News Feature • Donny Lumpkins
This week, grateful sons and daughters will be hitting retailers around the country in search of that perfect gift for dad – a tie, some socks, a Hallmark card, or maybe just a hug. But for a growing number of youth, the time around Father’s Day can be tough, bringing up memories of hard times with dad, or other times when he just wasn’t around at all.
The number of children in the U.S. living apart from their fathers has more than doubled over the last 50 years, from 11 percent to 27 percent, according to a recent study by the Pew Research Center.
While there are certainly a number of reasons for the increase, it is also certain that when the pressures and responsibilities of fatherhood get to be too much, some men simply choose to leave, to dip in and out of their children’s lives like a recurring dream or nightmare. We even have a special name for the guys who skip out on their fatherly duties – sometimes, “father” is just too personal a title.
We call them, “baby-daddies.”
Read more at Richmond Pulse
