Ten Tips for Making Family Services Work for Dads
In our last blog we talked about the unique contributions Dads make to children’s daily lives and their development, despite the media stereotypes which all too often belittle fathers and their efforts. Though there are early parenthood programs focused on fathers and recent efforts to promote rigorous evaluation of fatherhood programs by the Fatherhood Research & Practice Network in the US, most family service programs target primarily mothers. In this blog we discuss a UK report that rethinks the design of family services to genuinely welcome Dads, along with Moms and Babies, to perinatal and family support programs.
“It is 25 years since Professor Michael Lamb described dads as the ‘forgotten contributors to child development’ . . . and many others have provided valuable research, guidance and best practice examples to encourage services to work better for dads. . . . Despite all this excellent work, there is still a long way to go. . . . many dads still don’t get the support they need. Gender inequality still exists in early parenthood and health and children’s services often still forget to ‘think family’. New solutions are needed to these old problems.”
(All Babies Count: The DAD Project, page 2)
I highly recommend reading All Babies Count: The DAD Project, a very readable report from the NSPCC (National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children) in the UK. This project explored innovative solutions for providing information and support to new and expecting fathers during pregnancy and the first year of life in order to improve Dads’ emotional well-being and improve their relationships and family outcomes. The project staff brainstormed with parents, practitioners, and academicians throughout the London Boroughs of Lambeth and Southwark — in waiting rooms, groceries, hospitals, childcare centres, via Internet –conducting personal conversations, surveys, focus groups, and journey maps to understand and design new ways to welcome fathers into family services.
Transition From Partner to Family
Tapping into YouGov, an online opinion polling system, The DAD Project conducted a survey of nearly 1200 men in Great Britain (66% fathers) on the importance of supporting new Dads. Here are a few of the results of this opinion poll:
95% – It’s important for Dads to be involved in caring for their babies.
43% – Midwives* aren’t very good at including new Dads in maternity care.
58% – It’s common for new Dads to feel left out after their babies are born.
68% – If Dads were more involved in pregnancy, they’d be more involved during the rest of the baby’s life.
(Learn more – All Babies Count: The DAD Project, page 8. *Note: The references to midwives in this report might be translated as prenatal, delivery or newborn care nurses in the US.)
These opinion poll results confirm that men agree that pregnancy and the first year of a baby’s life are prime windows of opportunity to engage fathers in family life and services.
Pregnancy and new parenthood is an exciting and joyful time for most! But this time can also be full of stress, anxiety and sometimes depression for Dads, as well as Moms. As parents form new relationships with their baby and take on new roles with extended families and friends, their couple relationship and emotional well-being must adjust to major changes. Typically, Dads are assigned the role of supporter to Mom and Baby, but who’s supporting Dad? Who’s helping Dads express their feelings, understand their hormonal changes, reflect on their relationships with their partners, reflect on their parenting skills with their babies [LINK – KIPS], and explore their formal and informal supports? These are all real needs that are part of perinatal services for Moms, but who’s addressing these needs for Dads?
Maternal & Child or Family Services?
Most often, services during pregnancy and early infancy are aimed at Maternal and Child Health. Practitioners are stretched to meet Moms’ and Babies’ needs, let alone Dad needs. These services largely deal with women’s and children’s health issues in female environments at inconvenient times for Dads. And women practitioners may have little training or experience in dealing with Dads or couples. Some women may feel uneasy or think Mom would be uncomfortable if they asked about the “Father of the Baby ” if he isn’t visibly present and Mom doesn’t volunteer information about her partner.
Ten Tips Sneak Preview
If you don’t have time to read the full 36-page report, at least read and reflect on page 3,
Ten Tips for Anyone Working with Parents in the Perinatal Period
- Think of dads as service users in their own right, not only as mums’ supporters. Know, record and use dads’ names.
- Learn about the research around the psychological and social elements of both mums’and dads’ experiences of pregnancy and new parenthood. Educate yourself about the challenges they can face.
- Ensure your communications, workspaces and materials communicate that dads are equally valuable and welcome.
- Reflect on and challenge your own assumptions and stereotypes about fathers, and seek feedback from dads about their experience of your service.
- Help mums and dads to understand each other’s experiences of pregnancy and new parenthood and show them concrete ways in which they can help each other.
- Talk to mums and dads about the challenges of new parenthood so they know what to expect. In every contact, ask both parents how they are doing, and listen and respond respectfully to their answers.
- Teach mums and dads how to care for a baby (for example bathing and nappy changing) and specifically encourage and acknowledge dads’ involvement in caring for their baby when speaking to the family
- Utilise scans as an opportunity to help both parents to engage in the pregnancy and get to know their baby. Ensure dads are explicitly invited to the scan and acknowledged when they are there.
- Teach mums and dads about babies’ early cues and encourage them to watch and interact with their baby.
- Consider how you can facilitate conversations between mums and dads, dads and dads, and wider families and communities to help create supportive networks around new parents.
(Excerpt from All Babies Count: The DAD Project, page 3.)
When we were developing the KIPS tool, we invited fathers into our studies so the parenting assessment would work for both parents. I was struck with how eager Dads were to engage with us and their family support workers. There’s much more to learn from the The DAD Project about effective redesigns of family services. We’ll get to those in the next blog. Until then, think about Tip 9 and consider how an observational parenting assessment tool could point you toward teachable moments with Dads, Moms and their children.