FAthers in Child Care

Doctor stresses importance of fathers in child care

Back in the 1960's, when Kyle Pruett was in medical school and was leaning towards pediatrics as his specialty, he was angered by the dismissive attitude of the child-care industry toward fathers.
        But that was nothing com pared to what he felt a few years later when his first child was about to born.
        "I has to get permission of the head of Ob-Gyn to be present at my daughter's delivery," says Pruett, clinical professor of psychiatry at Yale University and author. "I was shocked that I wasn't wanted there even though I had just been delivering babies myself in the same room."
        Pruett, who will be the keynote speaker at the Second Annual Michigan Fathers Conference at the Community House in Birmingham on Oct. 6, has been intensely interested in fathers and fathering ever since. Last year he published his newest book, "Fatherneed: Why Father Care is as Essential as Mother Care for Your Child."
        Although his eagerly experiences set the stage for his interest in the subject of fathering, it took a question from a medical student in a class he was teaching to push him to look at the research on fatherhood.
        "I had a female student who asked what the effect on their child would be if she continued in medical school while her husband stayed home to look after their infant," Pruett said recently in a telephone interview. "I suggested to her that we look at the research."
        What they found was startling to him.
        "There simply was not a lot of research on fathering," Pruett says.
        That finding, however, led to him doing his own research on the role of fathers in the lives of children.
        Through his own research and that of others who have been looking more intensely at the previously neglected role of fathers, it's been found that fathers have a very important role in their children's lives.
        Pruett says even though more has been written on fathers, as he lectures and speaks to the media around the country there is still a question that gets asked frequently. That question, he says, is usually in the form of "Is it a good thing to have a father involved in a child's life?"
        The answer, according to Pruett, the father of three girls and a new son, is a resounding yes.
        "There is not an age when fathers are not important," he says. "The research consistently points out that it is a very good thing for children to have a father in their life."
        In the interview, he quickly ticked off the reasons why children of all ages - from infants through adolescents - need a father. One of the ways that fathers contribute to the lives of children is through play.
        "Fathers rough house more and kids really take to it," Pruett says. "Fathers also allow certain kinds of use of their bodies and this is healthy for children."
        Fathers handle discipline differently than mothers, he says, because while mothers emphasize education and learning objectives, fathers are more interested in teaching children how to deal with frustration and how to lose."
        Although Pruett acknowledges the many differences between mothers and fathers, he says he can't emphasize mothers have a great deal in common when they are parenting effectively. Good parents, he says, whether male or female, do many of the same nurturing and affectionate things.
        "You'd never have known in the past if you went on the basis of television show portraying fathers as idiots or Madison Avenue's ads showing fathers as clumsy and inept that fathers had any abilities as parents," he says. "The fact is mothers don't have a monopoly on caring for children."
        What he means is that for decades the research has centered on the role of mothers. Fathers and their ability to nurture were neglected and thought not to be important.
        "So although mothers may feel like they have the keys to the kingdom of nurturing," Pruett says, "they're learning on the job just like fathers are."
        When Pruett is in town to address the Michigan Fathers Conference, he will also speak to the staff of the Circuit Court/Family Division, to parents at The Roeper School in Birmingham, and to school counselors and mental health professionals. In each case, the topic will relate to fathers and the importance of their contribution to the growth and development of children.
        And he thinks it's about time that there is this emphasis on the role of fathers in children's live.
        "Since the women's movement brought women into the work force," Pruett contends, "men were drawn into the child-care vacuum. However, very few men, were talking to each other. It's taken more than a generation for men to find their voice and start talking to each other."
        What Pruett in his discussions with both men and women is that newly married parents are vitally interested in co-parenting. And there are more divorced fathers who are overwhelmed and moved by the uncertainty of being in a care taking arrangement.
        "I think that has left men feeling a need for knowledge and support," Pruett says. "There's a need for fathers that's gone unserved, and conferences for men just show there is a need to talk about fatherhood."