Chris Brown

Chris Brown is President of the National Fatherhood Initiative (NFI). Chris leads the organization’s work to help communities and human service organizations become more father-inclusive, strengthening families and supporting better outcomes for kids. His passion for this work is deeply personal, shaped by his own experience growing up without an involved father, and his belief that every child deserves a loving and supportive dad.

Chris's new book, "The 24:7 Dad, 12 Habits of Confident Fathers," is available for pre-order now - more information at confidentfathers.com.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Hey everyone, and welcome to Voices of Hope. I'm Ross Wilsie. And I'm Mike Wade. Each episode, we sit down to talk about what it means to live well, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and beyond.

SPEAKER_02 0:17

We'll look at how wellness shapes us as individuals, families, communities, and even the wider world around us.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Through real stories and honest conversations, we'll explore what hope looks like and how it grows, right here in the New River Valley. Thanks for joining us. This is Voices of Hope. Today we're joined by Chris Brown, president of the National Fatherhood Initiative. Chris leads the organization's work to help communities and human service organizations become more father-inclusive, strengthening families and supporting better outcomes for kids. His passion for this work is deeply personal, shaped by his own experience growing up without an involved father and his belief that every child deserves a loving and supportive dad.

SPEAKER_02 1:03

So, Chris, welcome to the Voices of Hope podcast. So glad to have you with us today. Happy to be here, Mike. Yeah, so we're going to jump right into the questions and uh get our conversation started. So just to begin, if you would, can you give us a brief overview of the National Fatherhood Initiative for folks listening who aren't familiar with your organization?

SPEAKER_00 1:23

Absolutely. So we are a national nonprofit that was founded in 1994. And so we've been around more than 30 years. And we're the leading organization in the country that focuses on building capacity and communities to help direct service providers, human service organizations, to more effectively engage fathers in their programs and services, and thereby helping dads to become as involved as they possibly can in their children's lives. So we don't provide direct services to fathers. Instead, what we do is we provide the programs and other resources that organizations need instead to do the day in and day out work with fathers that is required to help them be the best stats that they can be. So our focus is on uh creating those programs and resources, training uh direct service providers on how to use those programs and resources and continually improving them as well. The other thing that we do at National Fatherhood Initiative or NFI for short is we monitor the research that's being done, not just in the US, but across the world on father involvement. And so what we do is we help translate that research into practice, because that's one of the biggest challenges in any field is how do you translate some of the great research that's being done out there about what works in terms of behavior change, in this case, being the best father that you can be, into practical tools that can help organizations and fathers uh to solve some of the challenges that come on, come, come with uh trying to be the best edit that you can be.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

Sounds like quite the undertaking, but excellent work.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

But it is it is very important work.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

Yeah. So, Chris, uh, your organization has gathered and compiled a significant amount of data that underscores the impact uh an active and involved father can have on the long-term trajectory of a child. Could you maybe hit some of the highlights from that data?

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Sure. So the first thing to understand about um father involvement is what we mean by father involvement. And what we mean by father involvement is holistic involvement. So certainly uh it's easier to be an involved father if you're physically present, uh if you live with your children. But that doesn't mean that you can't be an involved father if you don't live with your children. But it's certainly a lot easier to be involved if you are living with your children. So that's the first part of being holistically involved. The other parts are being emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually involved in the lives of your children as well. So it's important that fathers don't just approach father of Alma from the perspective of being a financial provider. There are so many other ways that children need their fathers to provide for them. So when we look at the research comparing children who grow up with involved fathers versus uninvolved fathers, what we find is that there are a wealth of benefits that come to children when they grow up with an involved father, and that those benefits um run from the moment that children are born, or what we call the golden moment, and I'll talk about that in just a minute, uh, all the way uh through those children's uh childhood and into adulthood. So let's just you know hit some of those highlights, some examples. So uh when we uh look at father involvement and its benefits, it starts, as I mentioned, from the moment children are born. So when fathers are involved during the perinatal period, prenatally and postnatally, we know that children have much better birth outcomes. For example, they're less likely to be born at a low birth weight, they're more likely to be carried to full term. And the mothers are typically able to have a much better pregnancy when the father is involved by going to things such as prenatal visits. So once a child is born, um, involved fathers bring unique benefits to the parenting equation. And that's why children benefit so much from being raised by both their mother and father, is because fathers and mothers bring unique gifts, complementary gifts to the parenting equation. So let me give you another example. So as children age and they become more mogul, uh, fathers will often start engaging in what we call rough and tumble play. That's the type of play where fathers are often acting as the toy, whereas mothers are often engaging children with actual toys in their environment. So we know that rough and tumble play helps children with their emotional regulation. And it also, interestingly, helps children uh in terms of their equilibrium or their sense of balance, because fathers will often turn kids over. Uh, they'll you know kind of roll them on the ground, they'll hold them upside down by their ankles. Um, they'll do all sorts of things that help children's balance or their sense of balance develop. As children continue to age and they start to learn how to read, um, and parents start to read to them even before they can read. We know from studies that fathers read differently to their children. Fathers tend to use more complicated language, more complicated words, more complicated sentences when they read to their children. And what we see from the research is that when fathers read to their children in the way that fathers typically read, children have a larger vocabulary. They tend to do better in language skills in school. So, speaking of school, you know, as children enter school age, what we find is that children tend to do better academically when they have involved fathers. They're more likely to get A's. They're more likely to graduate from school and go on to college. As children get into college and as they enter adulthood, they're more likely to be successful in those endeavors. Uh, they're more likely to be successful in their careers and in their own relationships as well. So we see benefits again, starting from birth and extending into adulthood.

SPEAKER_02 7:54

Fascinating stuff. I mean, it really is. Really kind of mind-blowing when you when you put it that way. Um, yeah, Chris, so you've you've talked quite a bit about what it means to be an involved father, but maybe uh dig into that just a little bit more, if you would.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

Absolutely. So, as I mentioned, uh, there's this concept of holistic involvement, physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual. Um, but one of the things that we focus on at National Fatherhood Initiative is um helping dads to develop five cross-cultural traits of being the best father that she can be. Those traits are self-awareness, self-care, fathering skills, parenting skills, and relationship skills. So we see from cross-cultural research that those traits mark effective fathers. They may look different in different cultures, but they exist cross-culturally. And so what we do is we help fathers to customize their level of involvement based on those characteristics. So it's really important when we talk about father involvement to understand that each father is unique and that um he needs to be worked with as an individual in order to figure out how he can best be involved in the lives of his children. So how involvement looks may be different based on whether a father is married to the mother or not, um, whether he lives with his children or not, uh, whether he has custody of his children or not, and what is his level of knowledge, for example, about child development. So our programs that are run in communities across the country help fathers to develop that holistic involvement in a customized way.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

I like it. That's awesome. Yeah. So, Chris, you talked a little bit about cross-cultural data and um and what that looks like. But just thinking now mainly about the US and being 2026, which is crazy to think about. How would you describe the general state of fatherhood in the US today?

SPEAKER_00 9:57

Uh, I'd say I'd say in one word, it's encouraging. So uh let me let me talk about, yeah, it is. Let me talk about the data for a minute. So when when we talk about the data around father involvement, most of that data focuses on whether fathers are physically present. Uh, in other words, do they live with their children? Are they what we call residential uh fathers versus being non-residential fathers? So when we look at the census data, which is basically what we use to track um of father presence, we like to talk about the term, we like to use the term presence as opposed to absence. Um, we find that the vast majority of children uh in the United States grow up uh with a father present. That's about 76% of all children. Uh that's still a large number of children, about 24, 25% or one in four that grow up uh without a present father. And and to make that sort of abstract um data a little bit more concrete, that's enough children in this country to populate New York City twice and Los Angeles four times. That's a that's a lot of children. And it's really unacceptable. But the fact is, most children do live with their with their fathers. The the good news is that uh the trend that started in 1960, which was a rapid increase uh in the number of children uh growing up without a father in the home, um, has started to reverse in the last few years. Uh, we now see more children, a higher proportion of children, growing up with a resident father than at any time in the past 34 years. And even better news is that the group of fathers driving that change are black fathers. This is the population that has been most negatively impacted by father absence. So uh a much higher proportion of black children historically uh have been growing up without a resident father. That has started to reverse. We've seen about a 15% increase in the proportion of uh black children growing up with a resident father since 1995. The the proportions of uh white children and Latino children uh, by contrast, have remained about the same since 1995, which is the year that the rate of father presence uh being uh peaked in terms of the the proportion of children growing up without without a resident father. So that's that's really the good news. The other good news is that, and I've seen this uh with my own son-in-law. So I'm actually a grandfather. I've been a grandfather uh almost two years now.

SPEAKER_03 12:39

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

And um my son-in-law is a wonderful father, a very involved father. And so one of the things we're seeing from national data is that the millennial and Gen Z generations of fathers see fathering as much more central to their identity as people. So they don't just see it as a role that they fulfill, they see it as part of who they are. And it's really driving them to demand things like work-family balance, uh, jobs, careers that allow them to be the kind of father that they see themselves as being. And so their performance as fathers um affects directly how they see themselves as people. And so I think what we're starting to see in the US is a real change uh in how fathers approach fathering. And you can see this also in data on household tasks. We now see that fathers are spending much more time than they ever have uh in childcare and in general housework. So they're approaching fatherhood from a much more, and we call this an anthropology and egalitarian perspective, uh, than uh previous generations. So, like I said, I'm very encouraged by uh by these trends.

SPEAKER_02 14:01

Yeah, great news. That really is great to hear, and I would have assumed that things were going in the opposite direction. So that that really is good news.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

Yeah, it is it's great news. And that's and in part that's because of uh continuing portrayals in the media uh of uh the incompetence of fathers in raising children. It's just it it really runs counter to what we actually see from the data.

SPEAKER_02 14:25

Right. Yeah. I did want to go back um quickly, Chris, and circle back to the point that you made about black fathers um showing an increase in engagement and involvement. What do you attribute that to?

SPEAKER_00 14:38

Um I I I don't know. I wish I I wish I knew because then you know that can be applied maybe across the the racial and ethnic spectrum. Um but keep in mind that uh I think because the the gap has been so large between uh residency of black fathers and and white and uh Latino fathers, that there was much more room to grow uh in in that sense for for black fathers. But one of the things that's also interesting from the data is when we look at red non-resident father involvement, and as I mentioned at the outset of our time together, you know, involvement, you know, it it's it's not uh it's not an absolute that a father has to be physically present um in the home in order to be a very involved father. We see lots of examples of very involved fathers who don't live with their children. But when uh studies have looked at in recent years the involvement of fathers who are non-resident, they find that by and large, black fathers are most highly involved in the lives of their children compared to other races and ethnicities. And so I think historically, you know, that that's been the case as well. It's just that recent studies have shown that that's the case. So um I, you know, there's certainly many black fathers that we work with. And so basically, in terms of the organizations we work with at the community level, we call them partners because we couldn't have the impact that we have without the work that they do. And many of these organizations are led by Black men who have recognized the importance of building back a fathers, fatherhood approach uh in their communities that really encourages and expects Black men and men of all races and ethnicities that live in their communities to be good fathers when they become good fathers. And so, you know, perhaps we'll have a chance to talk about you know some of the things that need to happen to continue to push this positive trend toward greater father involvement uh along uh so that more children can benefit from them and what needs to happen at a cultural level for that to uh to to take place.

SPEAKER_02 16:59

Yeah, absolutely. I did want to kind of touch upon the um the challenges that sometimes fathers face with being involved. So, what are some of the more common barriers that uh men face in being involved fathers?

SPEAKER_00 17:11

Well, there are several, and so I'll kind of go through those. But the first on the list, and this may surprise you and and some of your listeners, is uh not being married to the mom. Um being married to the mother of your children is the single greatest predictor of father involvement. And if you think about it, you know, marriage as an institution uh links fathers to their kids. I mean, that's what is kind of the glue that cultures across the world have used to link fathers to their children. Um, so as we've seen uh a decline in marriage, we've also seen a decline in father involvement, and there's there's a relationship there. So uh one of the things that we are very clear on at National Fatherhood Initiative is while you do not have to be married for the mother of your children to be uh a good father, it certainly makes it a lot easier. And it also um helps men to be more committed uh to their families, including uh to their children. Uh the second is obviously not living with uh the mother of your children with your children. Um and so uh again, as I said, and I make this very clear whenever I talk about father involvement, you don't have to live with your children to be a really involved father, but it certainly makes it a lot easier. Um we also see uh the importance of the relationship, the quality of the relationship between the father and the mother. So um that co-parenting relationship needs to be focused on by the father because one of the things that we do see from time to time uh with mothers is a concept called restrictive maternal gatekeeping. This is where a mother either consciously or unconsciously controls access of the father to his children. We often see this in situations where the father doesn't live with his children and the relationship between the father and the mother is not a good one. Uh in that case, she may consciously uh try to restrict access to the children. But it even happens in married families, uh sort of unconsciously, where the mother takes on the primary role of control over what happens with the children, even the interactions of the father with his children. Um, another key barrier is when fathers become, when men become fathers and they grew up in a home without a good father role model. I'm an example of that. So when I uh entered fatherhood, I really was clueless about how to be a good father because I grew up with a very poor role model of the father, and I didn't have access to a lot of positive male role models. Um another big one that's emerged from the research is what we call self-efficacy or confidence in fathering. Many fathers enter fatherhood um with a lack of confidence, uh, in part because they lack the knowledge and the experiences prior to fatherhood around childcare. So that's a big one, and and a lack of child development knowledge. So uh one of the things that we often talk about with fathers is the fact that one of the things that they need to really grasp and learn uh when they when they have children is uh to learn about developmental milestones. What should your children be doing by certain ages based on their capabilities physically and emotionally and mentally? Because fathers can make mistakes in child rearing when they don't understand what children are truly capable of at different ages. So those are some of the uh most common barriers that we see to father involvement.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

Thanks, Chris. So one of the one of the barriers you just mentioned was kind of a history of generationally of fathers not being involved. Um and I'm curious if if you know of any ways that we can break those cycles. So if the if a father, you know, had a uh poor role role model in his life or or a father who was not involved at all, how can that father break that cycle?

SPEAKER_00 21:27

Absolutely. Well, first of all, fathers need to give themselves grace. Uh that's that's really important. Um, you know, we we we all uh all parents, uh fathers and mothers make make mistakes. And frankly, you know, we often tell fathers this you're gonna screw up, you're gonna make mistakes. But it's important to just learn from those mistakes and grow from them. But you know, many, many fathers uh like like me, for example, I've simply decided to be different. Um, so you know, a a poor role model for a father can uh be transmitted through generations. Um, and it certainly was in my family, um, until somebody decides, you know what, I'm going to use that negative experience uh as a way to grow and to be different. But aside from that, I think we need to accelerate uh from a cultural perspective these changing norms around being uh an involved father, again, based on an expectation of holistic involvement that, you know, while yes, it's important for you to provide financially for your family, it's also very important to be there intellectually, spiritually, uh, and emotionally as well. It's also very important to help men and boys. And I'm sure that you guys are aware of the crisis in this country with uh boys' mental health, for example, uh, and their physical health as well, uh, to embrace self-care, both physical and mental. That's why one of those five characteristics that we teach in our program, self-care, is so important because we don't raise boys and men to care for their physical and mental health. And it's really important to do that as a foundation before you even become a father. So it's a lot easier to be a good father when you enter fatherhood, understanding the importance of self-care. Um, it's also important that women and moms not settle for a lack of father involvement. Uh, that, you know, as they think about, you know, who they want to be fathers for their children, it's important that they think about this, again, holistic aspect of father involvement and they did that they don't settle for less. Um, and it's important to provide opportunities for boys and men to learn about the fathering role. So obviously, you know, when men become fathers, it's important to have programs like those organizations that we partner with run because they're transformational. Uh, and the reason for that is that oftentimes it's the first time that fathers have entered an environment where they can share openly and honestly uh and develop emotionally intimate bonds with other men around the role that the father plays. And so for many men, it's the first time that they've been able to open up and share about the struggles that they've had with other men who understand those struggles and to learn from the evidence, evidence-based programs, evidence-informed programs about what works. But we need to go farther upstream and we need to be working with young boys, even before they become fathers, to understand what that role is all about so that they make the choice to become a father when they're ready to be a father and not before. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:57

Um, so here's a question: Is it possible to be too involved as a dad? And if so, what does that look like?

SPEAKER_00 25:04

Yeah, it it is it is possible. And I I I've been guilty of this from time to time. You know, when I was raising my daughters, they're both uh adult adults now, 30 and 27. And I'm still very involved in their lives, but there were times when I, you know, would tend to smother them a little bit. So in my zip, my zealousness, if you will, to be a better dad than I had, uh, I sometimes went a little too far. So uh, you know, you don't want to spend too much time with with your children, so much time that you're smothering them and not allowing them to develop into independent people. You know, I've you know been interviewed in the past uh and and often been asked a question, which is what is the most important thing you did in raising your girls? And I always say that it is uh and was uh helping them to become as independent as possible. That's really the goal of any parent, a mom or a dad, is to raise a parent uh children who become independent. Um, and so they need time away from their fathers. Um, they need time with the mom, you know, alone time. Uh they need uh time with their friends uh as they start to to develop and grow and and and to uh you know grow their social networks. Um and uh the dad also needs time back on the self-care piece to care for himself. He needs alone time, he needs alone time with his friends, he needs you know date nights and and uh and another alone time with with the mom or the or the co-parent. So uh that can certainly happen. Another key thing, and this is one of the things we uh cover in our programs, is uh living vicariously for your through your children. So some fathers will, um, and this can be unconscious, um, they will try to push their children to achieve certain things in their lives that the fathers wanted in their own and didn't achieve. And so this may be sports or it may be academics or it may be music or it may be whatever. Um, but uh this idea of living vicariously through your children as if their life was your own life, uh, is something that can happen when fathers are too involved. Um, and the final thing is um, and this doesn't quite answer your question, but it's a little bit late, is that it's important for fathers to approach every child differently. So if you have more than one child, and and if you guys do, um, and and certainly this was the case with my girls, they're just different people. They're different personality-wise, they often look very different. Um, they they interact with their parents differently. And so if you try to approach fathering from as a one size fits all uh approach, um, you're gonna find that that's very difficult to do with both your children, with multiple children. So just like you need to customize your own level of father involvement, you have to customize how involved what that involvement looks like with each of your kids.

SPEAKER_02 28:07

Yeah, well said. And uh Ross and I, like you, have two of our own. And uh yeah, yeah, they are night and day for sure. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Um, so I don't think most of us fathers would claim that we haven't made any mistakes along the way uh raising our children, but um but what's the best way to handle a situation where you know uh that you probably screwed up?

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Yeah. Well, um, I mean, first of all, uh it's important to be self-aware enough that uh that that you make mistakes. So as I mentioned just a short while back, um, you know, we're we're all going to make mistakes, we're all gonna screw up. And so if we we we understand that, um, you know, it's a lot easier to spot when we actually do make mistakes. Um and I mentioned, you know, giving yourself grace as well. But if your children are old enough to understand what an apology is, um, then it's important to apologize to your children and own up to your mistakes. Um so whether your children are not old enough to understand mistakes or or are, uh it's also important to acknowledge your mistakes to your to your co-parent. Um, because you know, oftentimes, you know, a mistake that a father makes involves the mom or the co-parent in some way. Um, and so it's important to uh acknowledge that. And if you know the father wants to uh seek advice on how to rectify that mistake, often the mom uh or the co-parent is a perfect person to give that feedback as well. Um so uh that's that's the most important thing. And then obviously trying to commit to not making that mistake twice.

SPEAKER_01 29:53

Yeah, I've had I've had the opportunity to apologize to my children a couple of times. Um and it it's hard to do or to at least to get started, but I realize for myself at least, once I once I've done that, I it's a freeing thing. And I feel I feel you know that I've hopefully passed something on to them that they can use down the line when they become fathers.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

So right. And then a lot of that is related to the you know, the the the willingness to admit mistakes has to do with a man's view of masculinity. Um you know, so many uh men are raised uh in this country to look at admitting mistakes as a sign of weakness, right? And it's actually a sign of strength. So that's another thing that we work on in our programs is helping men to develop a healthy model of masculinity.

SPEAKER_01 30:42

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 30:43

So, Chris, for dads who have been at it for a while and maybe they um feel like they haven't done the greatest job as uh a father, is it ever too late to start improving?

SPEAKER_00 30:55

Uh generally speaking, no. Uh it's never too late. In fact, it's an imperative to start improving as a father. So uh in our programs, we have fathers. Um well, we have participants that range from you know teenagers, uh boys who are not yet fathers, but also teen fathers, all the way to grandfathers. I mean, so many of the men who enter our programs are much older fathers, and so uh they are looking for ways to improve. So, generally speaking, uh it's it's definitely not too late. Um, and that's even in the cases where a father has a poor relationship with their adult children, we've seen dramatic changes in those relationships. But that said, um, the time you lose by being an uninvolved father is time you can never get back. So you know, anyone who's out there listening or watching this podcast um, you know, and is concerned about his level of involvement, um, there's no better time than to start now because you can never gain that time back. So, you know, that that that loss of time is huge for the father, for the child, and for everyone else involved in, you know, in the family who who loves you know the father and and his children.

SPEAKER_02 32:13

Yeah. Well said.

SPEAKER_01 32:15

Yeah. So we understand you've written a book about uh or forefathers, which I had the opportunity this morning to to watch a little promotional video that you did. Uh and it looks it looks great. Um, can you tell us a little bit about the book and when it might be available?

SPEAKER_00 32:32

Absolutely. So it's called uh the 24-7 Dad, 12 Habits of Confident Fathers. So, as I mentioned a little bit earlier, one of the primary barriers to uh father involvement is a lack of confidence in how to be a good father. And so a lot of that confidence comes from uh learning what it means to be a good father, those those five traits that I mentioned. And there's actually a sixth trait in the book that I talk about called stewardship. Um, but it also involves um applying uh 12 habits that help build those traits. And so the focus of the book is on helping fathers customize those 12 habits for uh their type of involvement in their children's lives. And this book uh is relevant for any father in any situation. So it really encapsulates more than 30 years of work that I've been doing across the country, um, and also advising um uh uh people who are looking to increase father involvement in other countries as well, um, as well as just some guidance from my own personal experience in raising two daughters. And so uh the book is available for pre-sale now on Amazon and Barnes and Noble, and soon it will be online with other retailers. Um but it comes out uh not surprisingly in June, uh right ahead of Father's Day. Uh and um, you know, it is, as you mentioned, it's written specifically for fathers. And um uh we're getting a lot of you know excitement generated around it. And um uh people can go to confidentfathers.com, again, confidentfathers.com and learn more about it, and they can, you know, access links to pre-order it. Um, and if uh any of your listeners are with an organization that serves families, uh you have the ability to purchase the book at deep discounts from the publisher as well. And so there's information on the website about that.

SPEAKER_02 34:31

Oh wow, that's great. Yeah, really, uh, really looking forward to reading that. So as you know, Chris, we call our uh our podcast the voices of hope. And so we typically ask um this kind of question of all of our guests. So we're curious to know what gives you hope, both in your personal life as well as in the work that you do.

SPEAKER_00 34:51

Yeah, I think, you know, personally, the the contribution that I've made uh to uh father involvement uh in in this country, you know, I I committed a long time ago um to doing this work. And um, you know, I was fortunate enough to learn about National Fatherhood Initiative uh back around 1999 when I was uh working at the State Health Department in Texas, uh doing some work uh with public health programs around uh father involvement. Um and they were looking for someone who uh could run uh an office uh here in Texas uh using some grant money from the state to establish a statewide initiative. And at that point, I joined National Fatherhood Initiative and started the process of creating uh the programs and resources that you see today. And so, you know, when I see videos and testimonials of the fathers and families that we've impacted, uh that just gives me uh a warm feeling because uh leaving a legacy, a positive legacy has always been very important to me. And that's one reason why I wrote the book as well. Um professionally, it's what I see, as I mentioned earlier, in younger generations of fathers, um and the and the growth in organizations at the community level who are both intentional and proactive about uh engaging and including fathers. And let me just quickly speak to that point. You know, when I started more than 30 years ago in this in this work, um it was difficult to find a lot of organizations and communities that were intentional, that wanted to engage fathers, because we've developed a very uh focused infrastructure in this country on maternal and child health, which obviously is critically important, but we've left fathers out of the equation. In other words, we haven't taken a whole family approach to our work with families. Um, and so you know that's why that's basically our mission is to help organizations be intentional and proactive. And we've seen just an explosion in the the proportion of or the number of organizations across this country that are doing this work in lots of different sectors, from schools to healthcare, uh to correction systems, uh, to um, you know, a variety of social service nonprofits. I mean, uh law enforcement organizations, all sorts of things that are that are engaging fathers in in both an intentional and proactive way. So those are the really the personal and professional things that uh that give me hope uh for the future.

SPEAKER_01 37:30

Very nice. Thanks for sharing that. Um well, you've shared a lot of wisdom today. Do you have any final words of wisdom you'd like to share with our listeners?

SPEAKER_00 37:39

Yeah, again, I think uh back to just kind of reinforcing a few things that I've said during our time together. First of all, don't settle for less than holistic involvement. That's really important. As a father, expect that of yourself. Uh, and as a mother, uh, expect that of the father of your children. The second thing is uh the level of involvement of every father will look a little bit different. Uh, you can be very holistically involved in a number of different ways. Um, and if you've been an uninvolved father, just give yourself grace, forgive yourself, admit your mistakes, and then finally commit to being the best father that you can be, and also being the best co-parent that you can be. So whether you are, you know, still married to or romantically involved or living with the mother, regardless of your situation, um, it's important that you commit to developing the best possible co-parenting relationship that you can, regardless of the history that you have uh with your co-parent.

SPEAKER_02 38:44

Well, Chris, this has been just an incredible conversation, and I am so grateful for the insight and knowledge that you've shared with us. Uh, I've learned a lot today, even as a dad of uh adult children myself. So thank you so much for your time. Yeah, it's been it's been great. So we're we're truly grateful.

SPEAKER_00 39:01

Well, and then uh I don't know if you guys are grandfathers yet, but um I I can tell you that that is a wonderful experience. It's a little bit different than being a father.

SPEAKER_02 39:10

Yeah. I'll get there when something we can look forward to. Yeah, right. Exactly. Yeah. Chris, thanks again. Thank you, Chris.

SPEAKER_03 39:18

You're welcome.

SPEAKER_01 39:20

Thanks for listening to Voices of Hope. If you enjoyed today's conversation, we'd love for you to rate and review the podcast and help us spread the word. Voices of Hope is a production of New River Valley Community Services. To learn more or listen to past episodes, visit nrvcs.org slash podcast. And remember, hope grows when we share it. So keep the conversation going, and we'll talk to you next time on Voices of Hope.