Welcome to our new Father's Day column. Each month Rob Weisskirch will discuss topics of importance to fathers raising children in Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties.
Valentine’s Day means finding the right gesture to acknowledge your romantic relationship. This process might suggest buying a card, flowers, candy, jewelry, a romantic dinner, or–if you live in the land of TV commercials–a car with a ribbon around it for your partner. Throughout my relationship with my wife, I think I have done all of the above, minus the car (maybe, someday!). My gestures are rarely elaborate but are essential activities to acknowledge us as a couple. As a dad, I know my daughter sees these Valentine’s Day efforts and is learning from me how to have positive relationships with others.
Research supports that children’s understanding of later romantic relationships is greatly influenced by the relationship with and between their parents. Generally, kids who have positive, supportive, relationships with parents are more likely to have greater intimacy and relationship satisfaction with romantic partners later on. Knowing this, I often think about how my 5-year-old daughter experiences her relationship with me, her father. I am the parent with more rigid rules, but, at the same time, I also engage in more physical play, wrestling around, or squishing her with couch cushions. My daughter and I get dirt under our nails in the garden, and I am the designated untier of knots. What is she getting from this father-daughter relationship? She is learning that she can act freely and challenge others without getting hurt. She is learning that she can say “enough” and have it respected and that I, as a man, will treat her with consideration, reliably. Mostly, she is absorbing our interactions as part of her understanding of relationships with males.
My daughter is also learning about relationships from how I treat my wife. My wife and I are not big yellers when we disagree. We strive to treat each other respectfully and tease playfully. On occasion, when we are discussing a topic, our daughter will say, “Stop fighting!” And, we simultaneously say, “We are not fighting” (really, it’s just a discussion). But, for her, she may be interpreting this as fighting. I am okay with that. I want her to realize that romantic partners can disagree, discuss, and come back together successfully. I would rather she see us work things out than fall prey to a media image of couples who scream, yell, call each other names, and become physical with one another as the notion of what it means to be in a relationship. Reality is that relationships have to be nurtured.
It is not just about what you do for Valentine’s Day (and every day), it is also about what you say. Many years ago, I worked with adolescents who could not, for various reasons, live with their parents and resided in a group home. I remember after the teens had visited their parents, having a group session, and one teen girl saying that “I know my mom loves me and stuff. But, it’s always good to hear. And, she, like, never says it to me.” This girl was uncertain of whether she was loved. I remember thinking how I did not say “I love you” with enough regularity to my parents and changed my behavior. Saying “I love you” now to my daughter is frequent and purposeful. I want her to feel the comfort of being loved and also to be reminded of the love from her father. Research also supports that, for boys, feeling loved and learning to express positive feelings can support healthy relationships in the future.
Dads, as Valentine’s Day approaches, include kids in card making or gift buying and explain why you do so. Children pick up on the interactions you have with them and with your romantic partner. It is not about the size of your gift or the amount you spend on your loved one but instead about demonstrating to children how to treat others and how they ought to expect others to treat them. Valentine’s Day is just one concentrated day where hearts and words of love abound. If you want kids to have good, positive relationships, tell them how you feel and show them, every day.
Robert (Rob) S. Weisskirch, MSW, Ph.D., CFLE is a Professor of Human Development at California State University, Monterey Bay and is a Certified Family Life Educator. He is author of over 70 academic articles ranging on topics from parent-adolescent cell phone use to language brokering (i.e., when kids translate for their parents and other adults) to adolescent identity development among other areas. He and his wife are parents to a chatty 5-year-old daughter and reside in Marina.