Due to changes in family and life circumstances, it has become more and more common in the United States than ever before for people engaged in marriages to decide such marriages are not working and file for divorce. The majority of the time, the mother of the children will be the one to obtain primary custody of the kids. However, in some cases, the father is the one who wins primary custody and becomes the main caretaker of any children in the marriage. In other cases, there may not even be a marriage and the mother might leave the father with one or more children he becomes responsible for by default. No matter whether you are the primary caretaker or simply a father who needs to step up and take an active role in the life of your child after the mother of your child takes off with the kids, you need to be involved. This article will provide good tips to help you be a great single dad, whether your kids live with you or live with their mom.
Perhaps the most important tip for being a great single dad is to make sure your children never have any doubts about how much you love them. If your children ever ask you about if anything that happened between you and their mother was their fault, you should explain that the split was not in any way related to them. This will be extremely beneficial to you in the future when establishing and maintaining relationships with your children as they grow into adolescence and eventual adulthood. By reassuring your children about your love for them and their innocence, they will not have to spend years in anguish thinking that they were in some way responsible for the separation between you and their mother. This is something you should remember whether or not you are the primary caregiver of the children.
A second important tip for being a great single dad that is almost as important as the first is to refrain from speaking badly about the mother of your children under any and all circumstances. No matter how badly you perceive her to be, you have no need to share any of this information with your children. It may be hard to stick to this principle at times, but you should do your best. Let yourself and your words be guided by the classic rule that “if you can’t say something nice, you should not say anything at all.” This will be beneficial to your children. All you have to do to motivate yourself to stick to it is to think about how difficult it would be if you frequently were required to listen to bad things about your father or your mother. This is potentially psychologically damaging to your children and can lead to a large amount of needless stress, worry, anxiety, and confusion.
A third important tip for being a great single dad is to pay your child support each month at the specified time. This sounds like such a simple tip to keep in mind that you would think it to be obvious and not worthy of mention. Unfortunately, you would be surprised to find out how many fathers are negligent in their legal and ethical requirements to provide for their children. The good news is that you don’t have to follow this path; you can be one of the good guys who makes payments on time each month and shows his kids he will be there for them financially even if he isn’t the person they see whenever they go home. Of course you will have the occasional situation to deal with where you might not have the ability to make a financial payment one month or might have to pay a little later than planned. Just maintain communication with your ex and do your best.