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Tag: fathers

Dads are just as vital as mums for kids

Although it’s vital to support young men to make sense of images of sexuality that are largely devoid of meaningful relationships, and to encourage them to be mindful about how much time they spend online, when we work with boys in schools one of the topics that incites the most animated discussion is both much closer to home, and far less likely to usually be raised as worthy of discussion — parenting.

Perhaps there’s an assumption boys won’t be interested in exploring what it might mean to be a father. After all, as little boys they are far more likely to have been given an action figure to play with than a baby doll. TV tropes have long had us believe dads are a bunch of disinterested, bumbling slackers (from Fred Flintstone through to Homer Simpson).

And despite the rise of more dad-friendly commercials (an advertising trend known as “Dadvertising”) the vast majority of messages we receive about parenting still feature mothers as the nurturers and primary caregivers.

Member for Perth Tim Hammond with his wife Lindsay and seven-month-old son Tully in Bayswater after announcing he was resigning from parliament. (Pic: Rebecca Le May/AAP)

The reality is though that thankfully more men are choosing to defy convention and take a more active role in their children’s lives. Men like Labor MP Tim Hammond who resigned from Parliament this week by confessing, “I realise this is very unexpected news. But as much as I have tried desperately, I just cannot reconcile my life as a Federal Member of Parliament with being the father I need — and want — to be to my three children.”

And men like the fly-in fly-out miners in North Queensland who have recently signed up to “Hair 101 For Dads”, a workshop being run by to help fathers learn how to do their daughter’s hair. Lucas Vidler, a coal miner, told local news reporter Zarisha Bradley, that as he is away working for six months ever year, when he’s home he wants to be as involved as possible: “A lot of dads don’t know how to do hair and often we have to do the (school) drop-offs…(in the past) I’ve dropped my daughter off with some pretty average hair.”

For those young lads who don’t have a father present in their lives, opportunities to connect with good dads are particularly valuable. Earlier this year a pastor in Dallas, Donald Parish Jr., put out a plea on Facebook for men who could act as male mentors for the students who didn’t have a dad to bring to the High School’s “Breakfast with Dads” event. “We know that the majority of our students were not going to have dads present,” Parish told USA Today. “Many students don’t have any males figures around, or at least the kind who would show up for a school event like this.”

Marcus Obermeder learns to braid the hair of his daughter Annabelle, 5 with some help from Leigh Dole at Blow Bar in Waverley. (Pic: John Appleyard)

The school had hoped for 50 fathers. On the morning of the event, 600 fathers, uncles and grandfathers lined up to help out. One of the volunteers, Assistant Chief of Police Jason Rodriguez, took to Twitter afterwards to share how moved he was being involved, “Powerful to see a community of fellow men and fathers come together to wrap their arms around or (sic) young men.”

I saw how life-changing it can be for young men to be connected to positive father-figures first hand at the conclusion of a mentoring program I once co-ordinated for young people at risk.

I asked one of the teen participants what he’d most enjoyed about the six months he spent working alongside a plumber, Paul, who had acted as his mentor. I had expected this lad might mention some of the construction projects I knew they had worked on together, but his reply was far more poignant.

He said, “Every morning we’d get in the van and first drop off Paul’s son to the lady who would mind him. Paul would get his son out of the car seat so carefully and talk to him so kindly. He’d kiss his baby goodbye and tell him how much he loved him.”

“I’d never seen a man do anything like that before”, he continued, “and I want to be that man too one day.”

When boys grow up to become involved dads, everyone wins.

This post was originally published in The Daily Telegraph, 5/5/18

The right way for dads to parent teen girls

As a best-selling author and educator who works with teen girls, I tend to get streams of emails seeking parenting advice. But the calls for help I get from parents wanting to improve their relationship with a teenage daughter are increasingly coming from dads.

Despite the popular perception that it is mothers who fear losing their bond with their daughter during adolescence, it seems there are plenty of fathers seeking deeper connections too.

Many of these men tell me that they found bonding with their daughter when she was younger relatively easy, but now that her interests are more adult how, they ask, are they expected to stay relevant?

The hundreds of conversations I’ve had with teen girls (and the wide body of research that supports their claims) tells us what won’t work. Any attempt to control her changing body, or lock their princess in the proverbial tower, will be met with rightful resentment.

It’s understandable for parents to want to protect their children. But it’s important our girls feel empowered to know how to set their own boundaries; particularly as the reality is most romantic exchanges won’t happen under dad’s watchful eye.

When asked about how he feels about his teen daughters dating, entertainer Harry Connick Jr offered a refreshing perspective, “Everybody always says, ‘Oh your daughters are dating, you better get the shotgun’… it drives me nuts because I think that’s such an antiquated way to talk about young women. It’s almost presuming that they don’t have the good judgment to go out with a guy that’s appropriate for them… The way we raise our kids? Hopefully they will have enough self esteem so that they will be able to attract guys of a certain calibre, and then you don’t need a damn shotgun.”

Actively seeking to build the self esteem Harry Connick Jr refers to is vital work for fathers too. The gentle teasing some dads find amusing is likely to grate with a teen girl who may be hypersensitive, particularly to comments around her appearance (don’t let all the pouting selfies fool you — these aren’t necessarily indicative of a solid sense of self).

Comedian Dawn French attributes her strong sense of self to her father and in her memoir Dear Fatty, describes a parenting moment par excellence. As she sashayed down the stairs on her way to a party, dressed to impress a boy she fancied, her dad pulled her aside. Rather than delivering the almost obligatory, “You’re not going out dressed like that!” lecture, he told her she was his sun, moon and stars — and that any man would be bloody lucky to have a woman like her on his arm.

She got to the party, saw the hot boy, and decided he probably wasn’t good enough for her after all.

Smart fathers will also seek out opportunities where they can learn more about their daughter’s changing world. Whether it be by asking her to explain why she loves a particular band and listening to their music with her (hey, you sat through hours of the Wiggles, you’ve got this), or offering to take her to that Instagram famous art gallery she’s so excited by (#LetHerLead).

Smart father realise too their own world is also one worth sharing. A colleague says that some of her fondest memories of her father when she was a young girl were of going to the hardware store with him on a Saturday morning, “He’d scoot thorough the aisles looking for supplies for his latest project. When I got my first house? I found myself doing the same thing every weekend and thinking back fondly on all the things he taught me how to fix.”

We can all be taught how to fix things. Even if there are angry silences, and shut bedroom doors, bonds built on trust, empathy, and mutual respect may bend a little — but they rarely break.

This post was originally published by The Daily Telegraph, 22/7/17.  

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