Chapter 1

      The Crisis in Fathering

      My father was a very serious man. I used to make up all kinds of explanations, excuses really, for why he was the way he was. The truth is I don't care about the reasons anymore. He died without ever telling me he loved me, without ever hugging me, without ever saying he was proud of me. I still don't understand it. It's like there is this giant hole inside of me that can never be filled.

      Fathering. It's not a word we're comfortable with. It feels awkward and sounds funny. It isn't even in most dictionaries. While the concept exists as a logical counterpoint to mothering, we as a society seem at a loss for any sense of what it really represents. That fact is at the heart of a profoundly devastating wound for many men: We have lost our fathers, and far too many of us who are fathers are in serious danger of losing our children.

      To cite just one of myriad statistics indicating the problem, a recent study found that only 20 percent of the fathers surveyed felt that they had a close emotional relationship with either their fathers or their sons.¹ That is a remarkable piece of information. In this statistically saturated world, it is easy to let the flood of numbers simply roll on. But we as men, as fathers, must force ourselves to stop for a moment and look beyond the numbers to see the very real human suffering—ours and that of those we love—that this particular statistic suggests: The vast majority of men in this country are emotionally distant, disconnected from their closest male relatives.

      In general, men tend to be very good at controlling their feelings. We are particularly good at “getting on with things” in the face of hardship, danger, pain, and turmoil. It is our training, our history, and even our mythology, weaned as we were on larger-than-life heroes stoically pushing forward to overcome enormous difficulties and crippling losses.

      This skill, this ability to function effectively in the face of emotional pressure, has served us well, but it has also exacted a very dear price. It has allowed us to create and accomplish out in the world with single-minded focus; but, largely unnoticed, it has also forced many of us to lose track of what is most important and precious, the reasons why we work so hard and what we are working for—our loved ones. In homes all across the country, men are “getting on” with the business of living. But, as the statistics painfully demonstrate, in four out of five of those homes, they are doing it without the reassuringly deep comfort of a close emotional relationship with either their father or their children.

       My Dad worked himself to death. He dropped out of school when he was fourteen to get a job to put food on his mother's table, and he just never stopped. It was like he was afraid that if he ever slowed down, everything would fall apart. He had never known how to be a kid and he sure didn't know how to be with a kid; it was like living with an alien. I didn't know him well but I loved him. It still makes me sad to think about him. Sometimes I would catch him looking at me or my brother with this incredibly sad look on his face, like he knew something was missing, but it was beyond his ability to deal with it.

      This book is about something that is difficult to describe—the close and powerful emotional connection that flows like a current of electricity between a father and his children. It is a most powerful thing and a most fragile one. It can be lost or interrupted abruptly, or it can persist over vast distances and time. It can make the difference between a life that is rich and full and one that is empty and meaningless. It is one of our deepest desires as men yet, for so many of us, it has proven to be painfully elusive.

      For too long we have been silent about our love for our children, about the happiness and sorrow that being a father brings. Fathering: Strengthening Connection with Your Children No Matter Where You Are seeks to break the silence by weaving together men's stories about the joy and pain of being a father. These stories, told by fathers whose collective wisdom and experience is represented on these pages, appear as italicized sections. They are anonymous because the cloak of anonymity gave men the freedom to fully explore these deeply emotional issues. These stories—heart-wrenching, impassioned, and honest—represent the collective voice of today's father. The narrative that flows from their stories is my attempt to record what I have learned from these men, from their efforts and their anguish.

       I don't remember very much about my childhood—there are so many reasons to forget. My father was never home. Sometimes when I was already in bed and supposed to be asleep, I'd stay awake just to hear his voice when he came in. Even on weekends, I hardly ever saw him, except for when we would all dress up and go to church on Sunday. My parents broke up when I was twelve, and he just sort of faded away. My mother still tells me he is a good man, but how would I know?

      The emotional distance that has increasingly come to characterize men's lives has begun to reverberate out into the world. A second set of statistics² tells us that nearly 49.8 percent of our children live outside traditional two-parent homes; that fathers in the United States spend less time with their children than in any other country; and that among those fathers who do live with their children, the average amount of time spent with them is twelve minutes per day.

      These are frightening signposts proclaiming a crisis of monumental proportions. We have allowed ourselves and our children to drift, like untethered astronauts, farther and farther away from the heartbeat of our humanity. We have sentenced our children to the bewildering experience of growing up with a desperate need to feel loved by a father who all too often is simply not there, either physically or emotionally.

      There are even more statistics—ones that reveal the devastating ripple effects on society of absent fathers who fail to forge strong emotional ties to their children. These statistics are the most frightening of all, because they are, by definition, so impersonal and, tragically, so irrevocable: Nearly 80 percent of those who end up in our juvenile justice system lived in homes without a father; the overwhelming majority of our adult prison population grew up without fathers; the single strongest predictor of violent juvenile crime, specifically robbery and murder, is that the child grew up without a close relationship to his father.³

      The statistics don't lie. We are in a crisis of major proportions, and the casualties—both parents and children—are increasing at an alarming rate. We find ourselves at a juncture in time, where a staggering proportion of men feel distant and alone, each of us, like the boy in the hermetically sealed bubble, moving through life separated from everyone else by some inexplicable, invisible barrier. It begins when we are just boys, too often boys without the fathers we need, and it persists when we grow up, becoming fathers ourselves and, out of ignorance, re-creating the cycle of distance with our own children. And we've reached this place despite the fact that none of us ever wanted to be here.

       My children are all grown and have families of their own. I rarely see them and when I do, it is usually strained and awkward. I know that it is mostly my fault because I was never there when they were young, but that doesn't make it any easier.

       I just wish I knew back when I was a young father what I know now. When I finally realized what was really important to me—my kids—I had to face the reality that I had done this to myself.

      It is the absence of the father—physically and, much more important,