What's the best age to become a father?

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/07/whats-the-best-age-to-become-a-father

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David Marsh, Guardian production editor, whose fourth child was born when he was 58

I became a father for the first time at 25. And for the last time at 58. My first had been due on general election day in May 1979, when Margaret Thatcher was elected, although he did not put in an appearance until three weeks later. My initial thoughts: no wonder he looks so squashed, and thank goodness he will be too young to remember when we had a Tory government. Little did we realise at the time… My last was born in February 2012 (looking squashed, but at least he will be too young to remember when we had a Tory-led coalition government).

You'd have to ask my older sons how I did as a dad, but they haven't turned out too badly – in fact, they are lovely young men, all now in their early 30s, one with children of his own, my two beautiful granddaughters. My view is that I am a better father now, mainly because although I'm still working I am able to spend so much more time with Freddie than when I was young and ambitious and, let's admit it, a workaholic – like most twentysomethings trying to establish themselves in a job notable for long, antisocial hours. Ring any bells?

Nathan Ditum, writer who became a father at 20

Oh, definitely, but then I'm yet to meet a father who hasn't wished for more opportunities to be with his children at one time or another.

I became a father for the first time at 20, with a few weeks left as an undergraduate. It wasn't planned – at least not for that particular moment – and there were challenges. It's overwhelming to be responsible for another person when you barely have a grasp on the person you'd like to be. And, as you suggest, the effort of guiding a new life isn't always the best fit with the effort needed to shape your own.

But sometimes it can be. Until Jay was five years old I remained at university as a postgraduate. I had the flexibility to shift my research into the darker corners of the clock in order to spend what I now consider invaluable hours reading, puzzling and feeling a way into the world with my son.

I'd never be dogmatic about the choices we made because, honestly, different people with different ambitions, family support and expectations will thrive as parents at different times in their lives. But I treasure the fact that I believed passionately and uncomplicatedly (in that impossible way only the young can) that my job was to raise a thoughtful, generous person, and I had the chance to get started before the entanglements of life crept up around us.

DM I'm impressed. When I was an undergraduate I could barely take care of myself, let alone a young child. Which is my point: in my 20s, I didn't have a clue about anything, really.

It sounds as if you were an exception, and as you say, everyone is different; but how many people could, or should, be taking on the responsibility of bringing up a child within a couple of years of leaving school themselves? My parents, and their parents, tried that in previous generations, and it led to a lot of unhappy, unfulfilled lives – especially for women.

You are right about entanglements, but I have good news: there comes a point when they start to disentangle. As I've got older, I've seen my priorities change and life become simpler again. I'm lucky to be part of a large extended family that brings me such joy – Freddie and his brothers, my grandchildren, my wife and her family, uncles and cousins, four generations straddling 90 years – and, I'm delighted to say, we all get on. After all the years of striving, suddenly I only have one ambition: to live long enough to, in your phrase, help my youngest son feel his way into the world. And we are both loving every moment.

ND How many people could take on the responsibility of bringing up a child within a couple of years of leaving school themselves? I don't know… but then I wouldn't have backed myself before it happened, and I've had at least some part in shaping two children I'm enormously proud of. Which is why I'm not so sure my kids and I are the exception. Being very young gave me something that experience would not have, and idealism and experience seem equally viable routes to successful parenting.

The life you describe sounds good – I can't imagine a better one to aim for. But in the meantime, I'm making the most of being closer than most to the age of my children. Being physically active together is great fun, and without reeling out the "football in the park" cliche, it's also the best way I have of encouraging my children to stay healthy and feel capable within, and happy about, their bodies.

But more than that, there's less distance between us and our perspective on the world. I'm sure we'll diverge more significantly and – for them – embarrassingly at some point, but for now this lack of distance allows me to sit somewhere between an authority and a friend.

DM Sorry this reply is a bit late. It was my turn to take Freddie to his Music with Mummy class (one advantage of being an ageing baby boomer is that I can work part-time and share childcare responsibilities with his mum 50/50).

I wonder what I'd be doing now as a 60-year-old bloke, if I wasn't a 60-year-old bloke with a two-year-old son. Looking forward to retirement, perhaps – a spot of gardening, bird and butterfly watching, some travel, reading all those books I never got round to in my 20s, as a stressed-out young dad. Well, I can do all that with Freddie and it's much more fun: planting marigolds together in his tub; teaching him to identify the chirrup of a chaffinch or the exquisite markings of a peacock butterfly; exploring by bus (soon to be free for both of us); and lots of books – albeit Peppa Pig rather than Penguin Classics, at least for now.

We play football (and rugby) in the park too. Embarrassingly? Indeed; I was an embarrassment to my older sons, and no doubt still am, and look forward confidently to becoming one to Freddie too. As you say, it's all part of being a dad, at whatever age. I may be older, but I feel I am a better father now because I am a little wiser and a lot calmer – able not only to cope but to embrace the joyful chaos brought into my life by this wonderful person I have helped bring into the world.

ND Interesting… sometimes I wonder what I'd be doing if children hadn't happened so early. Looking at a great many of my friends who are also around the 30 mark, I'd most likely be planning a family and still anxiously wondering whether we were prepared enough to take it all on.

When Jay was born, I was young enough to still be sceptical of adults – the established ones, wrapped up in the things that facilitate life rather than life itself. And I spent a lot of time feeling conspicuously young and out of place, at school, at parents' groups, even at extended family gatherings. But it's impossible for me to see our children now and think we did anything other than a good job bringing them up.

As I say, I don't consider us exceptional – having seen what we were capable of when challenged while young, I have no problem encouraging other people in the first thrust of adulthood to have children, if they have the things and people around them that they need.