Engaging Dads Better

Engaging dads has become a hot topic amongst providers of family services, with more and more considering this a key issue for the quality of their services.
Harald Breiding-Buss writes that in order to involve dads in the right way, service agencies need to involve them for the right reasons.

When you ask people about why they think engaging dads is important for people who work with families, the answer you usually get is along the lines of: because dads are good for kids, or: because parenting has become too female-focused.

There is a much more compelling reason, however: dads spend a lot of time with their children alone. Some children are completely dependent on their fathers, like the babies in our Dependent on Dad study, while others may see little of their dad, but almost all of them would have some times where there is only dad, even if it is only because mum has gone out shopping.

Another intriguing aspect of the Dependent on Dad study was that sometimes it was exactly the men with the troubled backgrounds who would end up sole-caring for their children—fathers that a midwife or similar person may well have ’written off’ in her mind. The message from this is: you simply cannot know how the child you are visiting today is being cared for tomorrow. By not including dads, children are in danger of becoming disconnected from important social services, because their fathers are.

So while it is very important to reach out to solo dads, it is even more important to reach out to all dads, exactly because any one of them may become a solo dad in the future.

Much has been said and written about the failure of our family organisations to effectively include fathers, but our study indicates that, in fact, there isn’t
anything wrong with how a given service is delivered. Not one of the dads we interviewed complained about being looked after by a female, for example, and more often than not the more intensive support services were given a 10 out of 10 by those dads who were actually enrolled in them. The only difficulty is actually getting enrolled.

This is where it is so crucial that a father has been engaged while he was either still together with the mother, or already separated but not yet the full carer of the child. This not only increases the likelihood that the father will actively seek support in the future, but it gives him a foundation in parenting and, importantly, some tools for coping with the stress issues that single parents face more than the partnered kind. Too often family workers assume that only the ‘primary caregivers’ have to deal with these.

Fathers’ and men’s groups have long advocated to have male staff dealing with male clients, but there is no hard evidence that this actually makes any difference.

What is needed is organisations who can successfully role model cooperation between men and women. All organisations providing family work should have a mix of competent male and female staff, and neither sex should work exclusively only with their own. As long as male workers are employed to work only with males there will be a ‘problem’ stigma attached to male parenting, and females will continue to be viewed as the only sex actually competent in parenting issues.
But even if such a mix of male and female frontline workers is not achievable in the short term, organisations can make a big difference for families if they promote their service to both parents. The key phrase here is: Expectation, Expectation, Expectation.

While written promotional material, web sites etc about a service is important, the scene for a service’s involvement is set on that very first personal contact. This is where a family worker has the choice of asking for an appointment with both parents, or only one of them.

This initial approach is very important. Let’s say a midwife phones a family to make an appointment for a Well Child health check, and the baby’s mother answers the phone. The midwife can now make an appointment with her and say that it would be good if her partner would also be present. Or she could, from the start, ask what time would suit both of them (and, of course, baby).

The expectation created with the first scenario is: this is a service for mum and baby, where dad is also allowed to be. The second scenario creates a different expectation: it conveys that this is a service for the family. The midwife coveys that she expects to find both Mum and Dad at the appointment, and that it is up to the couple to decide otherwise, whereas in the first scenario Dad’s attendance is optional.

The same thing also works for families where there are other significant people that should be included, such as the mother’s mother or other people from either parents’ whanau. However, involving other people should never be at the expense of involving the father. Fathers and mothers are generally the only legal guardians when a child is born, and have unique responsibilities as well as rights under both national and international law. When things go ‘wrong’ with the mother, the father is more likely than any other family or whanau member (including the mother’s mother) to take over primary responsibility for the care of his children.

Where parents do not live together, and the child lives mainly with the mother, it can get tricky for a family service. To err on the side of caution the father should be involved and informed. Under the Guardianship Act, both parents have the right to full access to any information there is about the child. Services should be proactive in giving non-resident fathers this information and not wait for him to put in an official request under the Privacy Act.

The most common reason why this so often does not happen is because the mother of the child does not want it to happen. Sometimes this is out of fear that such information would give the father ‘ammunition’ in a current disagreement about day-to-day care. This creates a loyalty conflict with a family worker: to work effectively with this mother and establish a relationship of Trust would require to work with her and only her. But to meet the legal rights of the child and its likely present and future needs, the father should be given information about the service and the child.

Many family workers have been solo mothers themselves and therefore may identify strongly with the situation of the mother. This, of course, can lead to the worker being perceived as ‘siding’ with the mother and the father getting the impression that he is facing a battlefront over the mere issue of maintaining a relationship with his child.

Again, expectations are the key. When a first child is born it is rare even for separated parents to start fighting about the care of the baby immediately. This is a window of opportunity, and involving both parents in the service at this point in time sends a very strong signal of an expectation for cooperation.
When a child is a bit older and the damage has already been done (i.e. an expectation has been created of the mother being in sole charge of the child) this becomes much more difficult, and at times a family worker really has no choice but to work with only one parent in order to make any positive difference in the child’s life.

However the service’s management needs to try to mitigate such situations as much as possible to protect the child’s rights. If, for example, a family worker has strong negative opinions about one of the parents, or disagrees with applying the law or organisational policies in a specific case, there are management tools to resolve this: supervision is not the least important of them. It is also important that the organisation allows non-resident parents to complain so that it is able to gauge whether it has a problem with its internal culture.

The good news is that over the last few years I have noticed more and more discussions about these nitty-gritty issues of father involvement pop up within organisations. Research on this is still far and few between, and what is needed are some good pilot studies accompanied by sound external evaluation that try out alternative ways of working with families so that both parents are included by default.

Next: Supporting Breastfeeding

The Family Court is being reviewed by the Ministry of Justice and a consultation paper is now out and open for public submissions. See here.

Make a real difference in the community by working for Father & Child. We’re looking for a well-organised all-rounder in Christchurch to fill this position, which coordinates our local activities. For full details see here

F&C manager Harald Breiding-Buss was on Radio NZ today (25 Nov), talking about parenting issues for separated fathers. See here for audio file.

Thank you to all who came to see us at the 2010 Auckland Parent & Child show. It was great to be able to meet and talk with you. We trust that you are finding the information helpful.

Thank you also to all those who entered the draw to win a dad pack of cap, T-shirt, frisbee, pen, key-ring and one year subscription to Father & Child magazine – New Zealand’s best father focused quarterly magazine.

The winner of the draw is

Noel Coward of Howick

and the runners up who each receive a free one year subscription to Father & Child magazine are

Shane Barnett of One Tree Hill

Paul Cleary of Pukekohe

David Blackaby of Epsom

Kirk Wedgwood of St Johns

But if you missed out and didn’t win don’t despair – you can still purchase dad gear and magazine subscriptions

Dads might run the danger of delayed ‘crashing’ after the Canterbury Earthquake. Many of the men we have seen at Chch Father & Child recently report high anxiety levels in their partners and their children, especially daughters. Dads have taken on the role of the stable ‘rock in the storm’ for their families as the ground continues to shake regularly at night.
Experience, for example with postnatal depression, shows that fathers cope very well while a crisis is going on, but ‘crash’ when things in the family overall are improving as they have been postponing their own dealing with the situation. This sometimes leads to quite severe depression. With nerves being frayed, there is also a danger that couples fight more.
A good technique is to ‘debrief’: Talk honestly and earnestly to a trusted friend about how it all was, or come to us and we’ll ‘debrief’ you. If you’re feeling stressed already, or are arguing a lot more with your partner, it also helps a lot to talk things through.
The Chch office is open 10-2 weekdays, or by appointment, 1/369 Hereford Street, 982-2440.
Harald Breiding-Buss, Father & Child General Manager.

Here in Auckland the close relationship we have developed with the Onehunga office of CYF is helping to ensure that dads get the recognition and support they deserve.

This is from an article by Janie Smith in the Auckland City Harbour News on 3rd September 2010:

CYF Onehunga site manager Barbara Thomson says fathers play an important role in their children’s lives that can sometimes be lost in times of strife.

“Where there’s a lot of anger and grief between parents, for the child that’s half their family. A child needs to have some contact with their dad or at least their dad’s family. Even if dad doesn’t live with the family, he still has things he needs to give to that child.”

She says even if the father can’t provide a positive role model for his children, it’s something his family can often do.

“Dads are important.”

010910 NEWS Photo: Jason Oxenham/Fairfax Media. The Onehunga branch of Child, Youth and Family is working closely with the Father and Child Trust to make sure fathers are supported and recognised. Brendon Smith(left) from Father and Child Trust and Barbara Thompon, CYF site manager.

Read the full article here:
Support for fathers in times of strife

Teen dads are probably the first fathers to ever be mentioned in a New Zealand budget. The government set aside $750,000 over four years to re-train the service sector to better include teen fathers in existing services for teen ‘parents’.

This is part of about $15 million in funding for teen parents over the next four years, which includes an increase in directly funded ‘teen parent service coordinator’ positions.

Other social initiatives include a ring-fenced family and community services fund, and a fund to make the social sector more efficient and work together better.

Mauri Ora Father’s Circle

Looking for support from other fathers?

Looking to lend your support to other fathers?

Just want somewhere where you can grow in confidence in your role as a father?

Maybe you are looking for a male only environment where you can talk with other fathers?

Then our Mauri Ora Father’s Circle may be just what you are looking for.

Meeting every Wednesday evening from 7:00 – 9:00 pm in the Community Office 3 at the Onehunga Community Centre , 83 Church Street, (next to the library) the Fathers’ Mauri Ora Circle, embodying the principles of emotional, physical, intellectual and spiritual wellbeing, is a safe place where together we can discuss any fathering issues and collectively strengthen our fathering abilities.

Wednesday evenings – 7-9pm downstairs in Community Office 3 at the Onehunga Community Centre.

Facilitated by our Support Worker, Brendon Smith, what is discussed is determined by those who are there. Recently we’ve talked about topics like

• the need to inform children as soon as possible in the event of a separation
• deciding on the best school for your child
• the role our dads play in modelling how we father our children
• what happens when your ex partner wants to move to another town with your child
• children and sport

to name just a few.

Children are welcome, though we do usually leave them in front of a TV with a tin of biscuits!

You are welcome to “just turn up” any Wednesday or if you would like more information feel free to call Brendon on 525 1690 or 022 697 7026 or email him at auckland@fatherandchild.org.nz

The funding support of the Maungakiekie and Tamaki Community Boards (Auckland City Council) is gratefully acknowledged.

Recent discussion topics

Opinion: Protecting The Fathers

By Murray Bacon

Fathers are invincible, right? Many Kiwi kids have been raised on stories of Anzac heroes, All Blacks playing with gruesome injuries, or maybe Captain Falcon Scott’s stoic friend Captain Oates, saying “I’m going outside – I may be a while”.

Do we still need to make children this tough, in our time? Will this actually prepare them properly for their futures? Do these protectors ever need our protection?

Many soldiers returned from WW1 or WW2 with their emotions frozen, having witnessed or participated in brutal engagements.They found that friends or family didn’t find it easy to listen about their experiences.

While the soldiers needed a safe debrief, guilt or a lack of appreciation for the horrors of warfare obstructed many others from helping them.

They said real men don’t talk about the war, but we knew, they didn’t want to listen anyway. They were too proud to listen to what they’d put us through and it was too far away from where they lived.” Tough, they may have seemed, but more than a few of those old soldiers passed away in “unexplained circumstances”.

About 550 New Zealanders end their own lives every year, according to statistics. If we count that some “unexplained accidents” are variations on suicide, the figure may be higher still. Suicide, however, seems even more preventable than car or industrial accidents.

With the benefit of hindsight, the signs are often there for us to see, however, the warnings happen in hundreds of situations, where it never comes to a tragedy.

The no-warning attack, the futility, the needless destruction, the ineffectiveness of any remedy, can all help to drive those who are left-behind crazy. To most, the attack comes from an unexpected direction – an unknown enemy within. Many had honest faith in the strength, the resilience and the wisdom of their child, friend, or adult who had seemed ‘OK’ for quite a while….

Most of us probably know of someone who has taken their own life, though they may not have been close. When close, often the fact of suicide isn’t admitted to friends or workmates, this too is hidden.

Post Natal Depression is not an easy topic for women. It occurs in such a wide range of degrees, from mild or fatigued to actually scary, so no mother wants to be tarred with such a brush. This may lead to denial or hiding and contributes to tension.

Fathers who may have been looking forward to the ‘happy families’ period after a long or difficult pregnancy are often flummoxed.

If they have reduced contact with friends or family during this period, they may have relied on their partner for a listening ear.

If their partner is pretending all is OK the father may feel completely alone and become depressed. It is estimated that for every two PND– affected mothers there is also a clinically depressed father.

To complicate matters further, there is a large increase in suicide risk during the year after separation.

When couples do not separate amicably, there is possibly interference in the children’s relationship with the father, sometimes for disputed reasons or, to the effected party, unfair accusations.

In modern days, after decades of relative peace, our real life ordeals may pale in significance. Betrayal by a spouse or loss of a family member may not be totally unexpected.

Sickness and disease can be arbitrary murderers, support groups are almost mandatory, while victims of violence or car crashes need all the help we can muster.

To many men, however, just being blocked from contact with their children can be the most traumatic and frightening time of their lives.

If their separation was a surprise, via abduction or as part of a protection order, there may be unresolved emotions, separation anxiety and irrational, impulsive thoughts.

If the situation is compounded by being let down by authorities, in whom he thought he could trust, it may seem even more gut wrenching. In these states, men are often their own worst enemies, not reacting properly or feeling betrayed.

Certain men run from situations, some of them to escape responsibility for their children, but more are blocked, possibly without any good reason, from taking care of their own children. These situations are probably also kept silent, so work or social pretences can be maintained.

Are we sensitive to men being barred from fathering? Do we understand the consequences of unfair separation on both children and fathers? What can we do?

Industrial accidents kill about 100 men per year. A major effort has been made recently to reduce this needless toll. Car accidents carry away about 500 people per year.

We have eventually brought this toll down, to the lowest in fifty years, partly by instilling responsible behaviour into our drivers.

Of fathers experiencing unexpected loss of the children: 30% consider suicide.

The completed suicide rate also jumps higher for those who have experienced loss or interference with their own parental relationships when they were a child, or if the mother of the children has experienced separation anxiety.

These anxieties are sometimes fuelled through adoption or abortion.

This ‘separation anxiety’ drives impulsivity in general, more sharply when long term loss of children is involved (the biggest part of our reason for living) and the effects can become permanent.

Near great strength, there can be weaknesses. The Tacoma Falls (USA) Suspension Bridge had a very long span, supported by the strongest available steel suspension cables. The bridge could have withstood storms, but did not manage breezes at a particular, vulnerable speed.

Just before it’s opening, it was destroyed by gentle breezes, that generated standing waves. Despite the strength, the waves just built up, until the bridge was destroyed.

When our children are small, we can plant the seeds of resilience, let them know about the knocks in our life and how hard they can hit, but that it is OK to ask for help or support.

Letting our children see us asking for help goes a long way to enable them to seek help, if they ever need it sometime.

Next: Commission Without Clout?