What a lot of us guys don’t realise is how important we are in the lives of our daughters through the teenage years … the typical Kiwi bloke’s response is to pull away, and leave that stuff to mum.

John Trent, in his book, Dad’s Everything Book For Daughters says , “No other man will influence your little girl like you, Dad! The relationship you build with her will shape the very course of her life.”

In Healing The Masculine Soul, Gordon Dalbey says that the first man every girl loves is Daddy, and the character of that relationship shapes her expectations of what it’s like to get close to a man later in life.

Jonetta Rose Barras, author of Whatever Happened to Daddy’s Little Girl? Says, “Promiscuous fatherless women are desperately seeking love. We are terrified that if we give love, it will not be returned. So we pull away from it, refusing to permit it to enter our houses, our bed, our hearts. To fill the void that our fathers created, we only make the hole larger and deeper.”

So here’s the great challenge facing us fathers of daughters … what is it that we need to do to show our girls enough positive affirmation, encouragement and love that she goes into life confident in herself and in her abilities?

Gordon Dalbey sums it up so well:
“Find out what your daughter needs from you, and no matter how uncomfortable, difficult, or embarrassing, do your best to give it to her…”

I’m Tim Sisarich, and I love the old French quote that says, “it’s not only necessary to love, it is necessary to say so.”

Tim Sisarich, Executive Director Focus on the Family NZ as heard on Scrubcutters , Newstalk ZB

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