December and January are months of gifts and resolutions. My 2006 resolution is to give a daily gift to each of my children. It is a gift that every father can give. It is a gift that every child needs – the gift of an emotionally available relationship.

If you are a wife and a mom reading this you’re probably saying, “Amen! Add wives to that resolution!” If you are a husband and a father, I can almost hear you now . . . “Oh man, Rich you’re sounding like their mother! I’m not sure I’m able to be ‘emotionally available?’

 I know sometimes I’m emotional, read angry,  and I want to be available to my kids but emotionally available? I’m not sure what that is, if I can do it, or even if I want to do it. I must admit that this will be much harder for me to accomplish than laying off the sweets or working out more regularly.

Fortunately emotional availability is a quality of relationship rather than a personality trait. Regardless of your temperament, childhood experiences, relationship history or gender . . . you have the potential to nurture the quality of communication and connection with your child. In fact, emotional availability isn’t necessarily something you have or don’t have, it is more of a continuum of connection that takes shape and evolves through time and becomes easier with practice. Research repeatedly demonstrates that emotional connection is the most important element in a parent-child relationship.

Based on over sixteen years of personal research and the rich history of attachment studies, Zeynep Biringen, Ph.D., associate professor at Colorado State University and a licensed child psychologist, has documented the following effects. Children who have emotionally available relationships with their parents:

§ are more likely to develop a trusting and secure attachment to their parents characterized by an age-appropriate balance between autonomy and the need for connection.

§ are less aggressive and less likely to be the targets of aggression from other children.

§ have better peer relationships.

§ are more attentive in school and suffer less from the effects of learning problems.

§ seem to relate better with their teachers.

Many dads assume that it is the mom’s role to be emotionally available to the children, or that by just being dad, providing for the family and saying “I love you,” that their children know they are loved. These aspects of the father/child relationship are important, but of even greater importance is the relational connection that helps to ensure that expressions of love are getting through – that’s not a mom thing; it’s a parent thing.

How you develop an emotional connection with your child will depend to a large extent on the age of your child and the time you have with them. However, the following ideas should prove applicable regardless of your child’s age:
§ Play with your child – spend time on their level doing things they want to do.
§ Observe your child – make a point to observe and acknowledge your child’s emotions.
§ Talk about your relationship with the child’s mother or a trusted friend – sometimes others can readily see what we are blind to.
§ Seek to appropriately manage your anger – this doesn’t mean you should never allow them to see your anger. It does mean you are taking the appropriate steps to express your anger under rational control to achieve positive results.

Biringen’s book, Raising a Secure Child: Creating an emotional connection between you and your child (Perigee Books, 2004) and website: www.emotionalavailability.com provide an insightful introduction to the principles of emotional availability and ideas to help put them into practice.

Becoming a more emotionally available dad may not sound like your typically New Year’s resolution, but I can guarantee that, if taken seriously, it is a resolution that will reap immeasurable rewards that will last beyond your lifetime.

Rich Batten is the father of four, the family and consumer science agent for CSU Cooperative Extension Office in Douglas County and author of the e-mail newsletter Fastbreak for Fathers from which this article is adapted. For current and back issues of the newsletter visit www.douglascountyextension.org Click on the Family/Consumer Tab and then Fathers.