In honor of Father's Day, I have written a lot about fathers this week. I have included all fathers of adoption.

The photo above is me with my dad when I was about five years old. At that age, I was nearly always barefoot and climbing trees. The photo quality is not so great as many older photos were not as clear and crisp as today's high tech cameras.

However, if you look closely, I think you can tell that my dad is looking at me with obvious love and pride. As the youngest of my family of five, I was clearly the favored one, and a definite "Daddy's girl." Therefore, I have always appreciated the distinct advantage of having a father in my life.

Birth fathers have traditionally received even more scorn than birth mothers. We make false assumptions about birth fathers and generalize about their character. However, on a positive note, more birth fathers are coming out of the woodwork finally like birth mothers have done.

Although I raised my youngest son mostly alone, he had steady contact with his father. My relinquished son was also raised mainly by a divorced mother. It is unclear to me how much his adoptive dad saw him after the divorce, but, I know they have a relationship.

The son that I did not raise has had limited contact with his birth dad. In the future, I hope they have more contact. Interestingly enough, birth dad was raised by his mother and a stepfather. He too barely knew his father, and had scant contact with him as he was growing up.

Adopted children can benefit greatly from contact with their fathers - birth or adoptive. Even adult children can derive some benefit from a fatherly presence in their lives. My husband never had children, but he is a presence in my children's lives and I think that they benefit from knowing him.

Birth fathers often seem to have their rights trampled on in the adoption world, and they are dismissed as if they do not matter. They do.


Further Reading:

About Those Dads is a great post of Suz's about birth fathers.

The Experiences and Needs of Birth Fathers

Birthfathers - First Fathers

Protecting Birth/First Father Rights.

Photo by Jan Baker 2007