It's already that time of the year when many of us turn our hearts to the joys of yesteryear. It was a time when we anticipated the carving of the turkey, the special trip to grandma and grandpa's house, and of course going to bed on Christmas eve in anticipation of Christmas morning. Perhaps you experienced different traditions growing up. But they were, nevertheless, greatly anticipated. Remember that time? It doesn't seem so long ago.

Now that we're all grown up and have become dads we get to watch our own kids as they have the same anticipation and excitement in their eyes that we once had. But there are a number of dads who are not experiencing this holiday joy.

Some of our dads are in the military and are spending their holiday season in a tent or barracks in the desert somewhere in Iraq or Afghanistan. May I just say that my heart goes out to these men and their families. I'd like to encourage any of you reading this newsletter to consider reaching out to a military family who may live near you and invite them to take part in your family celebrations this Thanksgiving or Christmas.

Additionally, there are also a significant number of divorced fathers who won't get to spend time with their kids this holiday season. For them this can be an extremely difficult time due to the 'family oriented' nature of the holiday season. In some cases fathers no longer live in the same city or state as their children. For others the circumstances surrounding their divorce are not favorable for visitation. To these fathers my heart also goes out to you. If you are reading this and you know of a father who is divorced may I also encourage you to consider sharing your holidays in some small way even if it just means sending a card or making a phone call. This time of the year is considerably harder for men in these circumstances.

In his article, Divorce Dads and The Holidays Waylon Ward offer some very good advice for fathers who are divorced. IF you are a divorced fathers please take the time to read this article. If you know a divorced father please take the time to encourage another father by sharing this information with them. Use your best judgment when 'encouraging' someone with this information. For some of you it's best just to forward the newsletter on and let the divorced father read it for themselves. For others, your kind words will come at just the right time. Remember, timing is everything.

Now...on to the good stuff.

It was one of those cards written to make you grin at the sarcasm and I did chuckle. The card, decorated appropriately with red berries and green holly, read: "Don't let them destroy the hypocrisy of Christmas... It's the only part I enjoy!"

Even though such cartoons make us grin, they also remind us that the holidays can be tough for some people.

Divorced dads particularly find the holidays often lonely and very sad. I remember a Thanksgiving meal at a local Holiday Inn during my divorce. The food wasn't too bad, but the loneliness tasted horrible. And there was a Christmas Eve night spent at another Holiday Inn just a few short blocks from where my kids were asleep in the house where I used to live with their mother.

The holidays, particularly Thanksgiving and Christmas, are tough on divorced dads and their kids, and the first couple of years are often the roughest. This has to do with the "family nature" of these special days, the holiday traditions, and memories of past years as an intact family.

Visitation usually means that parents alternate years and holidays, so it means every other Thanksgiving and every other Christmas is going to be spent away from your children. It's hard, but not impossible. Here are a few ideas to make the season a more enjoyable experience for you and your children:

1. Include the children in the planning. Let them help make the choices about when to celebrate the holidays and with whom. If you can't be together on the special day, plan a time when you can celebrate with the children. Be careful not to put a guilt trip on them about their desires for the holidays.

2. Avoid the guilt reaction. Many divorced dads, still reeling from their personal hurt and guilt, may be overwhelmed by these feelings and respond to the children's pain by overcompensating with money or gifts. They feel they need to make it up to the kids or at least help them forget their sadness with lots of gifts.

The first Christmas after my divorce was obscene. The children received so many gifts from their mother and myself. I was embarrassed to have people look at my tree with so many gifts. I quickly learned that it didn't make the situation any easier to bear.

3. Help your children shop for their mom and stepparent(s). Children want to give gifts to the people in their lives just like adults do. Younger children have limited funds and often feel very awkward about buying gifts for the first few Christmases after the divorce. Make it easier on them by offering to help.

4. Allow the children to help with the Christmas cards. They can lick the stamps or seal the cards, and it's a good time to talk about all your friends and family members.

5. Build new family traditions. Divorced dads often make the mistake of trying to duplicate exactly what the family traditions were before the divorce. Create your own traditions, and let the children share in the planning.

6. Give gifts that can help you and the children stay in touch. A nice box of personalized stationery or their own personal cassette tape player with blank tapes make nice gifts.

6. Read the Christmas story onto a cassette tape for the child to listen to on Christmas Eve if you can't he there with them. The Christmas story from The Living Bible and/or "Twas the Night Before Christmas" make two wonderful tapes, and the younger children will particularly like hearing Dad's voice.

7. Write your children a special Thanksgiving or Christmas letter to read on that special day. The Thanksgiving letter could be a list of all the things you are thankful for, including the children. The Christmas letter could be about the best gifts you ever received-putting your children at the top of the list.

On those holidays when you are all alone, reach out to those children who do not have a father who cares about them. Your church or the Salvation Army can help you find these families. These holidays without the children can also be spent building your ties to your personal family of origin. Visit with your own Mom and Dad, and celebrate with them. It could be fun reliving your own childhood memories.

The pain of divorce seems the greatest at these family holidays. But a divorced dad who anticipates these lonely days can turn them into celebrations of thankfulness and joy. Your children will thank you for the memories!

Waylon Ward M.Ed. is the director for the Dallas Center for Fathering. He is a former football player for Texas A&M, a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary and a licensed marriage and family counselor. He and his wife Lynn have six children in their blended family.

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Find the Perfect Gift for Your Daughter

Ever get caught up in challenges or conflict raising your kids? Not uncommon.

The sad truth is though, that when mired in conflict we can lose sight of happier, better times and lose not only our own spirit but also the spirit of the relationship. When mired in conflict we can lose sight of our mutual love and escalate bad feelings, not to mention bad behaviour. We can turn our children, and they us, into villains.

When mired in conflict or parenting challenges, some parents reasonably turn to counselling. They look for strategies to manage their children’s behaviour. They seek better forms of behavioural control or discipline. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as children do need to learn limits and internalize rules. However, a focus just on behaviour and discipline can give rise to ongoing bad feelings between parents and children. Resentment can continue to build on both sides. Focussing only on behaviour leaves out a vital ingredient for parents and children to both feel great about themselves and the relationship. It may sound corny, but that ingredient is joy.

Finding and expressing joy in children tells them they are of value. As children feel and experience their parents finding joy in them, spirits lighten and bad feelings can fade. Rather than being mired in challenges and conflict, attention is directed to good times, good feelings and cooperation. Parents and children experience a different kind of emotional energy; one through which they can return to talking and discussion as a means of mediating behaviour rather than relying upon control and enforcement.

Reflecting on joy, one parent writes:

"It somehow brought their preciousness back to life for me and I realized that there are definitely times that it’s difficult to appreciate or feel loving towards our children until we revisit the times it was so easy to love them."

The challenge in using joy as a means to rekindling parent-child relationships and better feelings is that some parents may have forgotten how or where to find joy. A survey of parents involved in early childhood education, social work and family therapy provides the following suggestions for finding joy in children:

• Catch them doing something right.
• Watch your children when they are asleep.
• Remind your children of the pleasure and pride you take in them.

Reflecting on the outcome of using joy on her now adult children another parent writes:

"Having 3 very headstrong boys, when they were teens, I used to go into their bedrooms after they were asleep and just look at them and remember when they were babes curled up in their cribs. I also thought of times when they gave me laughter and tears of pride. I knew down deep that they would grow into responsible adults who not only would be my sons, but my friends. That got me through some rough times – did not resolve conflict, but did give me a better perspective and some patience the next day."

Mired in challenges or conflict with your children? Then think about finding joy in them. For more examples of how other parents find joy in their children, click here: Joy - Survey and Results.


Gary Direnfeld, MSW, RSW
(905) 628-4847

gary@yoursocialworker.com
www.yoursocialworker.com

Gary Direnfeld is a social worker. Courts in Ontario, Canada, consider him an expert on child development, parent-child relations, marital and family therapy, custody and access recommendations, social work and an expert for the purpose of giving a critique on a Section 112 (social work) report.

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