Dads learn strategies to connect.
The Dads Count conference took place June 12, with workshops designed to help fathers improve their parenting skills. Here, David Kim reads books to his three children Joshua ,6, (left), Sarah, 4, and Alex, 6, during LAMP's drop-in program for dads.
File photo/GRAHAM PAINE
Dads can give their children confidence and a sense of security through their practical and emotional involvement, says a Toronto psychotherapist and father of two.
"Tell your kids you love them," said psychotherapist David Schatzky, a former CBC Radio host, his voice breaking with emotion. "I spoke with a 90-year-old woman the other day who said her father never told her he loved her. She said she always lacked confidence, felt vulnerable. Those words, and spending time, is probably the best investment you can make in your kids."
Schatzky's remarks Saturday morning, June 12, opened Dads Count, the annual Etobicoke-based day-long conference for dads by dads. This year, 61 dads from Hamilton to Oshawa, most in their 30s and 40s, attended 10 presenters' often personal workshops.
Understanding their children is the best gift fathers - indeed mothers, too - can give their children, said Schatzky, who takes to a cottage a week every summer with his 24-year-old son where the pair fish and take nature hikes.
"A parent who is able to understand their child's mind...will make their child more secure," he said. "If a child grows up feeling understood, feeling you get him or her, that makes a huge difference. It's a great gift to be able to give that to your kids."
Children need at least one person to whom they feel attached, Schatzky said.
Dads Count is organized by hands-on dads Brian Russell, a father of girls ages 10, 12 and 13, and parent educator at LAMP Community Health Centre in south Etobicoke, and Mark McDowall, a father of four, ages one, four, five and 16, and marketing consultant who works from home.
"It's pretty amazing," said Russell of the momentum of Dads Count, now in its third year. "There's good discussion, good feedback about the workshops. Dads are getting good information, learning and feeling inspired about being a dad. That's what it's all about."
Toronto Community News, publisher of The Etobicoke Guardian, is a sponsor of the conference, as is City Parent, another holding of Metroland Media Group, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation.
Dave Warren, a single Burlington father of three children, ages five, eight and 10, attended Dads Count for the second time Saturday.
"It feels like home," he said of the free conference. "It's a positive experience. A lot of men are feeling challenged with their parenting skills. It's interesting to connect with other people in similar situations."
Scott McGrath, a Toronto psychotherapist who also works at Seneca College, presented the workshop, Understanding Your Teen, an exploration of the generation known as the Millenials.
Today's teens need structure and ownership over choices, insatiably seek parental attention, want to be included and can best be guided and motivated through the use of "contracts" to co-create solutions, McGrath told dads.
Teens need lots of input, feedback and affirmation, McGrath said.
The more animated a teen becomes, "escalating" behaviour in conversation by yelling, being dramatic or crying, McGrath explained, the more the child doesn't feel understood. The teen will either continue to escalate, or simply end the conversation.
"If they think what's happening to them is the worst thing that's ever happened to them, listen, acknowledge it's real for them," McGrath suggested. "Trying to reason, logic with them is a losing battle. You'll push them away. Say, 'Wow. That's really hard for you. I don't know what you're going to do.' Two seconds later, you'll be helping them with solutions."
Carlo Ceccovilli, an Oakville father, asked McGrath's advice on encouraging his teenage son to find a summer job.
"Many things we already do, but you have to set it properly," Ceccovilli said after hearing McGrath's parenting teens strategies. "I always feel very encouraged, but I want to improve my relationships with my kids. This (talk) gave me new techniques, new strategies."