My child arrived just the other day,
He came to the world in the usual way.
But there were planes to catch and bills to pay.
He learned to walk while I was away.
And he was talking ‘fore I knew it, and as he grew,
He’d say, “I’m gonna be like you, Dad.
You know I’m gonna be like you.”

Harry Chapin, “Cat’s In The Cradle”

 

Parents are the most important people in a child’s world.  To most young children who spend the bulk of their time with their moms, their dads seem almost like superheroes.  No matter how ordinary a man seems to other adults, in the eyes of his kids, he is awesome.  When kids reach the adolescent, “parents aren’t cool,” stage of wanting independence they are not yet ready for, their fathers’ involvement matters even more.   
 

The January 2006 Newsweek article, “The Trouble With Boys,” by Peg Tyre states, “One of the most reliable predictors of whether a boy will succeed or fail in high school rests on a single question: does he have a man in his life to look up to?”   Dads matter to girls, too.  Girls from fatherless homes are more likely to become teenaged mothers than are those from two parent families.  Fatherless children of both sexes are more likely to engage in sex as teenagers than those from intact homes.
 

Children without fathers tend to have more behavioral problems and are more likely to perform poorly in school than children who live with their dads.  Teenagers who grow up in single parent homes are more prone to smoking, drinking alcohol and experimenting with drugs.  Children and teenagers from fatherless homes are more likely to run away from home.  Teenagers who do not live with their fathers are more likely to be truant from school and more likely to drop out of high school than are those whose fathers reside in the home.  Children and teenagers who have little contact with their fathers are also at increased risk of juvenile delinquency and suicide.
 

When a father doesn’t live with his children due to divorce or to other circumstances, his involvement with them can reduce those risks.  A 1999 study by researchers at University of Maryland Medical School and University of Maryland Baltimore County found that, when fathers of three year olds played active roles in their lives, the children developed better language skills and had fewer behavioral problems than those without involved fathers.  This occurred even when the involved fathers did not live with the children.    Mothers hurt their children when they attempt to limit or deny visitation in order to punish the fathers.
 

Fathers do some things mothers can’t do.  Foremost, a father shows his kids what a man is supposed to be.  This teaches sons how to become men and teaches daughters what to realistically expect from men.  A father’s example is vital in an age when males are frequently portrayed as either villains or fools in dramas or as morons in sitcoms and commercials.  A father shows his children that men can solve problems, take responsibility, give moral guidance, teach life skills and make them feel loved, protected and secure.   A father doesn’t have to be involved in every aspect of his children’s lives to do so.  Even when “there are planes to catch and bills to pay,” children realize their dad loves them and learn from his advice and his example.
 

Additionally, fathers provide a male perspective on life.  Men sometimes interpret personal situations, academic problems and community issues differently than women do.  A father’s advice and insight increases a child’s understanding of life.  This helps children relate to boys and men.  It teaches them that men and women are neither the same nor so different that “men are from Mars and women are from Venus.”
 

Since the rise of feminism, fatherhood, (and, to a lesser degree, motherhood), has been devalued.  It shouldn’t be.  The absence of a father is detrimental to children.  When people become parents, they create the next generation.  The upbringing of that generation determines what its values will be.  A father expressed the scope of a parent’s job perfectly when he said, “My highest priority is to nurture this new life, with love and also meeting her physical, spiritual and intellectual needs.”  That is a huge responsibility to take on, yet one that is vital to our society’s future.
 

His daughter will be grateful to him as I am to my father.  Dad died in 1999, but I still miss him and wish I could talk to him again.  Harry Chapin’s, “Cat’s In The Cradle,” ends with, “But we’ll get together then, Dad. You know we’ll have a good time then.”  Dad and I got together as often as we could and had good times, but there is no longer a “then.”  Call your dad, thank him, wish him a happy Fathers’ Day and arrange to get together now instead of “then.”
 

Copyright Eva Ellsworth, 06/18/06, all rights reserved