Being a father can be complicated, especially when you’ve known “fatherlessness.” Even boys who live with their fathers often have little opportunity to experience the meaning of manhood first-hand. The consequences include the universal wound many men carry, father hunger, and a deep sense of loneliness. Here are some practical ways to address these issues and to foster fathers’ connection with their children.

Amongst all the demands placed on men, fatherhood can be one of the most challenging. There may be many reasons for this, but below we consider three causes that are easily overlooked.

1. “Fatherlessness”: the universal wound

Many men find some issues difficult to talk about. One of these is the emotional wounds they may have sustained, especially those related to their fathers. "The most universal wound," says the spiritual writer Richard Rohr, "is fatherlessness: a lack of engagement."

Many men (and women) have known fatherlessness in some form. Was your father absent, or physically present but emotionally unavailable? Did you feel as if he wasn’t really there because he lacked the confidence or the vocabulary to discuss important issues with you? Perhaps he was absent when you really needed him, due to his career, work pressure, divorce, or a premature death. Maybe, at some point, he walked out on the family.

Fatherlessness can take on many shapes. Seeing how this could relate to your own life does not constitute a witch-hunt or an attempt to criticise your father. Instead, it aims at making you aware of wounds in this regard so that you can better understand yourself and, perhaps, find ways to experience healing. After all, it’s difficult to offer that which you have not received yourself to others – whether as a life partner, friend, colleague, family member or a father to your own children.

The wound inflicted by fatherlessness stems from fathers who wanted a daughter and got a son, who got an artist instead of an athlete, or cerebral palsy instead of gold medals. This is how Steve Biddulph puts it in Manhood: an action plan for changing men's lives (Finch Publishing, 1994).

A father not only plays a crucial role in the arrival of his baby boy or girl, but also when a teenager finds themselves on the brink of the adult world. According to the writer John Eldredge, an adult-to-be’s single most important question is: “Do I have what it takes to be a man or a woman?”  

Every child has a deep need for their father to supply the answer to this question, Eldredge explains in Absent, an American documentary on the social pandemic of fatherlessness afflicting our society. "Children know their mother loves them, regardless. They need to hear their father say that they have what it takes to be an adult, and that all will be well. When this need for confirmation is met by a deafening silence, it causes immeasurable damage.”

For millennia, girls and boys were aware of making the transition to adulthood because of rituals marking a girl’s first menstrual period and initiation rites for boys. In the West, the markers of adulthood today are mostly limited to church rites or getting a driver's license. Girls’ bodies tell them when they transition to womanhood, but boys do not get a clear sign.

2. What does manhood really look like?

Boys find themselves in a different situation. At first glance they seem to be surrounded by men, but in reality their exposure to male role models and to what it means to be a man has decreased dramatically during the past few centuries.

For hundreds of thousands of years, humans lived in nomadic groups of two to three dozen, Biddulph reminds us. Boys spent hours in the presence of their fathers, grandfathers and other men - on a daily basis. Through their close contact with adult males they not only learned how to perform practical tasks, but had access to their thoughts and feelings.

Research shows that the hunter-gatherer lifestyle provided ample time for unhurried companionship. “The shift to agriculture, the birth of cities and the advent of the Industrial Revolution a mere five or six generations ago brought about dramatic changes.”

In many homes, moreover, there is no grandfather or other adult male who can fill this void, and in schools male teachers are in the minority.

The possibility that boys need hours instead of a few minutes of fathering every day is easily overlooked, writes Biddulph. Fathers who had the same experience as children find themselves struggling to define what manhood means and who they really are. It is very difficult to do so in a vacuum.  

The psychological term “father hunger” refers to a boy’s unsatisfied need to spend long hours with his father or another adult male, gaining confidence and learning how to function effectively. He longs for time to do things in the company of adult males, to strive towards mutual goals and to laugh about everything that can go wrong. A boy needs time, and lots of it, to immerse himself in the joy of being a man in the presence of others who have the knowledge he requires and are willing to share it with him.

Luister na joernalis Julian Jansen se gesprek met Mariette oor sy boek “Seuns sonder pa’s”.

3. Taking an oath

The movie Absent describes how the physical or emotional absence of a father can cause a child, male or female, to take an oath regarding his or her future adult life. The type of oath described here is an absolute statement that holds the person taking the oath to certain outcomes and severs him or her from the unpredictable, natural flow of life.

Someone who - come what may – is bent on living according to one rigid rule becomes a control freak and unwittingly limits his or her partner and children. He or she is usually a relentless self-critic. Becoming aware of such an oath and its consequences is the first step in a more realistic direction.

Examples:

• I will always be there for my child, even if I have to kill someone in the process

• I'll make sure I never get hurt again

• I will never trust a man/woman

• I will never let my wife down

• I will never run out of money

  In extreme cases, such an oath expresses tragic convictions:

• I will never have what it takes to be a man

• I will never be skinny and sexy enough to deserve a loving relationship.

Hier skryf joernalis Julian Jansen hoekom seuns - én volwasse mans - behoefte het aan ‘n gerusstellende manlike teenwoordigheid.

What can be done

• Your relationship with your father has a huge influence on you and the way you father your own children. Biddulph believes that your father remains part of you throughout your life, and if you are at odds with him, you are actually at odds with yourself. He recommends that you have an in-depth conversation with your father to ascertain - as far as possible from a neutral point of view - how he experienced your childhood as well as his own. Your father's "truth" may be far removed from your childhood impressions. A conversation of this nature may yield surprising insights.

• If your father has passed away you can write him a letter, speak to his contemporaries or visit places that played a major role in his life.

• There are relatively few opportunities available for men to work with emotional wounds. Possibilities include getting professional help, joining a men's group at a church or elsewhere, or becoming part of development groups such as the Mankind Project.

• Learn to view the time you spend with your child as a privilege instead of a chore. This can be a challenge since society expects us to focus on productivity. The Covid-19 pandemic has had many dire consequences, but it has also created more opportunities for families to spend time together – especially for sons and fathers.

Read clinical psychologist Jeffrey Rink’s insights on being a good-enough father against the background of Western society.

• Consider getting involved in a fatherhood organisation such as

Character company: https://www.thecharactercompany.co.za/

Father a nation: https://www.fatheranation.co.za/

Parent Centre: https://theparentcentre.org.za/

The World needs a father: https://www.theworldneedsafather.com/

Dads in the Picture: https://www.dadsinthepicture.co.za/

Heartlines: Fathers Matter https://www.heartlines.org.za/fathers-matter/home    

SAVF FAMNET presents the Botswadi parenting course and the Ubaba Unathi course for dad involvement: more information at famnet@savf.co.za

Counselling psychologist Luricka Fick explains what parents should know about postnatal depression.

This article originally appeared in rooi rose magazine.

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