There has been a shift in per­cep­tions of fa­ther­hood in T&T. Tra­di­tion­al no­tions of men as de­tached providers have grad­u­al­ly been re­placed by the con­cept of deep­er, more emo­tion­al­ly en­gaged men who are will­ing part­ners ful­ly em­brac­ing their roles in the fam­i­ly.

Or­gan­i­sa­tions such as The Fa­ther’s As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T are at the fore­front of this evolv­ing trend, chal­leng­ing long­stand­ing so­ci­etal mis­con­cep­tions about be­ing a fa­ther.

Their tire­less ad­vo­ca­cy, not on­ly in the in­ter­est of men but for the de­vel­op­ment of strong fam­i­ly struc­tures, pro­motes an ac­tive, lov­ing role for fa­thers.

It is a trans­for­ma­tion­al ap­proach that needs to be more wide­ly sup­port­ed and pro­mot­ed to fos­ter a greater ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the pro­found in­flu­ence that car­ing and en­gaged fa­thers have on child de­vel­op­ment.

Mod­ern Trin­bag­on­ian fa­ther­hood, no longer con­fined to the role of de­tached provider and oc­ca­sion­al pro­tec­tor, al­lows men to be much more present phys­i­cal­ly and emo­tion­al­ly for their chil­dren. It chal­lenges deep-root­ed stereo­types and in­spires pos­i­tive, healthy mas­culin­i­ty.

It is about much more than just be­ing in­volved be­cause even an in­volved fa­ther can cause harm if his par­ent­ing style veers in­to harsh­ness or he is emo­tion­al­ly dis­mis­sive. Nur­tur­ing, re­spect­ful par­ent­ing is not the ex­clu­sive do­main of moth­ers. For a very long time, the nar­ra­tive about fa­ther­hood in T&T fo­cused more on the neg­a­tive with terms such as ab­sen­tee and dead­beat be­ing bandied about. There was em­pha­sis on sin­gle moth­er house­holds and the im­por­tance of fa­thers, or fa­ther fig­ures, in the home was down­played.

Thank­ful­ly, more peo­ple now un­der­stand that this coun­try needs fa­thers as much as it needs moth­ers. The role of one par­ent should not eclipse the oth­er.

How­ev­er, this coun­try still has a long way to go in de­vel­op­ing more en­light­ened at­ti­tudes to­ward fa­ther­hood.

That is why it is so im­por­tant to em­brace every op­por­tu­ni­ty to cel­e­brate all the pos­i­tive di­men­sions of fa­ther­hood. To­mor­row is such an oc­ca­sion - Fa­ther’s Day is an im­por­tant time to ho­n­our all the men who ful­ly live up to their re­spon­si­bil­i­ties in the par­ent­ing part­ner­ship.

Mod­ern fa­ther­hood is com­plex, mul­ti­fac­eted and has un­der­gone a re­mark­able trans­for­ma­tion in re­cent decades. More men em­brace ac­tive in­volve­ment, and emo­tion­al con­nec­tiv­i­ty, and are com­plete­ly hands-on in day-to-day child­care.

There is al­so wider ac­cep­tance of di­verse pa­ter­nal mod­els such as stay-at-home dads and sin­gle fa­thers.

Ad­vo­ca­cy for work-life bal­ance has made it more ac­cept­able for fa­thers to be emo­tion­al­ly con­nect­ed and ac­tive­ly en­gaged in both the in­tel­lec­tu­al and so­cial de­vel­op­ment of their chil­dren.

As a re­sult, more T&T fa­thers are will­ing­ly tak­ing on re­spon­si­bil­i­ties tra­di­tion­al­ly as­signed to moth­ers. Fa­ther­hood is be­ing re­de­fined and is be­com­ing less about au­thor­i­ty and more about part­ner­ship and shared re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

How­ev­er, there are chal­lenges that come with more in­volved fa­ther­ing. Men have to jug­gle pro­fes­sion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ties and flex­i­ble work arrange­ments with their more ac­tive par­ent­ing. On top of that, the emo­tion­al and re­la­tion­ship prob­lems some par­ents en­counter can be dif­fi­cult to nav­i­gate with­out prop­er sup­port.

Fa­ther-friend­ly coun­selling ser­vices and sup­port groups that of­fer safe, non-judg­men­tal spaces where men can dis­cuss their con­cerns, learn from one an­oth­er’s ex­pe­ri­ences, and re­ceive guid­ance need to be more wide­ly avail­able.

Al­so need­ed are laws and poli­cies for pa­ter­ni­ty leave, flex­i­ble work sched­ules along with ini­tia­tives to pro­mote pos­i­tive fa­ther­ing.

These are just a few ways to sup­port and ap­pre­ci­ate men who con­sis­tent­ly step up and show up as par­ents.