Daddy’s Little Girl

“I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a fathers protection.” Sigmund Freud

It is true that there are thousands of father’s who run away from the responsibility of being a father. There are fathers who simply refuse to care for their children. Imagine your child for days, for months, for years asking you this simple yet desperate question: “Mommy where’s my daddy?”
Now imagine that daily you are dying inside because you know the truth but you realize that as devastating as it is for you, without a doubt you know that the pain that’s going to be rendered to your child will be much worse.
Now imagine that your child has gotten to an age where avoiding the question will know longer suffice.
Now visualize your child’s face as the pain wipes across it and an out pouring of tears that begins to dispense from his/her eyes. Now imagine both baring witness and feeling the extreme pain that your child is experiencing from a broken heart. I wouldn’t want to relive that day for anything in the world.

So, I again acknowledge and am fully aware that there are lot’s of men who just refuse to be responsible, but on the flip side, there are a lot of men who want nothing more than the opportunity to father their children, but are being denied that right.

Father’s are so important, the impact that they can and will have on their children’s lives is huge. And the impact that a father has on his daughter’s life is so great that it in most cases cannot be duplicated. Fathers and the way they treat their daughters set the standard/bar for every man that will come along after him. Fathers play a large role in how girls/females identify themselves, their ability to be loved and to love, as well as their self worth and value.

The absence of a father in his daughter’s life, if not handled with care, will essentially breed a woman who grows up living a life full of insecurities, fears, preventable failures, low self esteem and unhealthy relationships.

Sadly, lots of men are not being allowed to be in their children’s lives. I can speak from first hand experience when I say this. I have witnessed with my own two eyes what a man looks like when he is smiling on the outside but dying on the inside because he misses his children so deeply.

According to the U.S. Department of Health, 63% of teen suicides come from fatherless homes. Which is 5 times the national average. According to Justice and Behavior, 90% of all runaways and homeless children are from fatherless homes and 80% of rapists with anger problems come from fatherless homes. National Principals Association reports that 71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes. Jennifer Roback’s published review “Parents or Prisons” stated that daughters of single parents without a Father involved are 53% more likely to marry as teenagers, 711% more likely to have children as teenagers, 164% more likely to have a pre-marital birth and 92% more likely to get divorced themselves.

I hope that you can sense my heart in this. The role of a father is more than important. I know that in times past, I’d tricked myself into believing that I was capable of being both mother and father. Which I have since realized was just a lie that I told myself. Though I attempted it, I only ended up frustrated, resentful, burnt out, desperate and vulnerable. As a woman I cannot teach my sons how to be men and though I can show by example how a woman acts when she is being treated correctly by a man, but I am not a man therefore I can not offer my daughter the experience first hand.

So this is my word of advice, if you are a mother who is refusing to allow your children’s father to be present in their lives, realize that though you may be hurting him, the pain that you are rendering to your child/children is far worse. You DO NOT have what it takes to be a father, so forgive him and move on, your life will change because of it.

To the fathers who are trying, I salute and dedicate this post to you! To my very own husband and father to my children , babe you are the best and I praise God for you. We are going to get through THIS together.