Men Don’t Appear to Seek Out Parenting Help

OK, here is an uncomfortable truth I’ve come to believe.

Men, as a demographic, don’t do parent education.

I’ve been a small voice in the community of parenting instructors for 5 years now and I’ve developed friendships with some of the most amazing and inspiring people in this industry.

People like Jane Nelsen who wrote the Positive Discipline series of books and courses touching millions of parents over a 50 year career.

Kim Jon Payne of Simplicity Parenting and the upcoming book the soul of discipline has changed the way we look at toys and environment.

Susie Walton with her new course joy of parenting that integrates some of the best of parenting techniques with emotional self-reliance and self care.

Kath Kvols the creator of redirecting children’s behavior, the course that changed my life.

Todd Sarner, my good friend and the family therapist behind  www.Transformativeparenting.com

Jon Young, the acclaimed nature awareness author and inspiration for some many to get themselves and their families out side.

And many more…

They’ve all, at one point in time or another, lamented the fact that men, and more specifically father’s, don’t see out help with how to be a parent and a dad.

And it isn’t just antidotal conversations with experts that has us think of this. I have email lists that are over 80% women. The views that we get all across these experts websites are typically women.

And get this, even when I write as a NAVY SEAL and am specifically  targeting men my views are nearly all women.

I can’t even call myself the exception that proves the rule. It was Steph that decided to bid on the parenting course in the silent auction at my son’s school (little did she know the journey that would start!).

Even in my own situation, when nothing I was doing seemed to work as a parent, I was not actively seeking help and how to parent.

And I am a lifelong learner. A junkie for information. I just plain love to study and learn especially when it comes to anything around human psychology. When things were really bad at home not once did I think “ man I should go learn how to parent”.

I know all you mom’s reading would like it, but I’m not going to get on my pedestal and make a call to all fathers, telling them to turn off the game, put down the beer, get off the couch and go take a parenting course.

Those of you that have read my stuff before know I do that to everybody anyway and it just doesn’t work.

Whatever the call to action is we throw at dads these days just isn’t working. But I can tell you what is working when it comes to getting a man to try to up his game in life. It is simple.

Make him a promise that he will get better at his career, his health will improve, his body will look stronger and leaner, and the holy grail of all marketing to men:  make him better with women and better at sex.

Yep, you’ll get his attention right away.

So why is parenting different?

I have some ideas but honestly none of them are evidence based and I don’t want to trust my intuition. Instead,  I’m going to go on an exploration of what it means to be a great father and why fathers aren’t clamoring to know how themselves.   At the same time I’ll be developing a framework for being a father.  The “Fathering Framework”  of masculine skills that are critical to fathering.

And at the same time, Im thinking that these masculine skills will be very attractive to men in any phase of their lives.

And I’m going to look at what is it about our culture that gives masculinity a bad rap in the first place and the impact it has on how we father our children into the next generation.

Because after talking to hundreds of mothers out there, they all agree that fathering is important to our children and they all want more of it and a stronger masculine presence at home.

I hope you’ll join me on this journey to figure out what’s going on and what we can do just that change in this critical part of the family.

In the near future you’ll see some interviews with experts talking about this subject and data to support my claim.

More important is your voice and opinion.  What do you think is going on?  Leave a comment below or send me an email at jeff@peaceinyourhome.com

And don’t worry, peace in your home will become a men’s magazine I promise