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"Helping families, children and adolescents
grow well."
The Importance of Being a Father
From "The Heart of Parenting" column
by Emory Luce Baldwin, LGMFT
Published in the Takoma Voice, June 2006
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It turns out that fathers who love and nurture their children do indeed contribute as much to a child's happiness,
well being, and social and academic success as loving and nurturing mothers do.
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Once upon a time, fathers really were the kings of their family domains. For one thing, they owned the castle. In addition, fathers got to say how the little princes and princesses would be brought up. When these old-fashioned Dads needed advice about how to train their progeny, they could consult the first parenting advice manuals that were addressed to fathers. It is a little known fact, but it is true that the authors of the first parenting advice pamphlets didn't even bother speaking to the mothers, because they assumed the fathers would tell the mothers what to do.
Eventually, the Industrial Revolution rolled in, and the Dads began to leave the home and farm to earn more money. By the time the Victorian era was in full bloom, middle class fathers were valued more and more for the paychecks they brought home and less and less for their child-rearing contributions. In the meantime, middle class mothers were 'promoted' to the role of 'domestic goddesses,' and they took on primary responsibilities for the children.
After WWII, when many middle class families moved to new suburban homes, commuting Dads spent even more time at work and less time with their families. Although two-parent families were still the norm then, many families were adapting to life without father most of the time. It's not clear that anyone missed them, perhaps because so many women then were foregoing their own careers to stay home with the children. Even the lovable fathers depicted in the TV family sit-coms of the 50's and 60's were often shown as bumbling doofuses, who were tolerantly indulged by their clever wives and kids.
Today, too many families and kids have had to learn how to get by without even a doofus Dad. As the rates of divorce and unwed childbirth have risen, the numbers of children growing up without a father in the home have also increased. Over a third of all children now live apart from their biological fathers, and 40% of those children haven't seen their fathers for the past year.
It's been a long, hard fall from glory for fathers. The traditional "Father/Authority Figure" is out of date, and it is hard to tell what there is to take its place. If a father is worth something more than his sperm and his paycheck-than what exactly do Dads contribute to their children's lives?
Does it make any difference to children, for instance, whether their Dads change their stinky diapers or play a game of checkers with them or go to the school fairs with them?
For years, Moms have gotten most of the credit (and all of the blame!) for good and bad child rearing. Virtually all child development research has focused on mothers and children-often because it was simply easier for researchers to find and interview the mother than it was for them to talk to the father. Many parenting experts have reinforced this perspective further by continuing to focus on the Moms, and treating the Dads as amateurs.
But change is in the air. Spurred by a diverse coalition of children's advocates, conservative family organizations, and fathers protesting child custody decisions, among others, family researchers are making up for years of neglect by paying new attention to what a child gains from their father's love, care, and attention.
The preliminary results of these studies are encouraging. It turns out that fathers who love and nurture their children do indeed contribute as much to a child's happiness, well being, and social and academic success as loving and nurturing mothers do. Children who are involved with loving fathers, as well as mothers, are also more likely to have a healthy self-image, to behave pro-socially, and to avoid high risk behaviors such as drug abuse, truancy, and criminal activity.
Common sense tells us that all children benefit from being cared for in a stable and predictable home with loving caregivers-regardless of whether those caregivers are male or female, straight or gay, biological or adoptive, mothers or fathers. Common sense also tells us, and research is now confirming, that fathers are not superfluous. Kids with two parents caring for them get a better deal in life than kids with one parent. Children don't need their Dads to be kings or clowns, pay checks or power-rangers, but they do need their Dads to show up, to stick around, and to hang in there-because, in the end, Dads really do matter.
Emory Luce Baldwin, LGMFT, is both an experienced parent educator with the Parent
Encouragement Program (PEP) and a Family Therapist working with families with
children and adolescents in Takoma Park and Kensington.
For information about PEP classes and programs,
contact PEP at 301-929-8824 or visit www.ParentEncouragement.org.
To contact Emory, call 301-588-1451 or e-mail emory@emorylucebaldwin.com
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