Can Men Prevent Child Abuse?

April is child abuse prevention month, which prompts this question: how often do we think of men as central figures in promoting kids’ safety?

This morning, I was reading the Minnesota Fathers and Families network blog (http://www.mnfathers.org/blog/?p=13), which had some answers to the question:

We hope that all men from all walks of life will take steps to become lifelong advocates for children’s safety.The safety of children has always been a principal role of fathering. For generations and across cultures, men have stepped up to be the protector of the family — providing safeguards against the forces that would cause harm. Most fathers take pride in ensuring safety against poverty, against disease, against hunger, and against violence.

During the month of April, we honor these men for building safe havens in their homes and in their communities.

However, all too often, our culture, media, and family structures, also create environments that enable men to be the cause of harm. When violence is glorified or quietly accepted, we all share in the esponsibility for causing pain. It is for this reason that MFFN is spreading the message that healthy men are central elements for creating safety for our kids.

Throughout this Child Abuse Prevention Month, we encourage fathers and father-figures to advocate for child safety. We challenge you to speak up against words of violence and to step in when children are in danger. Healthy fatherhood demands no less.

For more information about Child Abuse Prevention Month, visit Prevent Child Abuse Minnesota at www.pcamn.org.

So, here’s another question: what are you doing to expect and ensure that dads, stepdads and other men are central figures in promoting kids’ safety?

“They’ll let any [expletive deleted] be a father.”

I think every prospective parent should watch the movie Parenthood before getting pregnant. The film could easily be called Fatherhood, since the main character is a dad. That movie makes clear some central truths about fathering:

1. It is like a roller coaster.
2. While you can’t guarantee how your actions will affect your children, You can guarantee that your actions do affect your children.

My favorite line from Parenthood is when Keanu Reeves’ character Tod says, “You need a license to buy a dog or drive a car. Hell, you even need a license to catch a fish. But they’ll let any [expletive deleted] asshole be a father.”

With that bit of earthy humor Tod explains the biggest dilemma a father faces: No one trained me for this job. My daughter doesn’t come with an operator’s manual, plug-and-play attachments, or downloadable upgrades.

Despite this, dads today have more freedom than ever to take “nontraditional” approaches to fathering. Many men take time away from their careers to stay home with their children while their partners return to the workplace. Other men work part-time or telecommute so they can commune with the kids every possible moment. Some men even teach HeadStart and early childhood parent education classes!

In other words, you don’t have to father the same way your father or grandfather did. You can be your own kind of Dad. That opportunity is liberating and exciting, but can also be disconcerting. After all, it’s harder to find examples to follow when you’re doing things in a new way.

Fortunately, nature provides tools that you may not yet be conscious of. For example, from the moment of birth, you and your baby can instinctively communicate with each other, even though it’ll be a year or more before she uses words.

In his book The Collected Wisdom of Fathers, my favorite fathering author Will Glennon, a dad’s biggest challenge isn’t mastering the “proper” way to change a diaper or teach your kid to read. The biggest challenge is to set aside obsolete attitudes about a father’s role and to begin fathering from our hearts. That means becoming conversant in the sometimes foreign language of emotion.

Communicating our love to our children and acknowledging their importance in our life is an undertaking of enormous significance, for our children, for our own well-being, and for generations of fathers yet to come. Historically and socially, we are conditioned to be able to put aside our feelings in order to fight. Now the purpose for which we must fight is to become fully engaged with our feelings in order to reinstate ourselves in our proper place in our children’s lives. The effort requires courage and determination, for this is new territory, an area in which we will no doubt make mistakes.

Part of fathering is teaching our children important tasks. But the heart of fathering is nurturing the psychological, emotional, and spiritual connection between us and our kids.

As we attempt to father well, we make mistakes, some of which will seem pretty dumb. Let’s face it, a few of them actually will be dumb. But we can’t let our mistakes stop us, any more than your infant will let her “mistake” of falling down keep her from learning to walk—even if the culture magnifies our mistakes.

Learn more about fathering daughters in Dads and Daughters: How to Inspire, Understand, and Support Your Daughter.

Silence is Optional

Men today are longing to have good relationships with their children. But there have been generations of silence about what it means to be a father. We didn’t hear our own dads talk about it.

At my fathering workshops the most moving moment is when I ask, ‘How many of you feel like you’ve been changed as a man by having this daughter? Stand up if you can tell me one or two or three things that are different for you.’ Everyone in the room stands.

Then I ask, ‘Stand up if your father ever spoke to you about how he was changed as a man by you being his child.’ Often no one stands, and rarely more than 3 men stand. That’s a very emotional moment.

So many of us dads never heard anything on the subject from our own fathers. That’s really sad. However, it’s also an opportunity to break that cycle of silence, and talk to other fathers (including our own) about it.

In the process of writing my book Dads & Daughters®: How to Inspire, Understand and Support Your Daughter, I conducted in-depth interviews with about 130 men across the US, and corresponded with hundreds more. Women are always startled to learn that fully half of these men said I (a perfect stranger) was the first person they’d ever talked to in depth about fatherhood. Me aren’t surprised, because we’re so accustomed to father silence.

The good news? With only a handful of exceptions, the fathers I interviewed were articulate and passionate; we have a lot to say about the experience and importance of being a dad. And while all of that had gone unspoken until the moment of our interview, those men and I quickly learned there’s real power in asking.

The Art of Giving and Asking

Each family has a heritage of how we give to others and how we ask for what we need.

Below is the last series of questions to help you and your daughter talk about the art of giving and asking. It was inspired by Rich Snowden of California, a life coach and Daughters.com fan.

You and your daughter should write down your answers to these questions on separate pieces of paper. Then, share you answers with each other and then ask (don’t preach) and talk to learn more.

When asking for help, did you ever feel obligated to give up something important to you—even if the other person didn’t explicitly ask you to? Describe what you did and how it felt.

How has your giving and asking for help changed or developed over time? Why has it changed?

Do you give mostly with your head or your heart? Or both?

How do you make your decisions about giving and asking for help? Do you plan ahead?

Do you give or ask for help in the moment when something inspires you? Both?

Use the comment section below to share some of the insights you’ve gained about your daughter—and yourself—by pondering the art of giving and asking--and consider giving a gift of New Moon Girls to a girl you care about!

Relationship Abuse

Recent news about singer Chris Brown prompted our friends at Jewish Women International to send this reminder--which is a good one for us dads and stepdads to remember:

Relationship abuse can affect anyone – regardless of age, race, gender, religion or sexual orientation. It’s an all-too-common nightmare where words and fists leave emotional and physical scars, and in the most extreme cases, some victims never wake up.
Have you talked with the teens in your life about dating abuse?
One in five teens in a serious relationship report being hit, slapped or pushed by a partner, and nearly half of all tweens (ages 11-14) say they know friends who have been verbally abused (called stupid, worthless, ugly, etc.) by a dating partner.

It’s never too early; talk with the teen in your life today.

Dads Influence Daughters’ Career Paths

More evidence trickles in about dads' influence on daughters.


According to today's New York Times online, University of Maryland researchers find that fathers have a marked influence on their daughters’ career paths by passing on job skills and work interests.

According to the Times, the researchers “used various data sets to study the career paths of 63,000 women born between 1909 and 1977. … About 6 percent of women born in the first decade of the study worked in the same field as their fathers. But about 18 percent of women born in the last decade of the study followed their fathers’ footsteps.”

The study used various criteria to try and isolate how much of the shift was due to parental influence, and I think their assumptions make good sense.
I found a lot of father influence on daughters’ career choices while doing interviews for my book Dads & Daughters®: How to Inspire, Support and Understand Your Daughter. Over an over, adult women who had strong, healthy relationships with their dads told of the sense of agency and interest their fathers conveyed in regard to work and career.

Of course, career is just one of the infinite ways a dad influences his daughter or stepdaughter. So make sure your influence is positive by taking an active role in supporting her, taking her seriously and listening to her!

Girl Scouts Battle Cyberbullying

The Girl Media Maven blog has info an a new Girls Scouts of the USA initiative to help girls battle cyberbullying (i.e., online harrassment). Be sure to check out the link for parents, too.

Dads Impact Girls’ Math Interest

Dads have a major impact on the degree of interest their daughters develop in math. That's one of the findings of a long-term University of Michigan study that has traced the sources of the continuing gender gap in math and science performance.

(Chart: Number of math and science items purchased for boys and girls by parents.)

"We've known for a while now that females do as well as males on tests that measure ability in math and science," said Pamela Davis-Kean, a psychologist at the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR). "But women are still underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and math graduate programs and in careers based on those disciplines.

"It's as if women are saying, "I can, but I don't want to," according to Davis-Kean.

Researchers found that girls' interest in math decreases as their fathers' gender stereotypes increase, whereas boys' interest in math increases as their fathers' gender stereotypes increase."Fathers' gender stereotypes are very important in supporting—or in undermining—daughters' choices to pursue training in math and science," Davis-Kean said.

Davis-Kean and colleagues analyzed how parents' values and attitudes affect children's math performance and later interest, and how these attitudes vary by the child's gender. They used data from a longitudinal study of more than 800 children and a large group of their parents that began in 1987 and continued through 2000.

They found that parents provided more math-supportive environments for their sons than for their daughters, including buying more math and science toys for the boys. They also spent more time on math and science activities with their sons than with their daughters.

(Chart: Impact of father’s gender stereotypes on son’s and daughter’s interest in math.)

Davis-Kean and colleagues also found that parents' attitudes, particularly stereotypes they hold about whether math and science are more important for boys than for girls, have a significant effect on their children's later math achievement, and even on their eventual career choices.

Love Shouldn’t Hurt

If you've followed the news about Chris Brown's recent arrest, have you also been thinking about the disgrace of dating violence?

I spent most of Wednesday at the Minnesota State Capitol for 3 rallies related to ending family and partner violence. 1) A “Second Chance” coalition supporting resources for people leaving prison—so that they find work, learn healthier ways to settle conflict, and don’t return to prison. 2) the Men’s Action Network, an alliance to prevent sexual and domestic violence (sadly, even in 2009, there were 10 times as many women as men at this rally) and 3) the MN domestic violence coalition, which honored (under the Capitol rotunda) all those murdered in 2008 because of domestic violence.

Domestic and partner violence doesn’t spring up in a vacuum out of nowhere. It often begins in the beginnings of intimate relationships—dating.

Charles Blow collects and shares some frightening statistics about dating violence on the NY Times blogs this morning. Be sure to read it:

http://blow.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/12/love-shouldnt-hurt/

And then, be sure to take some action to short circuit dating violence.

Dads & Daughters® Valentine's Day Tips

Don't let Valentine's Day be just one more chance for Dad to feel like a walking, talking (and unappreciated) checkbook. These Dads & Daughters® Tips will help fathers and stepfathers to show daughters that they care on Valentine's Day and beyond.

1. Remember, a Daughter hungers for healthy involvement and attention from Dad (even if she doesn't always show it).

2. A Daughter wants assurance that her Father and/or Stepfather really knows her and cares about her.

3. A Daughter wants to feel that Dad is proud of her and that he loves and understands her.

4. A Daughter wants these intangibles far more than she wants a box of candy or any other present or card.

5. Daughters sometimes feel that Dads only know how to show their love by buying something. So supplement this year's store-bought Valentine's card and candy with your unique message of love.

6. Give her a hand-written note or personal email -- in your own words -- telling her how proud you are of her, what you admire about her, how much you enjoy your time together, etc.

7. Give her the greatest gift of all: your time. Listen to what she has to say and what's important to her.

8. Spend 1-on-1 time together on Valentine's Day or the next available weekend. See a movie, take a walk, go out for coffee or ice cream, play catch. There are a million possibilities (for more ideas, see The Dads & Daughters® Togetherness Guide: 54 Fun Activities to Help Build a Great Relationship).

9. Remember that she only gets one chance to have you as her Dad or Stepdad while she's still a girl.

10. Out of the thousand things you do every day, make sure you always give attention, thought, time, and affection to your Daughter -- and your Son.

Have a wonderful Valentine's Day with your children! Learn more about healthy fathering of girls at www.dadsanddaughters.com

© Joe Kelly. All Rights Reserved

The Abiding Power of Pippi

Astrid Lindgren was on to something. Lindgren was the Swedish author who created Pippi Longstocking--a book translated into more than 50 languages. It’s no wonder that children—especially girls—are so drawn to its protagonist.

Pippi is always irreverent, and straightforwardly rude to the pompous adults who seem to populate so many children’s lives. If you and your daughter have never read Pippi Longstocking, put down this issue, go to the library, and borrow it. If you have read it, you know that Pippi is the gleeful 9-year-old orphaned daughter of a sea captain.

Backed up by the captain’s treasure chest of gold coins, she lives alone in Villa Villekulla, with only a horse and monkey for company. Pippi has moved in next door to two average, well-behaved children named Tommy and Annika, who quickly fall into Pippi’s orbit.

Tommy and Annika represent the book’s readers as they learn how fun, constructive, and reasonable it is for a girl to run her own life, ignoring the judgments other people cast on her behavior or her bright red stick-out ponytails. These are the elements that made Pippi Longstocking an international sensation.

In its obituary for Lindgren, the New York Times quoted a 1985 interview in which the author discussed Pippi’s impact:
“Bertrand Russell has written that a child dreams about power as grown-ups dream sexual wish dreams. This is a child who has power. That is wonderful, for children to think, ‘Oh, if I were like Pippi! I could say to Father, ‘You don’t do that!’ She has power, but she never misuses that power, which I think is the most splendid thing, and the most difficult.”

Lindgren’s words, and her archetypal Pippi, confirm one of the most important realities about our daughters, and one of the key challenges we face as their parents: Our daughters have power—real power, not the faux “Girl Power” merchandised to sell them Power- Puff Girls lunch boxes. They have the power to say no or yes—power it can be delightful to use, as Pippi demonstrates.

How does she do it? Pippi gives free reign to her power because she’s unfettered by adults’ interference. Of course, Pippi Longstocking is a fairy tale, and real girls have adults overseeing their lives. And that’s where a big parental challenge lies, because our supervision can so easily become stifling.

We have to walk a fine line between overprotecting them and providing our daughters the opportunity (and freedom) to exercise their power. And I mean exercise in the literal sense—try it out, see how it works, test its limits, strengthen its positive effect. That’s counterintuitive for parents.

Usually, when we think about “empowering” girls, we think of giving them the power to say no to threats and violations of their bodies. What’s different about Pippi is that she seizes her innate power and uses it to say yes to honesty, creativity, and the excitement of being alive.

It’s unsettling to consider allowing our daughters to exercise their power. They might, like Pippi, do something we consider outrageous, such as inviting a horse to dinner. But our daughters need their power to be fully alive. It’s like a muscle; it needs exercise, practice, and honing to work its best.

Perhaps our goal might be to say of our own daughters what Astrid Lindgren once said of Pippi: They have power, and they use it wisely.

Learn more @ http://www.dadsanddaughters.com/

The Hidden Baby Gate

Moms and dads do things differently. In fact, any two parents will do things differently (regardless of gender) because they are two different people. Kids benefit from the difference, so we parents have to make sure that our kids are exposed to both parenting styles.

To calm a crying infant, you may sit with perfect quiet in a rocking chair, slowly easing her to sleep. To calm that same crying infant, I may walk the floor, jabber nonsense, and bounce her on my knee until she tires and goes to sleep.

One way isn’t better or worse than the other, since both methods got the baby to stop crying and go to sleep. Even better, she learned that there is more than one way to nurture and to bond with more than one nurturer.

Parenting research indicates that a father is more likely to carry an infant so that she is facing away from him, while a mother is more likely to carry the baby facing towards her. Your baby needs both perspectives. It’s good for her to explore the world and it’s good for her to know her family intimately. It doesn’t matter which parent provides which—and it’s probably best if both parents provide a little bit of both.

Nevertheless, we tend to judge or rank different baby-care strategies, not based on whether they work in the end, but rather on how closely they mirror our method or the method we grew up thinking was the “right” one.

That vision is usually one that conforms tightly to worn-out stereotypes about which gender is supposed to do what when it comes to child-rearing. That limited vision is arbitrary, counterproductive, and completely inadequate to the demands of raising children in today’s world.

The key is to remember that most infants have more than one parent for very good reasons. Don’t let either parent be locked out, because that’s not good for the child.

Learn more @ www.thedadman.com

© Joe Kelly

Ten Tips for Dads to Promote Daughters' Sports

Why should your daughter or stepdaughter participate in sports & physical activity? To be more healthy (in mind & body), feel better about herself, learn new skills, stay off alcohol & drugs, defer sexual activity, and, TO HAVE FUN! Sadly, some people worry that girls are too delicate, unskilled, or inadequate to play sports. To which the smart father and stepfather reply: "Baloney." In anticipation of February 4, National Girls and Women in Sports Day, here are 10 Tips to help Dads provide the kind of support Daughters need.

1. Make sports fun from an early age. Keep a relaxed approach when she's young. For example, have athletic-theme parties, like kickball and pizza.

2. Demonstrate interest in her athletic programs and activities. Attend her games and other extracurricular activities. If you live away from your daughter, be sure to talk with her after every game to hear how it went.

3. Learn the importance of physical activity for girls. Read research from organizations like the Women's Sports Foundation (e.g.: "Go Out & Play") and Kids' Sports Psychology.

4. Leave coaching to coaches. Tina Syer of the Positive Coaching Alliance says, "You're there to fill the kids' emotional tanks and make sure they bounce back from mistakes, not to tweak their throwing motion or tell them where to be on the field." Be smart about choosing coaches tuned in to her age and skill level. If there's a lack of adequate coaches, sign up to volunteer!

5. Be a model fan. Cheer hard for your girl, and then cheer for everyone else who is playing, too. Think about what you would look like on the sidelines if someone were videotaping you instead of the game. Be sure you (and your daughter) would be proud of what you'd see. Every kid (and parent) should remember why they call it "playing" sports. And then encourage her to be a fan of college and professional women's sports like the WNBA--by becoming a fan yourself!

6. Ask, "What do you and I hope to get from the experience?" Then tell her what you hope she gets. If you don't talk (and listen), she may assume all you care about is a winning record or how good her stats are. Make sure she knows you want sports to be a fun place to make friends, test herself, be healthy, and feel good about herself.

7. Let her play with boys. In "Raising Our Athletic Daughters: How Sports Can Build Self-Esteem and Save Girls' Lives," Jean Zimmerman and Gil Reavill suggest utilizing coed or single-sex programs according to your daughter's comfort level and what will contribute most to her learning and growth.

8. Help her use "mistakes" productively. When she messes up, she'll look to you first. So illustrate how to put mistakes in perspective by a) showing her how to let go of them and b) encouraging (but not demanding) her to use them as motivation to improve her skills.

9. Make sure girls and boys have equal sports opportunities and resources. Support Title IX and encourage school and other sports programs to be aware of and promptly address inequities.

10. Keep a relaxed, fun approach. Team sports teach girls how to be self-reliant while also working collaboratively to be competitive. If she loses interest in sports, you and she can still be physically active together--and books like The Dads & Daughters® Togetherness Guide have plenty of other ways to relate and have fun together.

Learn more about healthy fathering of daughters @ www.DadsandDaughters.com.

© Joe Kelly

That Little Camera

So many memorable images on this historic Inauguration day. But the one that was most striking to me as a father was Malia Obama taking pictures with her pocket-sized digital camera (this photo is from the other day—she’s been snapping all weekend).

This Inauguration may be the most photographed event in human history, and anyone can find thousands of professional photos of the day. But seeing Malia photographing gives me the sense that she’s present—fully experiencing the remarkable events as a kid would experience any other special event in her life—like an aunt’s marriage or a Grand Canyon trip.

She’s just going through this experience in a remarkably normal way. If I was Malia’s father, my greatest hope for her over the next four years would be a profound, rooted sense of “normal” in her life. The fact that Malia is snapping pictures with a small camera (and is home tonight watching “Bolt”) tells me that she’s being very lovingly and well-raised by her parents and grandmother.

That’s a great blessing, when seen through this dad’s eyes.

Are girls still being held responsible for dating violence?

That’s a hard question to ask—because it speaks to both our tendency to re-victimize victims of violent crime and to our ongoing struggle to develop healthy concepts of masculinity.

Thanks to my friends at Hardy Girls Healthy Women in Maine, I learned about a commentary in American Prospect by Courtney E. Martin, a young writer I’ve known for many years. Martin makes a pretty compelling case for rethinking our efforts are ending dating violence.

She cites the example of Boston, where The Boston TenPoint Coalition and Boston School Police put on a program that tells girls “you must prevent your boyfriends from becoming violent”

What is your take on dating violence and its prevention? Share your thoughts below.

The “I’ll Always....” Agreement

If we want our daughters to make smart, healthy decisions, then we have to do the same ourselves. That’s not always easy to do—but here’s a possible solution to help both Dad & Daughter.

Draft an agreement in which you and your daughter each commit yourselves to take care of yourself. For example, you might vow to quit smoking and she vows to not start. You could promise to get a yearly physical and your daughter might promise to avoid parties where alcohol will be consumed. Plus, the document can include steps that each of you can take to help look out for the other. Your daughter could encourage you while you quit smoking, and you can promise to always come get her if she finds herself at a party where people are drinking or doing drugs.

A contract like this encourages communication about specific (and often difficult to discuss) situations like alcohol, drugs, peer pressure and being healthy. Continuous and open father-daughter communication is critical in helping your daughter make healthy decisions.

Dad Can Balance Work & Family, Too

A few years ago, while I was discussing fathering issues on a national TV talk show, the self-described “Gen-X” host called on a teen girl and her dad in the audience. The host asked the girl, “What’s your biggest issue with your dad right now?”

“When I was little, it seemed like we were best buddies,” she replied. “Now he works so much that I hardly get to see him. I want to spend more time with him.”

“Dad,” the host asked the father, “how do you respond to that?”

“Well, the demands of the job seem to be tougher and tougher each year,” he said. “It’s just hard to find time with her.”

The host interrupted the father and asked incredulously, “But Dad. How many 17-year-old girls say they want to spend more time with their fathers?”

That question seemed to cut to the heart of something important. I know from personal experience how hard it can be for us dads to see what’s important when we strive to balance the demands of paid work and fatherhood. While surveys indicate that younger dads increasingly list family time as a priority, most fathers still tend to judge our contributions to the family by the size of our paychecks.

We men must broaden our definition of being a “successful provider” to include providing our time and our experience, as well as our affection, knowledge, and stories. It’s crucial that dads join mothers in the battle to win family-friendly workplace policies and legislation, particularly because our fellow fathers still lead most of this country’s large businesses and institutions. These guys set the policies that either encourage or inhibit us from participating more fully in our children’s lives. These are the guys who influence the standards by which we measure success.

So start making your family concerns visible at work, and start talking with other dads about how they balance work and family. Listen to their ideas, and then use these insights to begin the process of changing your workplace and others throughout your community.

For me, this whole issue boils down to the ultimate bottom line. When I die, it’s unlikely my gravestone will say “Joe Kelly, he appeared on national TV because he wrote a bunch of fathering books.” What I hope it will say is “Joe Kelly, Dad.”

)For a list of my fathering workshops—including The Dad Man’s Guide to Work-Family Balance—visit http://thedadman.com/presentationtopics.)

10 Questions to Ask Over the Holidays

We Dads and Stepdads tend to have more time with our daughters during a big holiday week like this one. You might consider taking some of that time to engage in the kind of conversation you don’t normally have at “normal” times of year. Here are some questions she and you can ask each other to get the ball rolling (adapted from my book The Dads & Daughters® Togetherness Guide: 54 Fun Activities to Help Build a Great Relationship).

1. Can you name each other’s three best friends?


2. On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate the state of our relationship?


3. On a scale of 1 to 10, how crucial do you think Dad’s active involvement in Daughter’s life to her healthy growth and well-being?


4. Do you talk to other dads about being a dad? Why or why not?


5. When we’re together, what topics are you hoping I won’t mention?


6. What’s the most important thing that you think we should be talking about that we’re not talking about – or else not talking about enough?


7. Can Dad tell Daughter an important story from when he was her age?


8. What do wish we had more time to do together, just the two of us? (There are tons of ideas in The Dads & Daughters® Togetherness Guide.)


9. What is your greatest concern and greatest satisfaction in our relationship?


10. In your life today, what gives you the greatest joy? Satisfaction? Joy?

Have a wonderful Holiday week—and always remember to cherish your daughters and stepdaughters!

The Blame Game: Divorce Edition

Actor Alec Baldwin was on Larry King this week, hawking his new book. Perhaps this is small-minded of me, but I haven’t read it and don’t expect to. Baldwin is good on sitcoms, but has zero credibility with me on fatherhood. Why? Because he seems primarily interested in blaming someone for his troubles—and being bitter and angry about it.

To my mind, the bottom line is that Dad is the grown-up in any relationship with is child or stepchild. NOTHING anyone does justifies a father abusing his child. NOTHING. Nothing ANYONE does. Period. And by my lights, abusing a child includes hitting him, screaming obscenities at her over the phone, or engaging in spite-, ego- and power-driven battles with the child’s other parent(s).

As an advocate for fathers, I find it incredibly counter-productive when fathers focus so much attention, energy and verbiage on blaming someone else for their situation. I suspect that comment might piss some people off, so I’ll explain.

Strategically, the effort to improve fathers’ position/status/responsibility within the family is undermined when the loudest (and, often, ONLY) words folks hear about fathering are variations on these 2 sentiments: “mothers are b—chs” and “the courts (or “the people’s republic of insert-state-here”) are out to screw me/us.” And that’s merely the problems this creates strategically for the fatherhood movement—and says nothing about how such attitudes poison our very own children.

People who have followed my work over the years know that I’m a hard-ass on this subject. My job as a dad is to work on strengthening my relationship with my children. The first, primary step in that process is self-examination: looking at my own attitudes, values, words and actions. Close on its heels is the step of then responding to my self-examination (and the situations that life presents) in ways that best support and strengthen my children’s physical, emotional, spiritual and psychological growth. These steps regularly demand self-sacrifice. Self-sacrifice is seldom fun, but that's life; if I didn’t want to have any self-sacrifice, I should not have become a father (or a human being for that matter…but that’s another rant!)

Indeed, there is a strong argument that these steps are the ONLY things I can do. I can never control the attitudes, behaviors or words of another person—I can only control my own. So my job is to spend my energy keeping my side of the street as clean as I possibly can—not matter WHAT anyone else does.To quote my good friend (and non-custodial, divorced father) Bill Klatte: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the people I cannot change, the courage to change the people I can, and the wisdom to know it’s me.” (BTW, if you’re a divorced dad who hasn’t yet read Bill’s book Live-away Dads: Staying a Part of Your Children's Lives When They Aren't a Part of Your Home, then you’re operating with one hand tied behind your back.)

And to quote Thomas Aquinas: “Resentment is the sword with which we pierce our own soul” (Or as Phillip Fullmer put it when asked if he resented being fired as Tennessee’s football coach after all those years: “No, because resenting someone is like taking poison and expecting the other person to die.”)

There are many forums and men welcoming the message that the Alec Baldwins of the world disseminate. It’s always been one of my goals to fight messages of bitterness, blame and anger among dads. The best service fathers can give to one another is to engage in self-examination and support each other in doing the next right thing to help our daughter grow up healthy—even if she (or anyone else) tells us to “go f—k yourself” in the moments or weeks or years after we do the right thing.

My job is my job and my life is not someone else’s fault. To think or act otherwise is to think and act as a child. And when I’m a dad, someone else gets to be the child—not me.

“Stop Playing Like a Girl” Part 3

For the last couple of days, I’ve blogged about a dad who get annoyed when with his stepdaughters play “girlish” games like dress-up. As promised, today I’m providing some simple activities that stepdads and dads can do with their daughters to embrace and participate in girl play.

There are plenty of activities you and your daughter can share to stay connected in a healthy way while respecting your daughter’s need for independent play and physical boundaries as she grows up. Look at the following list for fun things to do together and then be inspired to find your own:

Get down on the floor and play dolls
Take dance lessons—or just make up dances @ home
Pillow fight
Gentle roughhousing
Hold hands while going for walks
Build something
Play in the pool
Lay in the hammock and look at the stars
Toboggan or sled
Give each other manicures
Let her put makeup on your face
Get dressed up yourself when she’s playing dress-up
Groom the dog

You can find dozens of other ideas in my book The Dads & Daughters® Togetherness Guide: 54 Fun Activities to Help Build a Great Relationship.