My eyes were opened to the remarkable impact that man had on my daughter’s life. I began to understand the depth of this stepfather’s love …
Stepdads: Be a Friend & Assistant
You married your spouse, not her kids. Your job is to help her, not take over her role or responsibilities with her children.
Ways to Stay Positive Through Discouragement
If you’re like many men, you love being a dad. It speaks to something deep within you. But sometimes it gets hard, and you get discouraged. Nothing seems to work with your kids, and the payoffs are few and far between.
Get Out of Your Comfort Zone and Connect with Your Kids
That word “engage” has transformed who I am as a father. I keep fighting off selfishness and the desire to go back to the Comfort Zone.
9 Ways for a Stepdad to Engage With His Family
by Ron L. Deal “How tall is it?” I ignorantly asked a Kenyan missionary. “Mount Kilimanjaro is over 19,000 feet tall,” he smiled. “It’s big!” No kidding, I thought. I could see the outline of the tallest mountain in Africa from my third-floor Nairobi apartment 130...
4 Ways Dads Can Help Hurting Kids
Sometimes life leaves emotional scars on children. How can we dads help them most effectively? A stepdad named Eric wrote to us about this. He said that the greatest difficulty he has faced with his children has been dealing with the hurt they brought with them from...
What We All Can Learn from Stepdads
Do teen stepchildren behave worse, or are stepdads more critical and less encouraging of their stepchildren? Here are three suggestions …
The Effective Stepfather: A Checklist to Live By
by Ron Deal – Stepfathering can be challenging — and perhaps that’s why many stepfathers disconnect from their stepchildren. But stepfathers can have profound and important leadership roles.
Someone Who Loves You
Children in eleven U.S. cities are giving moving tributes to their fathers as they read their prize-winning essays during Father of the Year celebration events. Each essay has a story behind it, and Haley Hubbard, a 12th grader from Tulsa, brought the entire audience to tears as she stood with her stepfather and read this essay:
Stepfathering Adolescents: It Takes Patience, Flexibility and Humor
Pre-teen and teenage kids can pose a tremendous challenge for stepfathers. As they develop their identity and self-esteem, they are very sensitive to dramatic changes in their family structure and living situations.
How to Cook a Stepfamily
Whether you realize it or not, your stepfamily has likely assumed a specific integration style. By that, I mean a set of assumptions about how your stepfamily 'ought' to come together. I like to use cooking as an analogy to identify some integration styles that stepfamilies attempt to utilize. Let’s start with the ones that generally don't work.
Stepdads: Don’t Compete With the Child’s Father
Orville is about to become a stepfather, and he wrote to me with a question: the 8-year-old son of his fiancée minds his father very well, but wreaks havoc at home. "What should I do?" Orville writes.
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Let’s TALK: 4 Keys to Connecting with Your Daughter
by Michelle Watson Canfield, PhD, LPC Dad, there’s something important you need to know about your daughter. Here it is, short and to the point: When a girl or woman knows and feels she is loved by her dad, she will have: greater confidence stronger inner fortitude...
What Makes Your Child Laugh?
As a father, it's good if you actively observe April Fool's Day—not by playing cruel tricks on your children, but by celebrating those relationships with lots of laughter. Victor Borge said, "Laughter is the shortest distance between two people." You already...
Dad: Your Faith Matters to Your Kids
Holy Week is a great time to remind and challenge you about one of the most profound ways you can influence your children—in faith and spiritual matters. There’s a wide range of approaches to faith, just like there are many different traditions for the Easter holiday....
Encouraging Our Daughters
Psychologist Dr. Joyce Brothers recalls the spirited discussions around the family dinner table she had when she was growing up. Their family discussed politics, world events and other goings-on of the day. One day, the topic was President Roosevelt’s attempt to...
When Your Daughter “Becomes a Woman”
What are some needed strategies for us dads to how to navigate life with our daughter when she starts her monthly cycle? You have to admit it’s foreign territory for a dad. In a nutshell, I recommended that you not make a big deal out of it, but continue to show your...
Teaching Daughters About Sex?
A dad named Allan wrote to me, not asking should I teach my daughter about sex, but how should I? You see, he’s a single dad. And, he’s wondering, should I find a woman to talk to her? I commend Allan for recognizing the importance of this area of his daughter’s life....
Take Your Daughter to Work
I’m reminded of one father who instilled the value of hard work into his daughter. Harry regularly took his daughter Demi to work with him, where she learned the value of hard work, honesty, and generosity. When she grew older, she went to work for him every day, and...
Sex: Daughters
In a world that is sexually spinning out of control, what can we do to protect and support our daughters in this caustic environment? Now, we know that girls are wired uniquely different than boys. Where boys may be lured in more by the visual temptation, it’s the...
Reflection Dad / Lunch with Daughter
teve had an important lunch appointment. He had traveled several hundred miles, and he was more than a little nervous. But this meeting wasn’t to cut some business deal. It was to start a new relationship. His luncheon partner was his daughter. Michelle had left home...
Daughters and “the Gender War”
Some time ago, I spent a week in the mountains with my daughter Sarah on a father-daughter retreat. For me, it was a cleansing, refreshing time; for Sarah, it was a time of empowerment and blessing to be all God meant her to be. That week deepened our relationship,...
Daughters and “The Real Thing”
How would you train someone to spot a counterfeit bill? Well, you’d probably make them aware of the common methods of copying the original, and you’d point out telltale signs of fakery. But most of all, you’d want that person to be very, very familiar with the real...
Daddy’s Daughter Comes of Age
Today your daughter has opportunities that mom and grandma never dreamed of. Women’s sports are making their mark. Of note are women’s basketball programs that rival the men’s. At some Big Ten universities, in fact, the women’s games are one of the hottest tickets in...