Children need healthy role models to look up to from all walks of life, and yes, this means from both men and women. While a child growing up in a single-family household can absolutely grow up well, they will do better if they have both parental figures in their lives. The good news is that these parental figures don’t actually need to be their biological parents. If you used a sperm donor and the father really just isn’t in the picture, then your father, your partner’s father, a brother, uncle, or cousin can substitute.
All families are different, and all families come with their own challenges. This is why it is important to fully understand your setup and how you can make changes.
Embracing Your Setup
You could be married and raising a child, and that child is still missing out on that male or female influence in their life. Why? Cause one parent is always out working or is emotionally and physically distant. You have to do what you can to ensure their presence is still felt.
These challenges only get worse if you are separated. The fact is, learning how to properly co parent is a skill that needs to be learned. You can learn on the job, or you can learn from outside sources like the co parenting class offered by twohealthyhomes.com. Either way, you need to learn how to parent together and on your own so your children have healthy relationships with both of you. After all, when a child has both female and male influence in their lives, they can enjoy plenty of benefits, including all of the below.
Relate to Others of Their Same Sex
Finding your community is essential, and where you find that community first is often with those of your same sex. This isn’t always the case since gender and sex don’t always align, but this generally holds true. Connecting with a role model of the same sex as you can help a child feel more comfortable and confident in their body and gender rather than feel out of place or different (which can happen if they predominately hang out only with the opposite sex when growing up).
Relate to Others of the Opposite Sex
Humans are often more similar than not, but that doesn’t mean it can’t feel like there’s this insurmountable difference between the sexes if you aren’t shown differently. That’s why having a strong bond with a parent or parental figure of the opposite sex is so important. It humanizes the other gender. This, in turn, can help girls and boys form stronger, more nuanced relationships later on in life.
Learn to Respect All Sexes
A child that’s raised with influence from both healthy males and females is likely to better learn how to respect everyone. Having both male and female role models helps children feel more at ease around all sexes and, most importantly, can build up the essential building blocks necessary for respect. Of course, remember that how you educate them on respecting all sexes also plays a part. For example, if a father talks poorly of a child’s mother, and they don’t grow up with them or have any other healthy female role models to take up the mantle, they can have a soured or disillusioned relationship with women in general.
