Dads and Daughters...Help! (Page 3)

Oh my goodness I have loved reading this thread.  What wonderful advice and stories.  I think Dads with daughters are so vulnerable.  You are a daughter's hero, idol, one moment and the next moment you are her embarrassment, chopped liver. 

One of my favorite memories is of an evening when I was a second grader.  My Dad took me to the shoe store in Butte, Montana to get new ice skates for me (I was one of five children so one on one time was rare).  Then we went to the flooded ballpark and skated under the lights.  I felt so loved by my dad.   He remembers that night also, but he remembers a detail that I cannot even recall today.  He remembers that a fourth grade boy from my school named David came up and I went off to skate with David and left my Dad alone.    It's so funny, I only remember my Dad and I......and how my new skates made me skate "just like Peggy Fleming".

BT Dads on behalf of all the daughters who manage to break their daddy's heart or worry them sick, we love you!

I gotta snap this one on the nose.

Unless you are talking about some bus for the kids that had detention that day, I really hate to see this kind of joke.  These kids take enough abuse from "normal" kids that they don't need adults poking fun, especially in a forumn about how to positively reinforce children's self esteem.

This is interesting - Houston-tri-mamma is my sister.........  I only just remembered my mom telling us that as I read her post......   I try to tell the 6yo neice above how smart and strong she is.   Right now "pretty" is a given.  But "pretty" is different than "beautiful".  Beautiful implies so much more than pretty.

"Smart" and "strong" are so important - in the long run we learn we are "beautiful".  The conflicting image/peer pressure/ weight/ etc....  issues make it hard for them to believe them they are beautiful.  I remember my mother telling me I was beauriful and thinking she was daft.  Dont tell her that, Cathleen!

Yup - girls need their daddies to be proud of them.  I never doubted my father's pride - I can still remember swim team meets.  After my dad left work early to come over and set up the judge platforms and bleachers (my dad is a logistics kind of guy) I can remember HEARING him cheer "Go Mary!" when I swam, and heard him well above the otherwise droning crowd.  Hearing it, I knew, I was 10 years old and on top of the world. 

He also went to most of my basketball games, and showing me good sportsmanship as he would cheer the opposite team when they fell too far behind.

When I was 29, I made a stand at a very lucrative job and quit because I was not respected - many peers and friends came down on me for this decision.  I still remember how my father told me he was proud of me for making the tough decision.  Thinking about this, even now at 40, I am on top of the world again.

Wasn't there a Superbowl commercial aimed at opening dialogue between dads and daughers on self image?  I saw a news magazine show clip about it with a former olympic gymnast sponsoring it......   did someone see this? Report?

This is a great thread--thanks much for posting. I have a son and that shares some of the pitfalls discussed for girls--he is beautiful, physically as well as on the inside; there's a kindness in him that's striking. He is also smart and engaging and funny. I try to emphasize the non-physical, while acknowledging it sometimes-- it's not the focal point, though. Strong--that I can emphasize--and my training and other activities help. Being strong means he'll be able to do cool and fun things, just like mommy. He tells his teachers how, when he is 10, Mommy is going to teach him to scuba dive. And this year he wants to race with me (beach races here open to families). This is a great foundation to counteract the body image messages kids get bombarded with while growing up.

Renee is absolutely right, on both sides of that coin. I remember a lot of things my father said to me, and frankly most of it involved how I wasn't enough--in whatever way you want to name. A charitable view is that he was just trying to push me to suceed. Either way, not a good thing to do to a child and teenager.

On the positive side, I've come a long way, baby, and like that. I'm good with who I am and what I've done with my life, proud even. It took me a loooong time to get there, though.

I also know precisely what I DON'T want to do to my son, so that's helpful. I'll make different mistakes, I know, just not those. The messages you dads and moms are giving your girls will allow them to skip over most but not all of the difficulty I had in building myself back up after I left. Not that it will be easy, but there won't be the roadblocks, b/c you set them up with a good foundation. Good for you.

And TMWelshy, that's a great way to make a powerful point without shoving it down your daughter's throat. Nicely done.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has expressed an opinion or offered advice in this thread. I am not in an environment professionally or socially where I can really say there is anyone I would emulate or see as a role model. I come here, and there's so much good advice I have to print the thread out and take notes. It's really interesting to think that many of the best people I know are people I've never even met. Thank you, for me and for my Hannah.

My nephew stopped eating any green food when he was old enough to realize that his father didn't eat anything green. At around age 9 he started taking a magazine with him into the john. Comical. The boys also repeat their dad's favorite swears.

Okay, not to get all kumbayah-ey on you... but this is one of my favorite songs:

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - Teach Your Children Lyrics

You who are on the road 
Must have a code that you can live by 
And so become yourself 
Because the past is just a good-bye. 
Teach your children well, 
Their father's hell did slowly go by,
And feed them on your dreams
The one they picks, the one you'll know by.
Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry, 
So just look at them and sigh 
and know they love you. 
 
And you, of tender years, 
Can't know the fears that your elders grew by, 
And so please help them with your youth, 
They seek the truth before they can die. 

Teach your parents well, 
Their children's hell will slowly go by, 
And feed them on your dreams 
The one they picks, the one you'll know by.   

Don't you ever ask them why, if they told you, you will cry, 
So just look at them and sigh
 and know they love you. 

foolproof - 2006-02-24 8:18 AM No kids, no advice.  Except, I looked at  Hannah in your album too, and IMHO it's a good thing you're a big, strong man because in a few years you are going to be beating the boys off with a stick.  Even in pictures that girl has a HUGE personality!

She has enough personality for the two of us. And, she can tell when my mind is drifting when she is educating me about the latest thing she's decided I need to know. She'll stop in mid-sentence and ask "Dad are you listening to me?"  She's dialed in to my moods too. I can't pull anything over on her. If I've had a bad day, within 5 minutes of walking in the door and doing my best to fake it she's on me with the "What's the matter with you dad?" stuff. There's just nothing like it.

I digress. Now I'm just bragging about my kid!

Wow, tears for sure.

It sounds like there are a lot of lucky kids and awesome parents out there.  Keep up the good work.

Thanks for sharing. 

Are people actually suggesting that dads continually tell their daughters that they are beautiful until they believe it?  If so, I have to disagree with that advice.  I have two children, a daughter (age 6) and a son (age 7) and I do not comment on how pretty or handsome they are.  I applaud their achievements, I encourage them to exercise their bodies and brains, I teach them about respect and manners, I tell them I love them and that I am proud of them but I do not focus on how they look.  In my opinion, by telling your daughter that she is beautiful you would be reinforcing the idea that appearance is important.

Maybe I misunderstood the other posts?