Invitation to a Dialogue: A Father’s Place

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/19/opinion/invitation-to-a-dialogue-a-fathers-place.html

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To the Editor:

Forty-five years ago I tried an experiment on my children’s pediatrician. When my wife and I were both in the examining room, I noticed that the pediatrician directed all his questions to my wife — as if I weren’t even there. On one visit, I suggested that my wife sit in the “daddy corner” and allow me to answer all the doctor’s questions. Despite the fact that I was next to him and answered each of his questions, he kept looking across the room and continued to address all his questions to her.

Fast forward 45 years: Dad-accompanied visits to the pediatrician are more commonplace, and the American Academy of Pediatrics last month released a report, “Fathers’ Roles in the Care and Development of Their Children,” documenting the myriad benefits to children of positive father engagement.

This report, preceded by a few days by another report, “The State of America’s Fathers,” produced by Promundo, is one of many indicators of the inadvertent social evolution I call the “Daddying Movement.”

Both reports demand our attention and offer recommendations for action that it would be wise for us to embrace, including these:

1) Encourage men to enter professions involving early childhood, health and caregiving heretofore seen as women’s professions.

2) Teach all children about the importance and value of being caregivers.

3) In child custody decisions, keep the best interest of the child foremost, even if it challenges the assumptions that traditionally favor mothers.

4) Pass a national policy guaranteeing paid leave of equal length for mothers and fathers after a birth or adoption.

What is often left out of the research findings is the benefit to fathers when they are positively engaged in their children’s lives. Being a dad enriches them, reminds them of what is really important, diminishes their self-absorption, and fills their lives with humor, imagination, enthusiasm, a willingness to make mistakes, and a sense of wonder.

ALLAN SHEDLIN

Chevy Chase, Md.

The writer, a former educator and founding executive director of the National Elementary School Center, is a parenting coach and the founder of the DADvocacy Consulting Group and Reel Fathers.

Editors’ Note: We invite readers to respond briefly by Thursday morning for the Sunday Dialogue. We plan to publish responses and a rejoinder in the Sunday Review. Email: letters@nytimes.com