In the Beginning My story really starts off no different than many of yours. I was born and raised in a small town in a two-parent household, the oldest of five children. I was surrounded by family, friends, and support my entire life. None of my friends were from divorced or separated families. None of my friends had a parent who died. I had no experience with these traumas and never ...

Australia’s child support system was introduced by the Hawke Government in 1988. Since that time, it has undergone various incremental reforms such that the system as it stands in 2021 at times seems to work contrary to the well-being of children and their parents.  According to a renowned expert on such matters, Professor Patrick Parkinson, from the University of Queensland Law School, says the introduction of the child support system in ...

Happy Father’s Day. Many are getting breakfast in bed, Father’s Day cards and lots of smoochie kisses from their children (as Bandit, the dad in Bluey, would say). Not only that, most dads will receive their yearly supply of socks and undies all on the one day. Even more exciting is that the new Dads4Kids TV community service ad is being played on TV all over Australia. Watch it below if ...

I know this bloke: he is an old fella, but a single dad. He has been through the mill before; the ‘family court mill’, I mean. Anyway, he now has a 9-year-old little girl who is living with him. She is a beautiful, vibrant, loving, caring little girl. He has no court orders, hasn’t been to the courts, hasn’t applied, just has an agreement with his wife, and the child is ...

Dear God, help me to write when I am looking at an empty page. Dear God, help me to be a better person, a better father, a better friend, a better husband. Dear God, help me to become whom You want me to be. Dear God, help me to like Spongebob Squarepants reruns.   Dear God, help me not to get cranky when my daughter leaves a mess wherever she goes. ...

“Can you help me?” These were the words I first heard when I picked up the phone. “I can’t see my kids and I don’t know what to do. I feel like giving up and I am thinking about killing myself to shut off the pain.” The matter-of-fact way he said these words told me that this was no veiled threat, but a carefully considered option. Men don’t usually tell you ...

It’s Friday night and I have just come home from the fish-and-chip shop up the road. I went up earlier with my 9-year-old daughter Angel. While we were waiting for our order — chips and gravy — she was telling me with much conviction that if you spit chewing gum onto the footpath, some people will come along and pick it up, and because it has your tooth-prints in the gum, ...

Sometimes I find myself wondering what it would be like if he were here now. I’d like to make a place for him at our table for Christmas lunch, like I do for Mum and other family and friends. I’d like to serve him and make up the spare room in our home. I’d like him to see what I’ve become. I was a skinny, pimply, constantly awkward teenager when he ...

My good friend Robert Day sent me a link. He said, “Check out Gavin Topps and his ‘Fight Like a Pro’ Program”. Rob is a Dads4Kids board member. He has worked with men all his life. He knows men. So, I just had to check it out for myself. Below is the challenging call to Manhood from the Gavin Topps Rite of Passage for the Modern Man landing page. “Friend, if ...

Yes, you can learn to father. Hear from 86-year-old Clive on how he went from having no relatable dad in his life to becoming the pivot around which many from inside and outside of his bloodline proudly call him ‘dad’. How do you learn to be a father when you have not had a good example from your father? Can you just trust instinct? Is that enough? And when you decide ...

Thanks so much for all the wonderful help with the End of Financial Year ‘Help the Children’ Appeal. Your giving will help Dads4Kids to keep going. The good news is, we are just over halfway to our target. I am sure we will get there in the end, but it just might take a bit more time. If you would still like to support the Dads4Kids Help Children Appeal, please DONATE ...

Dads in Distress hold weekly meetings to enable fathers who are affected by relationship and custody issues to come together in an atmosphere geared toward practical support, progress and healing. We don’t denigrate woman at our meetings, in fact we encourage men to look in the mirror to understand what part of the blame they own, if any. We simply guide men to become the cause of their future and not ...

The DIDs story, Part 1. My name is Tony Miller, and I am the founder and national coordinator of a group called Dads in Distress, a dedicated support group of men whose immediate concern is to stem the present trend of male suicide due to the trauma of divorce or separation. Current statistics indicate that 5.3 males per day or 37 males per week (ABS Information Paper, Suicides 2001) will take ...

Anzac Day — what do I think about that? Well, firstly I’m grateful, grateful to soldiers who laid down their lives for me so that today I live in peace because of their selflessness, their courage, their daring. So I am grateful, and I spend the weekend carrying thoughts of those men in my heart. I wonder how many were fathers; I wonder how many families had to survive without a ...

Dads4Kids often gets heartbreaking calls from single dads who have been shut out of their children’s lives in the process of family breakup. We have advocated at a parliamentary level for a fair go for single dads who can’t see their kids. Sadly, the changes to the system have been wound back. The legal bias and the complex problems single fathers face as a result are beyond human understanding. Sadly, we ...

Crystal’s mother and father had broken up a few months ago and had moved from the family home, each going their own way. The family home was put up for sale. One night, the neighbours were woken by a loud noise that sounded like an explosion. They looked out their windows to see a massive fire which quickly engulfed the house. Arson squad detectives said it appeared that an accelerant had ...

We need women. That’s a line that all men can agree on, but not always for the right reasons. Feminism only gained ground in the 1890’s when men became vocal supporters of a woman’s right to vote. In those days, in a court of law, a woman did not have the same rights as a man. Thankfully, this has changed, but as always, the pendulum has swung too far. Now, in ...

Happy Father’s Day. I hope and pray you have a good one. Recently I received a call at the Dads4Kids office. It was most unusual. Junior Stowers was his name, and he was was calling from inside a detention centre. Having performed concerts in 20 gaols across Australia (where nobody has a mobile phone), this really did my head in. However, I found that Immigration Detention Centres have a different set ...

To our children, Christmas is one of those special times of the year. When I was growing up it was the best time of the year and was always a long time coming. New Year was always an anticlimax, despite my Scottish heritage and the importance of Hogmanay in that country. When I was 6 years old, we lived with our mum and grandmother in Edinburgh, Scotland. Christmases were cold and ...

Charles Dickens’ words could well apply to Christmas for many people here in Australia.  “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…  it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness.” From my point of view Christmas is one of the best times of the year. Christmas is a time for family. Christmas is a time to be happy. Christmas is a time to ...