to do that. When I got there it was an all new experience but it was all very good.”
What are pros and cons of going to university?
“f you really enjoy academic studies, it’s a great way to stretch your mind further and learn new ideas and concepts and be with like minded people.The con is that if [university]is not your kind of thing and you just you want a less academic work then it’s probably not the best thing.It’s difficult moving away from family for the first time but because it was something I really wanted to do it was quite easy to then settle in.”
What was it like to become a stay at home dad?
“…it you go through lots of different… different emotions I think so to start with its lot of fun getting to spend because you were one when I stopped working one and a half and we moved to america at that time and just being able to spend so much time with you going to the beach going to playgrounds that was all really good fun and uh yeah then you then have the difficult thing that the stay at home dad is a lot less common that the stay at home mom.”
“It's not like I saw older brothers and sisters go…to university ”
-Dave Williams
Do you have any advice for dads who want to become a stay at home dad?
“Um It's great fun it's worth doing you won’t regret it but you've just got to get stuck in and just go to the playgroups and everything else…and it has to be a choice some of the dads that you ocanisily see at these things that kind of had to do it um and they resent it and they don’t seem to engage and it doesn't seem to work as well so you have to want to. You have to want to do it and then um yeah just just get stuck into it”
“You've got to just get stuck in and just go to the playgroups”
