Daddyman Speaks Archive   Tim Hartnett, MFT is father to Molly at their home in Santa Cruz, CA. Tim also works part time as a writer, psychotherapist and men's group leader. If you have any feedback, or would like to receive the monthly column, "Daddyman Speaks" by Tim Hartnett regularly via email, (free and confidential) send your name and email address to E-Mail Tim Hartnett, 911 Center St. Suite "C", Santa Cruz, CA 95060, 831.464.2922 voice & fax.. Almost Killed by a Fashion Doll The American Question Asleep in My Arms Believing in Children's Goodness Boys will be .... The Best Father You Can Be The Biggest Stress In Today's Families Children's Friendships Circumcision A communal version of family Controlling Bossiness Crossing into and out of Dreamland The Daddyman's Christmas list The Daddyman's Dad "Dad, I'm bored." The Dad I want to Be Emotional Abuse Defined Exclusionary Play Freedom's Birthday The Fun Club Getting Dragged Along God bless you, Mary Poppins Halfway Point "Heads Will Roll" Healing Our Way Through Divorce Interpretting Jesus's teachings at Christmas Is it a boy or a girl? I Win! Just Go to Sleep Learning To Parent by Experience "Little House on the Central Coast" The Meaning of Parenting Men and Suspicion of Child Abuse The Morning Rush My Dad’s Advice My daughter, Sisyphus My, She's Shy My Vasectomy The Naked Truth On Dad's and Love Our Beautiful Daughters Our Family Beds Our Family Talks About Sex Parenting is challenging Peanut is Gone! Piano Practice The Playground and the World Punishment and Permissiveness The Report Card Reproductive Rights & Fatherhood The Second Parent Sibling Competition Spring Strengthening the Marriage Talking to your kids about sex Teenage Christmas This Story Has An End The Toll of the Breadwinner Role Trust Two Bedtime Scenarios Until Mid-life Do We Reconsider Valentine's Day - Acts of Love Validating Feelings Wake Up DaddyMan What I Did On My Summer Vacation Workday Teenage Christmas I don’t visit my parents for Christmas anymore. They live in northern Wisconsin, and it’s just too cold there this time of year. But I think of them every Christmas. And I remember all the Christmas Days I spent with my family as a child. In my early years Christmas was full of fun and magic. My parents could WOW me every year with a battery-powered car, a three speed bike, a pair of skis or such. As I grew older I still cherished the excitement of Christmas, even though my expanding appetite for expensive gifts grew too large to be satisfied on my father’s salary. When there was nothing left under the tree but a white sheet sprinkled with pine needles I remember secretly thinking, “Is that all?” But in the last few years that I lived at home I struggled even more with the Christmas spirit. I wanted to believe in the joy of giving, but the rampant greed and hypocrisy of the adult world I was entering was hard to reconcile. I had learned too much to believe in magic. I was bitter, disillusioned and only seventeen years old. Nothing my parents could buy for me could even touch my pain. I wanted a world where war was not an option, where the earth was not being raped, and where purported Christians did not hoard great wealth five blocks away from neighbors who lived in poverty. How could we all celebrate Jesus’ birth so religiously when no one seemed to actually believe in his teachings any more than they believed in Santa Claus. I felt betrayed. I had been taught that I could help make the world a better place. The American values of liberty, justice and equality would supposedly support me. Instead, I was being handed a world that seemed hopelessly screwed up. Further, my parents and teachers did not appreciate my criticism. It was my negative attitude, they said, that was the problem. Underneath it all, I was terribly lonely. I didn’t know it at the time. And no one else guessed either. Then one Christmas my Uncle Henry came to visit. Uncle Henry is my mother’s brother. He taught history at a college in New York. He had a reputation as kind of an “absent-minded professor”. I had heard many jokes about his numerous embarrassing social faux pas’. But it had been about six years since I had actually seen him. On Christmas Eve he followed me when I left the dinner table after scarfing down my food. The rest of the adults were drinking wine and happily discussing matters that seemed to be important to them. I plopped down on the couch in the TV room and Uncle Henry sat down beside me. It was kind of strange having an adult follow me. I hesitated to turn on the TV, so I could figure out what he wanted. He began to ask me questions. Big questions. What I thought about the world, my future, my friends, the meaning of life. He seemed excited by every answer I gave, no matter how inarticulate. I was anticipating a lecture from him in response to some of the more controversial points I made, but none came. My plans to become a hippy on Vancouver Island sounded intriguing to him. I told him my view that no one should have more than ten times the wealth of the poorest person on earth. He thought the idea was worth seriously considering. As the conversation progressed I began to trust that his agenda was just to get to know his nephew, nothing more. We talked all evening. The attention he gave me was intoxicating. I felt important. My ideas were legitimate. My feelings made sense. The next day was Christmas. Uncle Henry suffered the embarrassment of receiving a present from each of us when he had not been able to do any shopping himself. He was grading papers, he feebly explained, right up to the time his plane left New York. In his defense, I announced that he had given me his present last night. All eyes turned to me, expecting me to describe the alleged gift, if in fact it did exist. I just winked at Uncle Henry. He smiled back at me. No one knew what to say. So finally someone grabbed another gift from under the tree. And Christmas continued.   Wake Up DaddyMan "Wake up, you're the DaddyMan now!" It was my wife's voice on the morning after our daughter's birth. And with these words began the first day of the rest of my life. I was very excited, and already completely exhausted. Like many men in Santa Cruz I wanted to be a different kind of dad than the model of my father's generation. I didn't want to be just the breadwinner. I wanted to be a "hands on" dad, and be closer to my child than my dad knew how to be with me. But how would I fare in this realm so long designated to women? Can dads bond with babies without the benefit of breasts? Would I try, but soon feeling woefully inadequate compared to mom, would I retreat to other things I knew I could do well? Like paid work. Would there be any support for me? Or would I be the only man at every play group? And what of all the other things I'd spent my youth dreaming I might like to do with my life? As a boy I had been very encouraged to strive for ambitious career goals. No one ever said I would command great respect by just earning a passable income and spending a lot of time fathering. So my head was packed with a very full slate: getting a doctorate, creating a counseling practice full of workshops and topical support groups, building a house, writing a book, recording a album, etc. I always figured I'd slip having a child in there somewhere. But I never thought about exactly where. Then suddenly, with my daughter Molly's birth, there was no time for anything but parenting. So the onset of fatherhood meant, for me, the need to grieve all the things I could no longer find time for. I had to unpack my head of dreams and goals that kept pulling me away from time on the floor, playing with Molly. Lying with her at nap time, impatiently waiting for sleep to take her, I would sigh, a tear rolling down into my ear. My break was almost here, but all I would really have time for is the dishes and the floor. Doing this grieving has been my biggest challenge as a father And what is the payoff? Fatherhood has taught me many things. Some of them are answers to my early questions, such as: men are natural nurturers of children, the father-child relationship can be as rich and deep as any human pairing, no other work is more important than giving loving attention to a child. But the main thing fatherhood is teaching me is who my daughter is. "Who are you today, Molly?" There is no question that intrigues me more. In it lies all the complexity and nuance of human intelligence and personality. And Molly's unfolding is my unique privilege to witness. Her answer changes every day. And unless I'm there, I'll never know. Interpretting Jesus's teachings at Christmas Why Christmas? To explain why the birth of a baby 2000 years ago could generate all this hullabaloo, I have had to begin teaching my daughter some religion. I've never had the chance to teach spirituality as I see it to someone. Its been hard enough getting anyone to listen to my personal views on the subject, let alone have my listener believe everything I say as the truth of the universe. The power to shape someone's budding belief system so directly both excites and scares me. Who am I to tell another person what the nature of God is? On the other hand aren't my beliefs about life's unanswered questions as good a place for my daughter to start as any one else's theories. In researching how to talk about Jesus to a child I found that even among my close friends there is much dissension about what the man stood for. Some believe in him as God incarnate. Some think he was manic depressive and possibly schizophrenic, suffering from poor reality testing and major delusions of grandeur. Some view him as a champion of integrity who exposed the violence of the state. Some say he is a symbol of Love. Some say he died to save our souls. Each has their own twist on what Jesus was really all about. I decided to tell my daughter what I believe, and let her know that others might disagree. I decided not to turn this task over to a church, as my parents had done. In Saturday catechism class strange nuns taught me things I later found out not even my parents, who sent me there, believed. If faith of any kind is to stick, I now think, it must be taught by someone close to you. It should not be farmed out to "experts". I think some parents hold back teaching children about spirituality because they do not feel confident in their own beliefs enough to teach them. Many religions hold that a particular theology is the ultimate truth. And those influenced by such religions may feel that until their faith is in line with church doctrine they are in no position to be teaching others. On the contrary, I believe that doubts about religion are themselves important spiritual beliefs. When we honor ourselves enough to admit to what we truly believe (and don't believe) we can begin to articulate our own particular brand of faith to our children. It doesn't matter if there is a church out there that agrees with us enough to sanction our personal spirituality as a bonafide religion. And if our children are to survive in this multicultural world, the faith we teach them must be humble enough to recognize that there are manylegitimate realities separate from our own. My own brand of spirituality may sound to some so political that it hardly smacks of spirituality at all.Still, it is what moves my heart and soul. "Jesus," I told Molly, "was a teacher. We celebrate his birth because he taught things that were so very important. He taught things we still are trying to learn. He taught that we are all lovable, that no one deserves to be harshly judged or mistreated. He taught that we must all strive to love our neighbors, all of our neighbors. He taught us to give, and trust thatthe goodwill and community we create by giving will give us more in return than hoarding wealth." She asked if she could play with her rat now. I was going way over her head. I tried again. "Did you know, Molly, that there are some people who are very very rich and many people who are very very poor?" She nodded yes. "Jesus, taught that this is not okay. He said that people should not keep trying to get more and more money and just let other people go homeless and hungry. Do you agree?" "Yes" she dutifully, but earnestly replied. "Well a lot of people still don't understand that yet. But every Christmas I pray that more people will learn, and one day no one will be rich and no one will be poor, and we will all share the world the way you and your friends sometimes share your toys with each other." "That's how it should be," she said, proud of the fact that she already knew that sharing is a good thing. I sat back and wondered how the seed I had just planted might grow. In a world that so often seems blind to the most basic principles of justice and cooperation, I was grateful that someone heard me, and seemed to agree. Even if she is just four years old. The Biggest Stress In Today's Families As a parent I try to advocate for the well being of my fellow parents and our children. This newspaper is dedicated to that mission as well. Articles appear that help us to cope with the stresses in our lives. We get tips on being better parents, and we are able to connect to various community resources which can enrich our lives. My personal mission in this column has been to model fathering as a priority in men's lives. I have attempted to address cultural issues men and women face in relation to parenting. And I have tried to help both mothers and fathers reflect upon the poignancy of their role, to strengthen the sense of meaning we derive from our daily care-giving. Many times, however, the problems parents experience are much greater than can be truly addressed by any advice even the best parent educator can offer. How do you give battling siblings the individual attention they each need when you come home from work exhausted and have only enough time to make dinner, clean up, and get them to bed? On the weekends, how do you take care of everything you need to do AND give the kids quality time AND have some time to yourself AND get some intimate time together with your partner? How do you buy a house with enough space AND save for your retirement AND save for college tuitions AND not stay up late worrying about money? Our economic system is hugely unjust, and it is time to recognize that 80% of our families, not just the poor, are suffering. Consider the following statistics. The top one percent of our population owns 40% of the nation's wealth. That's up from 20% twenty years ago. The top ten percent own 70% of the wealth. That leaves 30 % for the other 90% of us. 45% of US households have less than three months of financial reserves. 50% of US households have seen their real income (adjusted for inflation) stagnate or decline since 1980. Meanwhile, the incomes of the top one percent (over 330 K/year) have doubled. In the papers we read of economic boom times, but this boom is almost all going to the wealthy. The consequences of these gross inequities are far reaching. They extend into our family life on a daily basis. In many families parents who would love to spend more time at home both have to work full time. When only one parent has a job, it often demands such long hours that the working parent barely sees the kids, and the care-giving parent never gets a break. Families who need help caring for their children can't afford to pay child care workers decent wages. Many good child care workers, consequently, can't afford to stay in the field. At the same time that we try to provide for a family we must also be saving for retirement. Few trust that as elderly people we will not live in poverty if we haven't saved a large sum of money. Thus we must make choices daily to invest in our own future security instead of provide for our children the way we would like to. When my daughter wants to be a teacher, or an artist, or gardener, do I tell her to follow her bliss? Or do I say, "Well you know, if you ever want to own your own house you had better pick your career on the basis of how much money you can make, not what you like to do, or who you would like to help". People often experience these economic stresses their personal failure. They think there is something wrong with them for not having anything to invest in this really cool stock market. Or they feel like a loser because they still rent, or because their house payment takes half their paycheck. The reality is that hard work at a worthwhile task that benefits the community no longer guarantees anyone a decent living for their family. The only ways to really make money are to have a lot of it to begin with or to pursue wealth for it's own sake, without being hindered by other values. Something is very wrong with this picture. What can we do to make it better? We can stop blaming ourselves and start changing the injustices of our system. Campaign finance reform is a good start. For five dollars a person we could publicly finance all campaigns and end our current system of legal bribery. Then we could return to having the wealthy pay their share of our taxes. Instead of a flat tax or a national sales tax (proposals which shift the tax burden even further onto the shoulders of working families), we could ask those with incomes over 200 thousand to use their profits to strengthen the social security system (without privatizing it). How would it affect your family if you could focus more on raising your children and less on wondering if you will ever be able to retire? That would be a good start. The Daddyman's Christmas list When my daughter, Molly, began her first in a series of letters to Santa, I thought of a few things I could use as well. I wrote: "Dear Santa, I know I am a parent, not a kid, but I have been good, and since you are coming to our house for Molly anyway, perhaps you could drop off the following for me: a house cleaner (Right away please. I don't think we can make it until Christmas). a new family car that can never get in an accident (Yippee! No more seat belts!). a refinanced mortgage at a super, super, super low rate. enough money for college tuition and my retirement (just stuff it under my mattress). Remember Santa, I'm counting on you. And thanks. Love, the Daddyman."  I felt a little bad, asking for such blatantly materialistic things, but I figured that's Santa's bag. He gives stuff you can buy at a toy store. Why not ask him to stop at the bank as well? Then I remembered what my mom used to tell me, "Its not what you own, it's who you are." That would have been comforting advice if I had known that who I was would be considered good enough. Unfortunately, my mother was very ambitious for me. There was always a lot of work to do before who I was would be good enough. This ambitiousness has been a monkey on my back throughout my years as a parent. I haven't had much luck pursuing my various and lofty goals while Molly insists on constantly playing Guess Who or Freeze Tag with me. In my second letter to Santa I sought relief from the pressures of my unrequited ambitions. "Dear Santa, If my first letter appeared too greedy, please work from this list instead. I realize that none of this can come wrapped in a box, but if you can get down our wood stove's smokestack, then you can do some pretty amazing things:  I want to be a famous musician. I want everyone to like me (a lot!). I want to end all human suffering and bring peace and justice to the world. I want to get the credit for having done so (before I die). I know it is a tall order. But I have faith in you Santa. Love, the Daddyman." If the truth were told, I have very little faith in Santa. Even as I wrote this letter I knew he would disappoint me. I had the feeling I often got as a child around mid-afternoon on Christmas day. I would keep wandering back to look under the tree, amidst all the torn wrapping paper, to see if maybe I had missed a package with my name on it. The joy of getting was all over. I would gather all my new toys in one pile and try to enjoy how much I had, and try to stave off the disappointment that there would be no more. Counting my blessings is still the antidote to my endless desire for more. If Santa does bring me fame or fortune, I know already that he will not bring enough. What could really make me happy is not on either of my lists. What really makes me happy is now done with her list, and she wants to play Freeze Tag. So this Christmas I won't be counting on Santa after all. Instead, on Christmas night, the would-be famous musician will sing Molly her favorite lullabies. And when her breathing changes, and I know she is asleep, the would-be world savior will tell her that I love her one more time, knowing only her spirit can hear me. What a pleasure for this long-way-from-financially-secure father. To be able to say "I love you", and mean it all through me. To say it not to convince, or reassure, but just because it feels so good to love someone so much. More than I ever thought I could. Asleep in My Arms Its 11 PM and I am driving home from a party. My daughter, Molly, is beside me, blissfully singing along to the car stereo. I have kept her up late because I didn't want to leave the party. Now I am really tired and hoping she will fall asleep before we get home. I just want to crawl into bed. I don't want to shepherd her through brushing her teeth, getting on her jammies, and reading her a story. I love our usual bedtime routine, but tonight I am just too bushed. My chances of her falling unconscious while she is singing look pretty slim. So when the current song is over I advance the CD a few tracks to what I know will be a slow song. Luckily, Molly doesn't seem to care. I fish out a pillow from the back seat and suggest to her that she rest her head. She lays the pillow down against my thigh and slides herself down horizontally, her hips twisted by the seat belt. My right hand lights softly on her shoulder. She sighs, and in a few more blocks she is gone. I become aware of her in a different way now that she is asleep. Her arm is so small. Her head is so heavy. I can feel the weight of it through the pillow on my thigh. I massage her neck with my thumb. I wonder at how relaxed she is. It's been thirty years since my neck and shoulders were that loose. Here is this person next to me. Eight years ago she didn't exist. Her body is small, but amazingly healthy. If I twist my back, I'm down for two weeks. If she sprains her ankle, she can play soccer again the next day. What a vibrant package of life! Her mother and I have fed and clothed her, but it is some life force within her that propels her body to grow. It is a mystery beyond me. Yet, as her father, I have the honor of watching this mystery unfold. I park. I lift her out of the car, carefully navigating past the steering wheel and the car door that won't stay open like it should. She is much heavier than she used to be. Her body spreads out too far for two arms to easily support. Still asleep, she senses this and wraps an arm around my neck as I climb the stairs to the house. "I love you, Daddy," she whispers dreamily. "I love you too," I whisper back. Inside the house, I lay her down in her bed. I pull up the covers and kiss her on the forehead. Now I am done. Now I can go to sleep. So why do I pause before I close her bedroom door. And wish she was awake, so we could read a story together. Sibling Competition My dad turned seventy a few years back. The planning of his party brought up all the old resentments of we, his five children, competing for his favor. It was like opening the door to our attic storage closet. Old tennis racquets, down coats, boogie boards, and boxes of photos all spill out onto the floor. My oldest, and most important sister, Christy, took charge and planned the event. The next youngest and oft forgotten sister, Sarah, was furious about not being included. My third sister, Elaine, fought back, slyly convincing my mother to change Christy's plans. Christy screamed of betrayal, stabbed in the back once more by her younger siblings. Sarah and Elaine complained bitterly of Christy's arrogance. My brother and I only found out about the party a week before, too late to make plans to attend. When the dust had settled my Mother made one request. "The only thing I want for my seventieth birthday," she said, "is for my children to be able to get along." I wondered what it takes to raise a such a family. Was there something missing in our upbringing that accounts for why we still bicker with each other in our forties? The whole brouhaha came back to me when I got an email from Sarah addressed to each member of the family, asking everyone to respond to a number of questions about how we might together plan my parents 50th wedding anniversary. Each was to have an equal say before any decisions were made. It seemed like such a rational way to gather information and include everyone in the decision making process. I've been organizing groups of people in both my personal and professional life with this type of democratic-cooperative style for many years. Still, I had never considered using such a process in my family. I don't know why. Perhaps I gave up long ago. Christy was eight years older than me. Her myriad concerns about her boyfriends and her dawning political awareness would almost always dominate the dinner conversation. "Joe Fuller's Dad wants Joe to get drafted. Can you believe that?!" I had no hope of debating a topic with her. She courted my parent's approval, but had only a passing interest in the rest of us. We were too easy a match. I learned not to try to compete. Sometimes I thought of something funny I could say if I could find a pause to say it in. Mostly, I just listened. No one listened to me until bedtime, when I had a few moments alone with Mom. Without conscious structure, our family had a distinctly Darwinian feel. The loudest and pushiest got all the attention. In this setting Christy never learned that the rest of us had ideas just as interesting as hers. She wondered why we didn't just speak up if we had something to say. She never intended to prevent any of us from getting our chance to shine. So she never understood why we resented her. My parents didn't seem to know that they could have structured things differently. There is a simple rule that would have changed everything. If there are seven people at dinner, then each of us should take only one seventh of the group's attention. If my parents had structured the way we shared attention, then the quieter among us would not have to compete with the loudest. We might have found out that Sarah had been using drugs most of high school. We might have found out that my brother needed help with his homework before he almost flunked sixth grade. Christy garnered much more of my parents' attention than the rest of us. But it didn't made her any happier. The resentment she felt from her brothers and sisters only made her more desperate for parental approval. The more she struggled to get it, the more resentful the rest of us got. No one wins when children are having to compete for attention. It doesn't matter whether each child has the charisma to capture the family spotlight. We each have an equal need to be heard and seen. One child might be choosing what college to attend. Another may be waiting to hear if she got a part in the class play. The youngest may be just figuring out how to make a three word sentence. A good look around the dinner table reveals that each have a genius with which they make their way through life. Is it a boy or a girl? When my child was born the midwife and I caught the baby and wrapped it up in a blanket. I held the bundle to it's mother's breast. None of us had noticed if it was a boy or a girl. We wanted to look, but we decided to give this child a few hours of life without any gender conditioning. And give ourselves time to fall in love with this person before we knew how to picture it's future. My wife's sister was outraged when we told her over the phone that the baby was born but that we couldn't answer her question, "Well... what is it?!" Most people will not directly interact with a child until they know it's gender. If not identified with the telltale pink or blue, an admirer will ask an infant's parents if it is a boy or a girl. The answer to this one question allows them to begin speaking to the child. Now they know what tone of voice to use and what compliments would be appropriate. Gender conditioning begins at birth. It is important for all of us to try to counter this conditioning. It is hurtful to both girls and boys to be boxed into roles that limit the full expression of their humanity. Sexism is not just men telling women to stay in their role. It is all of us telling each other how we are allowed to feel and behave, based on our gender. Children base their identity on what we tell them we observe in them. Consciously or unconsciously we all predominantly reflect boy-like qualities to boys and girl-like qualities to girls. We generally ignore behaviors that do not match the child's gender. Then we wonder why our children are already firmly identified with their gender role by age two. Many parents try to avoid gender steriotyping their children. They let the children pick their own clothes and toys. Then, when their three year old throws his body at full speed into the back of my knees, they explain within earshot of the child, "He's such a boy!" Parents unable to explain why their own efforts have not blocked the tide of sexism from washing over their child give up the fight and stand back in awe of the power of biology. As they watch their kids line up more and more with our society's gender roles they usually feel pretty powerless to do anything about it. Its not that biology doesn't play it's part. I'm sure our children's hormones have their effect. We have no way of determining, however, how much of the gender differences we notice in children are due to Nature and how much to nurture. So let us just agree that both forces are important. If we seek to protect our children from being gender steriotyped, it is the cultural forces we must continually try to counter, even when it seems hopeless. My daughter (it was a girl) wears only pink tights and lacy dresses. She could care less about a bat and a ball. What she has learned from her culture and peers, despite her parent's best intentions, makes me cringe in embarrasment over my inability to influence her. On the other hand, she also throws herself into my knees at full speed. (Is that because she's a girl? Maybe its something about my knees.) And the most rambunctious child at her school is a girl, not a boy. Instead of making comments that reinforce steriotypes whenever you see children comply with them, try looking for the exceptions and commenting on them. Notice when boys are focused, compassionate or communicative. Notice when girls are physical, strong, or outspoken. Let your children know that these qualities come at no surprise to you, in either gender. Several hundred people have told Molly that she is pretty. No wonder she only wears dresses. I can't change that. But I can make sure when we wrestle everyday that someone is also feeling her biceps and exclaiming how strong she is, and how powerfully she holds herself. Almost Killed by a Fashion Doll It started at one of Molly's friend's birthday party. Lying wrapped up in the stack of presents was a secret gift from the grandmother. Before the parents could do anything about it BARBIE had emerged. Molly's eyes were wide as she struggled to get a turn holding this new doll and changing her clothes. I felt a sense of impending doom.  On the ride home from the party Molly popped the question. "Can I get a BARBIE for my birthday?" I tried to explain: "Well you see Molly, BARBIE's body is not shaped like regular people's bodies. It's shaped like how some people think women are supposed to look. And if people grow up thinking they are supposed to look like BARBIE they won't feel proud of the way they do look." Molly didn't nod. I could tell she didn't have the slightest idea what I was talking about.  As her birthday approached she repeated her question with increasing frequency. None of my responses had any effect. Finally, my wife Sue and I decided that we can't protect her from everything, and off we went in search of BARBIE. As we entered Toys R Us I was immediately overwhelmed at the size. Sue began studying the store directory. My brain sort of fogged over. There was a swing set display in front of me. Was I supposed to buy the $199 one with the five foot slide or the really spiffy one with the 7.5 foot slide for $499. "How good a dad am I?" I started to wonder.  Sue tugged on my arm, which felt limp. BARBIE was not hard to find. More than half the doll section at Toys R Us is her exclusive showcase. I walked down several aisles of BARBIE wearing this and BARBIE wearing that. I thought of how much Molly might spend on clothes as a teenager. My ears started to buzz and I felt a little dizzy. "Sue," I said, "maybe there is a dress up doll that is not BARBIE." We looked at the alternatives. There was one row of dolls that all looked like prostitutes. Little girls were supposed to dress these dolls up. Why was I fantasizing about undressing them? Then there were the Disney dolls. A chance to be the pawn of both the movie and retail industries at the same time.  I staggered back to BARBIE, a headache building rapidly. "It's not just her body and her clothes," I said to Sue, "It's her whole lifestyle. BARBIE's favorite pastime is shopping. And flirting with ultraviolet overexposed bodybuilders who must work double shifts to afford their sports cars. Does BARBIE ever question authority? Does BARBIE think for herself? Will BARBIE help Molly think for herself?"  I could feel my pulse pounding in my head and my stomach ache was so tight I was leaning forward. Sue said I looked very pale. She brought me SKIPPER. SKIPPER is better than BARBIE she said because SKIPPER has flat feet and won't develop low back pain from always wearing high heels. Also, SKIPPER is more politically correct because she is black. "Great," I thought, "Soon every girl in the world will be playing with the same set of dolls and learning the same set of values, defined by our captains of industry." That's all I remember. Sue said my eyes rolled back and my legs just gave out. Luckily she was standing right there and caught me. She carried me out to the car. When I came to I was lying in the grass at a nearby park. At first I just heard the wind in the trees above me. Then I felt Sue holding my hand and placing a wet cloth on my forehead. "It's okay," she was saying, "we don't have to buy a BARBIE." I repeated her words slowly to myself, "We don't have to buy a BARBIE." Sue said she had bought some clay and we could make our own dolls. "But I don't know how to make a doll, I whined. "We'll learn," she said. "We'll all learn together." My Dad’s Advice I took my annual pilgrimage to visit my folks in Minnesota this summer.  My father is eighty, and we are not sure how long he has to live.  To the collective horror of his wife and children he repeatedly expresses his hope that his next stroke will be the big one.  He would much rather get life over with than become an invalid.  The rest of us prefer not to face such options for the time being.  To be supportive, though, we listen to him for as long as we can. One afternoon I took a break from cleaning up his garage with him and walked around the old neighborhood.  Memories of my childhood lay in the rolling contours of the grassy lawns, the familiar rustling of elm leaves in the wind, and the old houses full now of new families.  Years ago, I would run inside these homes without knocking and ask if Tomy, or Jeff, or Char, or could come out and play.  Now I keep to the sidewalk so as not to arouse suspicion or appear to be snooping. A sunny hillside, though, recognised me from thirty years ago.  It invited me to sit for a while and I was happy to oblige.  I leaned back on the grass, my hands cradling the back of my head, my elbows spreading out.  The same clouds I used to watch floated across the sky once more, making the blue of the sky beyond them look so deep in contrast. It was on this same spot that I had once sat thinking about my life, with just thirteen years under my belt.  I remember having heard my dad call me in for dinner, and I fully intended to go, but I wanted to figure something out first.  One thought had then led to another without any resolution. Suddenly I was surprised to find that my father was sitting beside me.  He had found me lost in thought and suspected that something might be more important than dinner right then. I remember taking my eyes off the clouds and looking up at him. “Dad, what should I be when I grow up?” I think we were both surprised by the question.  Even at thirteen I had already made it clear that my parents were not the authority on my life.  I was my own man.  So why was I suddenly so vulnerably seeking advice?  I must have felt very confused. But what a golden opportunity for my dad!  It is rare that teenagers will even listen to their fathers’ advice, let alone ask for it.  All the wisdom of his years in the workforce could now be applied to help his son not repeat his mistakes.  Any unfulfilled dreams of his could now find a channel into this extension of his self.  “Law school” or “Medical school”, for example, might have been choicely placed words that could have guided me into a prosperous future. He paused to gather himself and execute this moment to the greatest advantage.  Then finally he said, “I don’t know, Tim.”  And then after some thought he added,  “But whatever you do, let it be something you really enjoy.” We stood up and walked back home.  I still had no idea what career to plan for, but somehow that didn’t matter so much any more.  I was free of whatever invisible weight had been pressing on me.  Life was going to be okay. Thirty years later I was now sitting on the site of this profound advice. Grateful to the man who gave it, for all the joy it has brought me, and for sparing me all the pain that some other answer might have inflicted.  Thanks dad. Learning To Parent by Experience Before I became a parent, I did not know how to parent. I had the modeling of my own parents. A mixed blessing. I also had many theories from my training as a psychotherapist. Some have held water. Others leaked badly. I read books about parenting. But the books did not agree with each other. Luckily, just as I became a father, an expert on raising children moved into our house. She calls me Daddy. Everything I thought might be true about parenting has since had to be tested by this little child development specialist. Only direct experience with her has converted theory into skill. The accumulation of experience, however, has an essential component: mistakes. I have made many of them. Countless times I have watched my daughter respond the "wrong" way to what I considered to be the "right" parenting technique. Eventually my experience and my mistakes teach me something new. Then I confidently apply my new expertise to other children, and what happens? More mistakes. It seems I really have only learned to parent my own child. And she keeps changing! Knowing the importance of experience and mistakes, let us consider the predicament of most fathers, whose work takes them away from their children. Mom or another caregiver has been with the kids all day, making mistakes and learning from them. Dad takes over in the evening and promptly begins... making mistakes. Mom is watching, listening, perhaps correcting him. Its embarrassing as all hell! Dads often don't get to see the experience and mistakes that taught Mom what she knows. Many mistakenly come to think that women are innately more skilled at this stuff than men. In comparison to those with more experience, fathers often feel inadequate and vulnerable to criticism. They see themselves bumble and they begin to relinquish care giving to those who have developed more skills. In so doing they forgo the direct experience with their children that is necessary to develop their own parenting skills. The tragic irony is that a father's lack of experience parenting may lead him to avoid spending time with his children, the only cure for his lack of experience! For fathers to stay active and involved with their kids we have to be able to feel successful in this role. First we must claim our inherent potential to be excellent caregivers. We are not doomed to failure because of our gender. Secondly, we must value our unique connection to our children. No matter what our foibles, there is something about who we are that is important for our children to know. We enrich their lives by relating our unique perspectives. We offer an important alternative to our children's other caregivers, each of whom, no mater how skilled, have their blind spots. And thirdly, we must give ourselves permission to make mistakes, look awkward, and thereby gather the experience that will make us excellent parents. We do not need to know everything from the start. Experience is there to teach us if we are patient enough to gather it before we judge ourselves compared to those with more of it. When we give ourselves the space to make mistakes with our children, we can feel the personal victories of figuring out creative solutions by ourselves. Trust Some folks say that there are a bunch of souls hanging out somewhere in the great void getting ready to choose their next set of parents and get themselves born. I don't know what to think about that. But I am struck by the leap of faith babies are taking when they enter this world. As our daughter looked up at her mother and me on that very first day, she was the picture of peacefulness and serenity. She had only just learned how to breathe. The rest of her repertoire included only crying and sucking. She was completely dependent upon us. And she trusted us implicitly. She didn't know what she would need, but she seemed sure that we would take care of it, whatever it was. At times I wondered about the wisdom of her blind faith. How was she so sure I would be a good parent? I was far from convinced of that myself. Didn't she know how easily I would get distracted from parenting by my various other pursuits? Didn't she know I had my weak points? Didn't she know that I had never done this before?  Still she trusted me with all her might. She trusted that I would keep her warm and dry and fed. She trusted that I would keep her safe from all the harms of the world. Did she know that this world is full of harms from which I myself do not always feel safe?  Now that she is four, she trusts me to think well of her. When she wakes me up by knee-dropping onto my mid-back she trusts that I will not shame her as if she meant to do me harm. She hopes instead that I will patiently teach her about my body's vulnerabilities and show her safe ways to use her power. And when she is older and she comes home from school and sits around and whines, "I'm bored!" she trusts that I will hear that she needs some help initiating some activity interesting to her. She has faith that I will not blame her for her troubles in order to avoid feeling guilty about not being available enough to her. And as a young teenager, when she gets all excited about something I think is completely ridiculous, she trusts that I will not ridicule her interests. She wants me to see that what is important to her friends is important to her. She expects me to challenge my aging neural pathways and to open my mind, with her as my teacher, on a subject I was sure I already knew everything worth knowing about.  And when as a full-fledged teenager she says to me, "Screw you and everything you stand for!" she trusts that I will translate her words inside my head. She is relying on me to hear, "I need some space now to figure out who I am without you around. I'll be back in a little while."  As I said, I wonder why she thinks I can be trusted with all these things. I've already messed up many times. But in the end she will be asking me to trust her. She will want me to trust that she can live her own life and make her own decisions. I imagine she'll be asking for that before I'm sure she is ready to do it. How will I be able to let her walk away when I know how much there is that she will not yet be prepared for?  But then all along the way didn't she trust me before I was ready? Didn't she have faith that I would rise to the occasion in ways I had never done before? And didn't I do the best I could? Reproductive Rights & Fatherhood I plan a lot of things. And I had planned to be a father... someday. That's not what I was planning, however, when my wife and I conceived our daughter. Our only plans that evening were to enjoy ourselves as much as we liked. Later we found that Sue was pregnant as a result of our revelry. Fortunately, we both agreed that while the timing was not the greatest, we were ready enough to welcome a child into our lives.  Unfortunately, not all fathers get to choose whether or not they are ready for parenthood. Birth control does not always work. In cases where lovers rule out abortion as an option, parenthood may come unbidden and then proceed under very stressful circumstances. Among couples who might abort, our culture grants that it is the woman's right to choose. I have long supported the idea that no one should be able to tell a woman what she has to do with her own body. But I have also wondered, do pregnant fathers have any rights to choose? Throughout my dating years I was terrified of being confronted with a father's lack of choice . What if a girlfriend of mine became pregnant and wouldn't agree to an abortion? A friend once said I could probably just walk away. "Just get her to agree not to put you down as the father on the birth certificate." While that might protect me from the legal responsibility of eighteen years of child support payments, it did not calm me. I did not want to abandon a child. I could give it up to adoption, but I could not just walk away. If I saw it on the street it would tear out my heart to know that it was growing up without a father, without me.  I feel sad to realize that our culture does not expect an unwavering commitment to fatherhood. We train boys to be breadwinners, but not to be fathers. We do not teach them how to care for children. We do not impress upon them that if they become a father, their care giving will be their most important life's work, and their most enjoyable pastime. And then we expect that if they aren't ready to parent, it's no skin off their back to opt out. On the contrary, I believe that it is terribly painful to men to have their importance in the lives of their children so undervalued. It is a pain most men have become numb to, never knowing what it would be like to have their love as a father honored as something essential to children, the way we recognize a mother's love to be. Not having a role in decisions about pregnancy is one of the ways that fathers are marginalized. When fathers are not included in such a key decision they feel unimportant. It doesn't matter what they think. And if they do not feel important, they are less motivated to take up all the sacrifices that parenting demands.  On the other hand, the fact that many men have not consistantly taken responsibility for their parenthood is a big reason why some women feel reticent to offer potential fathers a role in the decision. The right to be involved in the choice must be earned by men through their demonstration of a stronger commitment to parenting. It's a two way street.  Changing our culture's view of fatherhood will take some time, as will changing the degree of responsibility for care giving that fathers generally assume. In the meantime, what scared me most as single man was that I might be denied a role in the choice of when I am to become a dad; denied because of assumptions that I would be a less uninvolved parent. And I feared that if I had to father before I was ready, I might not be able to be the kind of father my heart has always wanted to be. I wondered if anyone knew how important that was to me. Talking to your kids about sex I learned about sex when I was ten. An older boy, Mike, explained the "facts of life" to my friend Shep and I as we poured over a stash of Playboy magazines in our secret fort. Shep was sure Mike was lying. He told me not to believe any of it. I didn't know who to trust, so I asked my mom what sex was. She read a book with me about how the dad's sperm meets the mom's ovum and a baby starts to grow. That was all very nice, but the details of how that sperm gets in there were discreetly omitted. My curiosity was not at all satisfied. Sex, according to my mom's book, was for reproduction. Even at ten years old I knew there was more to it than that. I'd venture to guess that less than .5% of all adult sex is for reproduction. The vast majority of sex is for intimacy, pleasure, or both. But no one I could trust was willing to talk to me about these things. I had to figure out what sex was about from adult magazines, movies, and the often very distorted information I could get from peers. My experience was not unique. Most of us learn about sex in a shroud of shame and misinformation. Shame grows whenever it is not okay to talk about something. It's like anaerobic bacteria that festers in closed containers. Once exposed, it dies. Talking about sex heals shame (or prevents it from gaining a foothold in a young person's psyche). As a psychotherapist I am well acquainted with the effects of unaddressed sexual shame: men feeling inadequate due to unrealistic expectations of themselves, women unable to communicate their sexual needs, couples unable to find consensual love-making because one is desperate for sex and the other confused, and most everyone wondering at some level if their particular sexuality is really okay. I think a lot of the trouble we adults have with sex is because our sexual education needs were neglected. In recent years we have been uncovering the tragedy of sexual abuse, both its shocking prevalence and its painful effects. But we have not yet acknowledged that the deliberate denial of information about sex is also hurtful to young people. If we did not teach our children to read, we would be considered neglectful. If we did not teach them manners, our parenting would be widely questioned. So I think it is time to consider sex education to be a vital developmental need that we cannot allow to be ignored. How then, do we as parents talk about sex with our children? Most of us are too embarrassed to even bring the subject up. When we do, we often count on our kids to lead the discussion with their questions. If there are no questions we assume they know it all and we're off the hook. Try this instead. Go down to your favorite bookstore. Tell them how old your child is and ask for a good book on sex. Read it yourself and talk to your spouse or a friend about any parts that make you squirm. If you need more help, find someone who seems really comfortable talking about sex and ask them how they would explain sex to someone your child's age. Then sit down with your child and read the book together. Read it as many times as your child seems interested in it. Then pat yourself on the back. Well done. Emotional Abuse Defined Ever wonder just what emotional abuse is? Tune in to Dr. Laura's radio talk show. But please don't listen for more than a minute or two. Her completely wrong advise about how to treat your family members is surpassed only by her flagrant abuse of the callers themselves. She is a master of shame and humiliation masquerading as help. The antidote to her poison: respect. People thrive on it. Dr. Spock goes to heaven You may have missed it in the news, but a couple of years ago Dr. Spock died. He was the author of the hugely popular text on raising children in the fifties and sixties. Succeeding authors have made great improvements on his work, so I didn't think much about his passing, until an obituary I read in the editorial pages helped me put his message in proper context. Dr. Spock's views were a big leap from the "children are to be seen and not heard" pedagogy that came before him. Corporeal punishment, isolation, and shame were tactics that had been widely touted prior to his book. Instead, he urged parents to trust their own instincts and not to treat their children in ways that don't feel right, even if advised to by "experts". In his trust of parents he modeled how parents might trust their children. And with his faith in human nature he won the trust of a whole generation. Spock took considerable heat for his views. He was blamed by some for the rebelliousness of the children raised under his standard of "permissiveness". But Spock stood along side the young adults whose values he was held responsible for. In 1968 Spock was arrested for protesting the Vietnam war. When questioned why a pediatrician would involve himself in such politics, Spock asked what the point of raising healthy children is, if we then ship them all off to be killed. I know my parents read Dr. Spock, though they had been raised without his guidance. And I now feel grateful to the man. My father complained throughout my childhood about how good we kids had it compared to kids in his day. When he joked that children should be seen and not heard, he was telling us what it had been like for him. When his dad said it, it was real. My parents suffered in ways I did not have to. And there are scars on their characters that I have judged them for, without knowing that it was changes they made in their parenting that saved me from being hurt in the same way. My freedom to think for myself and my ability to understand human nature are things I have been very proud of, as if they were all my doing. In fact, it was the work of Dr. Spock, other child advocates, my parents, and my teachers that brought me to where I am. With Spock's help under our belts I wonder, "Now how can we make it even better for our kids?" The American Question I recently had this great idea about changing where my daughter, Molly, goes to preschool. Studies have shown that children raised in stimulating environments score higher on IQ tests. I realize that the age of recognizing multiple intelligences has dawned, and that IQ tests will soon be considered a very crude and limited measurement of a child's gifts... but still. What harm could a few extra points do? The emphasis at Molly's current preschool is on facilitating free play and social development. She has been there two years, so I figured that a new preschool might present more stimulation than the same old stuff at her present school. I looked around and found a preschool that has lots of great learning materials in it. The kids were all very focused on their activities and the stimulating curriculum. "Yes!" I thought, "This will help Molly grow into a good student". I made a plan to switch Molly to the new school for the summer, before she starts kindergarten in the fall. "NOOOOO WAY!" was her spirited response. Though taken aback, I reassured myself that it was her parent's decision, not hers, because we know a lot more about schools and education than she does. Still, I asked her what her objections were. The crux of the matter lay in her friendships at her present school. She did not want to leave her buddies and have to meet all new kids, no matter how stimulating I thought that might be. Then it dawned on me that I could be replaying my past. My mother had switched me into a "better" college preparatory school in seventh grade. It WAS better academically, but it was a nightmare for me socially. The social costs were not something she calculated. She was thinking about college. To her delight, I excelled academically, but the success in life she wanted for me was delayed by the poor social skills I developed. My new school had sadly ignored my social needs. Knowing how painful this had been to me I was surprised to see how close I had been to quickly subjecting my daughter to the same unbalanced priorities. I had not considered her social concerns in my quest for facilitating her cognitive development. I thanked Molly for her input, and let her know she could stay with her friends until everyone goes to kindergarten. The urge to accelerate my child's academic development is something I see not just in myself, but all around me. It is not that stimulating a child's intellect is wrong. Children need close attention to their cognitive development, or they become bored and behavior problems can result. But our society's headlong quest to accelerate academic progress often comes at the neglect of other needs. French child psychologist Jean Piaget referred to this phenomenon as "the American question". Piaget's research identified the stages of normal cognitive development in children. When he lectured on the subject in the states, however, he was always asked the same question. It annoyed him to no end. The "American question" was something like this, "Yes, yes, I understand these stages, but is there anything we can do to help children get through them more quickly?" Piaget was appalled at the thought. Why would anyone want to speed childhood up? My mother wanted to speed me up so I could succeed in the world. I studied by myself, memorizing Latin vocabulary because it helps raise your SAT scores. I think what I really needed was help playing with my friends, and help learning how to date girls. This was not part of the curriculum. To my mother's dismay, when I graduated high school, I refused to go to college. Instead, I hitchhiked off to the East coast to live on a commune and try to learn about people. So much for succeeding in the world! "Little House on the Central Coast" "What did you do in school today?' I ask my daughter, Molly. "Nothin'," she replies. "Well, what did you do over at your friend's house after school?" I ask, thinking she might be able to remember that, since she just got home five minutes ago. "Nothin'," she replies. I am trying to connect with my daughter, but she has no interest in talking about herself. My attempts to converse being dead in the water I try another tact. "Wanna go read about Laura?' This always gets an enthusiastic response. Molly is six. She loves hearing me read her the stories about Laura Ingalls Wilder, author of the "Little House on the Prairie" books. I sit down and open the book. Molly sits in my lap, her head directly between me and the page I am supposed to read. I lean to the side and begin. Today Laura has been naughty. She did what she knew she must not do. She went alone to the shore of the dangerously deep water. Now Pa must decide how to punish her. Should he whip her with a switch? I stop reading and ask Molly what she thinks. She tells me that she thinks Pa should just tell Laura never to do that again. I ask Molly why she thinks Laura went to the deep water even though she knows her Pa told her not to. Molly says Laura was probably hot and wanted to swim and that Laura probably thought that if she only goes in a little bit then it won't be dangerous. "So Laura felt like she could trust herself to be safe, even though her parents didn't think she was old enough for that yet?" I ask, aware that now we are having a very meaningful conversation. And we are talking about Molly and me as much as we are talking about Laura and her Pa. Is it a surprise that Molly clams up when I ask her about herself but talks freely about Laura? I think I do that too. Ask me how I am, I might say, "Fine, thank you. How are you? Ask me about a movie I saw recently and I'll tell you all about how I loved or hated it. Talking about someone else's story lets me talk about myself without the stifling effect of self-consciousness. Later that night I lay in bed wondering what Molly might write in her memoirs of her childhood. Her version of "Little House on the Prairie" might be titled, "Medium sized House on the Central Coast". The vast wilderness surrounding Laura Ingalls is now the incessant onslaught of suburban development. The dangers of wolves, panthers and bears are replaced now by the fears of drug abuse, human violence, and automobile collisions. The pressures of securing a warm cabin and food for the winter are now lived as stress over the checkbook and how to find a way to pay off the credit cards. On Christmas morning Laura Ingalls found great joy in Santa's gifts of a doll, a comb, and a candy cane. In the "Medium-sized House on the Central Coast" Molly will be expecting considerably more in Xmas bounty. But though times have changed, some things remain the same: The thrill of leaving cookies for Santa. The soft purring of your cat in your lap. The adventure of walking alone in the woods as if you were an Indian. The love of friends you wish could spend the night with you. The joy of someone opening your present to them. Molly knows these innocent pleasures in life, just as Laura Ingalls knew them, just as I know them. Yes, I know a lot more about the world now than just it's innocent pleasures. But nothing that really pleases me is anything more than innocent. I need to be loved. I need to be free to find my own way in life. And I need to see the shining in my daughter's eyes that tells me I have done something today that has helped her to be happy. The Toll of the Breadwinner Role Some fathers are easy to love. They spend a lot of time with their children, nurturing and guiding them. They know how to accept their children's emotions. They can trust that given the support needed, their children will grow into healthy, responsible adults. They seize the years their children are small, knowing that the psychological foundation laid in these early years will carry their children through life. And they play with their kids, while their kids still want to play with them.  But sometimes fathers aren't easy to love. They may spend long hours at work to the neglect of their children and/or their marriage. When they return home they may be exhausted or grumpy. They may stifle their children's expressions and be harsh in their discipline. They may never have learned how to foster trust and safety in their relationships with anyone. They can be stressed and lonely and burdened, feeling like they are the "bad guy" within their own home. With Father's Day coming this month, one of the best gifts we can offer is understanding. How is it that men can be, at times, so out of touch with the loving, nurturing parts of themselves?   Perhaps it has to do with the facts that for endless generations men have been raised to fill the role of the breadwinner. We train boys to compete fiercely with one another. We shame them into completely stifling their feelings. Their resulting ability to compete aggressively without worrying about how you or anyone else feels can be valuable skills for climbing the ladder of success in our economy. But such training leaves men's hearts neglected. A man who competes successfully in the world can look like a good catch to a woman hoping for financial security. (To some, men are "success objects" in the same way women are sometimes viewed as "sex objects".) But when a woman finds out the cost, that her man's armoring off his own feelings has blocked his ability to empathize with others, she may blame him for his ineptitude in relationships. He ends up in double jeopardy. Having had his feelings shamed out of his awareness in order to become a man, he is now shamed by his wife for being emotionally retarded, or for absenting himself from the emotional life of his family.  Feeling unskilled and unsuccessful in family relationships, it is easy to see why many men would gravitate toward work and away from their families For working class men the draw to work is fueled by the need to earn enough to survive. Career is not something you do for fulfillment, it is something you do for the money you need to live on. Hopefully you can earn enough that someday you can retire and not have to work any more. Many working class men would love to take time off with their families, but simply can't afford to. Working class women are in the same boat. Thus the best way to strengthen working class families would be to change the hugely inequitable distribution of wealth in our society, so that both men and women could work part-time. For middle class men, work is a place where you can succeed in something you have been trained to do. Home is where you flounder at parenting, something you have no training in, save the often flawed modeling of your own parents. Home is where Mom is the more experienced parent. Home is where you feel second best in a field of two. That's last place to anyone whose looking. The women's movement has shown us that women are fully capable of the intellectual and leadership challenges once allowed only to men. If a woman does not seem up to par we explain that sexist attitudes have hampered women's self-esteem and the development of their potential. In a similar way we need to raise our consciousness that men have a huge capacity for heartfelt compassion and excellence in relationships. If that is not what we see, it is not the men at fault, but the way that we have raised them.   So what can you do for Father's Day? You can see through the layers of armor the men you know have had to develop to compete in this world. Let them know you see the heart inside. Do not blame them for not letting it show more. But see the ways in which everything they do is in fact their attempt to show their love and find love in return. On Dad's and Love I remember consoling a woman friend of mine many years ago. She was crying about her difficulty in establishing a career. Between her tears she said, "My dad kept telling me that all I needed to do was love someone really well, and I would be taken care of." The message she got was that her job as a woman was to focus on relationships, and that the man she finds will do everything else (presumably better than she could have). This kind of sexism had left her with great doubts about her ability to be successful on her own.  I, on the other hand, found this message very intriguing. No one had ever suggested to me that the most important thing I had to offer the world was my love. I was taught that fathers are important because they earn money, provide discipline, teach right from wrong, protect their families, and model manhood. Love wasn't even on the list. It was mothers who were the experts on love.  In truth, a father's love is his greatest gift. But our culture has not reflected back to us the importance of our love. The loving part of our natures is largely unattended to in our upbringing. Consequently most men feel insecure about their love. We wonder if we love enough or love well enough. One dad I know spent most of his first pregnancy worrying how he could possibly bond with his baby on anywhere near the level he expected his wife to. No one would claim that men are universally skilled in showing their love. Rather, we have had extensive training in how not to show our feelings. Hence, many fathers struggle with expressing their affection. Sometimes they lose this struggle, they never take down their walls, and they die with words unsaid. I often hear adults say that they never knew if their father loved them. I can feel both the pain of these grown-up children and the pain of their fathers who never knew how important their love was.  In the face of our culture's gender steriotypes it is helpful to keep affirming what we know to be true. I know my father loved me, though I don't remember him ever saying it. I know my woman friend was very competant in her field, though she struggled to feel confident. As a parent I know that what I reflect back to my child (about what I see in her) becomes built into her developing image of herself. And now I find that I have not outgrown the need to have the undervalued aspects of my humanity reflected back to me. So let us honor the great love within the hearts of fathers. And let us never mistake a man's conditioning to avoid his feelings as an actual lack of love. All men love deeply. How nice it would be to wake up one morning and hear our loved ones say, "All you have to do this morning is feel how much you love us. And thank you so much for loving us so well." Punishment and Permissiveness I am reading a youth novel with my ten year old daughter, Molly. Alice, the teenager in the book, gets pressured into hiding her friend, Pamela, in her bedroom, so that Pamela's parents will think their child has run away. Big mistake. The plot is discovered. Alice is remorseful. Alice¹s father is furious. He grounds her for a week. She cannot have any friends visit and she cannot leave the house. "Wow," I spontaneously comment, "a week without social contact would be really hard on a teenager." "Yeah," Molly agrees. "She's probably going to be really frustrated with her dad by the end of it," I speculate. "I'd feel miserable if I had to enforce a punishment like that." "Do you think you will ever punish me like that?" Molly asks. I reflect on her question. The answer depends on what one means by "punishment". If punishment means imposing harsh, extended, irremediable consequences with the intent of making a child suffer in order to teach them a lesson, then I can honestly say that I have never punished Molly and I never intend to. This is not to say that I have never gotten mad, acted impulsively and scared the daylights out of her. I have. But I have never believed, once I had time to think about it, that the fear of punishment is the tool I want to use to ensure my daughter's cooperation. Psychological researchers have concluded that fear of punishment is effective in controlling behavior only when children believe that they might get caught. I do not want my daughter to fear me when I am around, and disobey me when I am not. A parent can err in the other direction as well. I have often seen the unfortunate results of overly permissive parenting. Children who are not taught proper behavior through clear and consistent limit-setting suffer as much as those who are parented too strictly. A permissive parent may intend to offer her child the freedom to express himself. The resulting misbehavior, however, sets the child up for conflict, disapproval, and punishment outside the home, where cooperation, sensitivity to others, and self-control are necessary for social success. How can a parent find a healthy balance between permissiveness and strictness? As I planned this article I tried to think of specific examples of good parenting solutions to common behavior problems. The uniqueness of each real life situation, however, defies any pat solutions. Instead, I offer the following principles. The art of applying these principles, I leave up to you: When children are helped to understand and agree to the principle behind a given rule, they own the rule and follow it because it makes sense to them. Children have a drive for mastery. This includes mastering the demands of good behavior. Believe in your children¹s potential for success in this quest. Notice and comment on their victories. Make sure they identify themselves as people who can behave well. Provide whatever support and supervision a child needs to successfully keep the limits you set. Do not abandon them to fail in situations where they have limited self-control. Rather, watch closely, provide just enough help to ensure that they succeed. Then let their success experience build their confidence in themselves as competent rule followers. Never try to prove to children that they can¹t be trusted. If they sense your lack of faith, they may give up trying to prove you wrong. They may settle, instead, for the rewards of misbehavior. Never change a limit in response to a child's misbehavior. Rules and limits can be changed through respectful dialogue, but never in a way that rewards whining, sulking, or tantrums. Do not overly protect children from the natural consequences of their decisions. Unless their safety is at risk, allow them to experiment sometimes with choices you would not advise. If it is always a struggle to get them to take a coat with them, consider letting them experience being cold. Be honest and consistent in your words and actions. If you tell your child, "We have to go now, don't stand and talk to another parent for fifteen more minutes. Or if you do, recognize that it is you who are teaching the child your definition of "now". Children have a drive to please you. When you appear to them to be a beacon of fairness, honesty, and responsibility they will respect your opinion of them even more. When you are a vital source of empathy, understanding, and compassion for them, they will crave your approval. So my answer for Molly is: "No, I don¹t intend to ever turn our home into a jail and hold you prisoner. I trust that you will be able to understand whatever it is I need from you in one heartfelt conversation. And I hope to be able to do the same for you." "Yeah," she said. "Me too." The Report Card The report card came in the mail today. I haven't opened it. I haven't even told my daughter, Molly it is here yet. I'm just taking some time to think about this whole report card business. Molly is thinking about it too. She is talking with her classmates over the phone. Some are curious. Some are upset. Some are proud, but don't want to come right out and say so. Molly wonders how she will feel when she sees her grades. So do I. We just finished watching the Women's Olympic Figure Skating. Skater after skater dazzled our family with their skill and grace. All have dedicated their lives to this pursuit. All, in my mind, are worthy of the acknowledgment a gold medal provides. But only one got it. The judges decided who. And based on a single performance, and whether or not any slight mistakes were made, careers paths were paved or dreams were broken. It was very fun to watch. But I knew I would not enjoy placing my fate in the hands of a panel of judges. They might miss the genius of my creative choreography because of a mere difference in taste. And I would certainly not enjoy the torture of seeing disappointing marks flash on the scoreboard while the world watched, voyeurs to my shame. It reminds me of when my high school would post the "honor role". We students would crowd around the bulletin board to read the list of names of honored students. Once, to my delight, I was mentioned. It was just my name in 12 point electric typewriter font, but it felt light blinking neon lights on the movie house marquee. I was so proud. We returned to this bulletin board the next time grades were released. I had worked just as hard and surely I was still as smart as I had been a few months earlier, but for some strange reason they left my name off the list this time. As good as I once felt, I now felt bad. When Molly told me that her report card was coming soon, I could tell she felt a little nervous. I wanted to protect her from the roller coaster of emotion that comes from reducing months of honest work into a single letter grade. So I talked to her about the inherent flaws in this almost universal practice. Too often report cards are treated like the authoritative word on whether a child is a success or not. I told Molly that grades are one person's view of how well you are doing in the things that he or she thinks are important. Often they aren't even a good measure of how well you are doing, because some teachers grade you not based on your achievements, but by whether you are doing better than your classmates or not. We agreed that this is silly, because who really cares whether other kids are doing well or not? Their performance doesn't change whether or not you have worked hard and learned a lot. "No one knows you as well as you know yourself," I told Molly. "Teachers don't know all the things you are good at, because they only test you on the things they teach. So you are the best person to write your own report card. How about if you think up all the subjects you have been learning about and give yourself grades? You can include things like horseback riding, playing soccer, and thinking up good card game strategies." Molly thought this was a good idea, and it seemed to relieve some of the pressure she was feeling in anticipation of seeing her grades. She has not actually constructed this self-made report card, however, and now the school's report card is here, waiting. It could be a source of much celebration. Or it could be a real let down. Should we open it? The Second Parent We are all dressed up for the Renaissance Fair: my daughter Molly, her step-mother Amy, and I. It is a day dedicated to fun and togetherness, and we are all filled with expectation. But lo, before we are even under way, a scuffle breaks out. Molly has made an impassioned bid for the front passenger seat. Amy, not sure whether this is her call, has held her tongue and looks at me with anguished brow. I sigh. Whatever I say will disappoint one of my loved ones. Amy is "the second parent" in our threesome. She gives a lot of love and care to Molly, but their bond is not as strong as the one between Molly and her daddy. Step-parents often feel this secondary status. Fathers also, often feel like the second parent compared to mothers. In families where dad is the primary care parent, it is the mother who may feel secondary. In lesbian couples, the non-birth mom may feel like parent number two. It is a hard role. Second parents often have to parent in situations they didn't design. By the time Dad gets home from work Mom may have already negotiated a plan for the whole evening with the kids. A step-mom may end up driving her step-son to and from a school she doesn't even think is right for the boy. A mother may long for peaceful family dinner conversations that never happen because the kids love to clown around with Dad. When they are all wrestling in the living room, Mom gives up and clears their half finished plates. It can be tiresome to parent according to someone else's plan. Parents are much more motivated to give their time and energy when they feel like their personal vision of "family" is possible to create. Without the authority to implement their own vision, second parents may lose interest in parenting. They may feel like they have a boss at work and a boss (the primary parent) at home. In addition to not setting up the context in which they parent, second parents often suffer from a lack of appreciation for what they do provide. A father may rush over to comfort a son who has just skinned his knee, only to have the boy run into the house crying for his mom. A step-mother may offer to read her step-daughter a book she really loved as a child, but the girl opts for re-reading old comic books with dad. Such rejections can be painful. And second parents usually find themselves alone with this pain while the primary parent is snuggling with the children. The choice second parents often face is whether to assert themselves as parents more strongly or withdraw. Asserting oneself runs the risk of creating conflict with the primary parent. Is it possible to negotiate a mutual vision for the family? Can the couple find enough time away from their children to talk this through? Does the primary parent have enough energy consider the needs of the second parent as well as the kids? Withdrawing from parenting avoids these difficult questions. My own father watched TV every evening, rather than address these issues with my mom. But withdrawing only entrenched his status as the second parent. It passed the time without solving the problem. As a boy, it was when I watched my dad, watching TV, that I vowed not to let that happen to me. So now I am the primary parent. And my daughter is pleading for the chance to sit up front with me. Amy is quiet, but I know how she feels. I imagine her sitting in the back seat, staring out the window, withdrawing. "I'm sorry Molly, but you have to ride in the back seat." "Why," she whines. "Because when Amy and I support each other we are both happier. And when we are happier we have more energy to give to you." This apparently made sense even to a nine year old. Molly got in back. Amy sent me a smile over the roof before she got in. We drove off. And had a