UAE: Why The Stress Of Fatherhood Needs Greater Understanding

(MENAFN- Khaleej Times)

I spent time with 20 fathers a few weeks ago. My workshop was titled The Stress of Fatherhood, and the first thing I said was this:“I am sorry that we don't speak enough about the burden that you carry. I am sorry that you have been villainised as the emotionally unavailable parent.” It is a sorry state.

“Trauma is not what happens to you. It is being alone with what happens to you,” says Gabor Mate, the world's leading physician specialised in trauma, addiction and childhood development. Men are often alone with what happens to them. Women, on the other hand, are not. Women can speak to each other; we understand one another whereas men simply do not have the ability to speak to anyone about their emotional wounds, not because they don't want to; but simply because they haven't been allowed to. They don't have the skill.

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Being emotionally in tune with ourselves does not come naturally. It is a skill that needs to be learned. And the only way we can learn is when our parents model it to us. The fathers of this generation were taught that being a man meant one could not express emotion. They were told 'Big Boys Don't Cry', suffocating them into tormented silence.

It is difficult to dig deep and feel empathy for a man raging at you, or one who is unable to show any empathy at all. However, it is important to remember that much of this behaviour, while unacceptable, is because our men are emotional invalids. The reason they cannot feel what their partners go through is because they have been cut off from feeling; understanding emotion is a gift they have not been given.

When a father is not emotionally able to regulate his feelings, a child feels unsafe expressing him/herself and the cycle of fear and repression repeats, leading to something far more dangerous: disconnection and indifference. The child consequently cuts him/herself off from the father, losing his/her foundational self-worth. Research shows that an involved present father leads to greater success, self-esteem and confidence in children. When children do not want to be around their father, or don't feel understood by their father, they don't have a completely developed sense of self. So, how can we begin to help the fathers of today? The first step is to acknowledge their pain:

1. Being the primary breadwinner: Being the source of your family's financial well- being is a daunting responsibility with mounting expenses and the maintenance of a certain lifestyle. Just as women are looked at as the source of emotional nurture, men are seen as the primary financial providers. Work stress, dealing with job uncertainty and trying to ensure that your family has enough, can be difficult. Even when the woman contributes financially, men have been schooled to tie their self-esteem to how much they can provide, not how present they are with their children.

2. Work is everything: Men are seen as worthy when they are professionally successful. Have you seen two men speak? Their conversation only consists of what happened at work, the state of politics, investments and world news. They never reveal what is troubling them. Speaking the truth will make them look vulnerable, which to a man, is a sign of weakness.

3. A restrictive emotional life: The only emotion a man has been allowed to feel is anger because it is perceived as an appropriately 'masculine'. If a man cries, is emotional, expresses grief or pain, he is seen as strange and called a series of names that are meant to be demeaning. As boys grow into men, any emotion they feel is expressed as rage simply because it is the only thing they know how to feel.

Yes, mothers are suffering. There is pressure, lack of support and unrealistic expectations of what a mother should be in the modern day without a village helping her achieve these lofty goals. Our fathers are suffering too. Healing is when we look at men not as perpetrators, but as people battling their own inner demons. This is the first step.

Follow Kavita on @conscious or

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