Staying When It’s Not Easy

In partnership with

Fellas

It’s late. The house is mostly quiet. The TV is on, but no one is really watching it.

Your son is at the table with his homework open, pencil resting against the page like it’s waiting for permission to move.

His eyes are somewhere else entirely.

You say his name once.

Nothing.

You say it again, louder this time.

He looks up. “What?”

And in that half-second pause, before you respond, a tension creeps in. Not anger exactly.

Is this laziness?

Is this disrespect?

Is this the start of a bigger problem?

But what if these moments aren’t problems to solve? What if they’re invitations. Invitations to practice something harder than control. Because patience isn’t passive.

It’s active. It’s deliberate. And in fatherhood, it’s often the difference between distance and return.

Daydreaming is rarely about refusal. It’s usually about confusion, boredom, or a task that feels too large. Their attention leaves because it has nowhere clear to land.

This matters because how you respond teaches more than the assignment ever will. What helps in this moment is not correction. It is transition.

The most effective fathers do something simple. They shorten the task. They sit nearby or they join briefly: “let’s do that problem together”.

The moment you notice drifting is the moment to guide. Children don’t know yet how to return their focus once it leaves.

That’s something to be learned, not a character trait. When drifting is treated like failure, the lesson they absorb is not focus. It’s shame. And shame makes learning harder.

This isn’t about fixing your child. It’s about guiding them back without making them feel wrong for wandering. It also helps to give imagination a place to live outside of work time.

Drawing, building, quiet thinking, or storytelling. When imagination has a container, it stops interrupting tasks that require focus.

A Different World

Now the scene shifts.

The house is quiet in the way it only gets at night. Your son is at the table with his homework open.

Pencil in hand. Eyes somewhere else entirely. Following a thought you can’t see. You say his name.

Nothing.

You say it again.

He doesn’t look up. “I’m doing it.”

And in that small pause before you answer, he finally looks up.

“Why do you always do this? You always think your way is the right way.”

It doesn’t even sound like him. 

And now you are standing at a crossroads that most fathers never see coming. Because this moment is not about homework.

It’s about how you respond when something that sounds borrowed lands in your kitchen.

If you snap, you confirm the script.

If you shut down, you confirm it too.

If you over-explain, you walk straight into it.

So what actually works here? This is where it helps to zoom out.

Over the years, a handful of well-known experts have built entire frameworks around disrespect, defiance, and parent-child power struggles.

Three in particular offer very different angles:

James Lehman, Dr. Ross Greene, and Dr. John Gottman.

Because the truth is, there is no universal response that fits every child, every age, every family dynamic.

Ross Greene

The “Skill Deficit” Lens (Collaborative & Proactive Solutions)

How it handles disrespect:

Example response to disrespect:

Where this approach shines

Where it struggles

James Lehman

The Accountability & Structure Lens (Total Transformation)

How it handles disrespect:

Example response:

Where this approach shines

Where it struggles

Gordon Neufeld

The Attachment & Relationship Lens

Core belief:
Disrespect is a symptom of disconnection. Kids push back hardest against the adults they no longer feel anchored to.

How it handles disrespect:

Example response:

Where this approach shines

Where it struggles

I’ve always leaned most toward James Lehman in how I raised my kids. Clear rules. Clear consequences. No negotiating respect.

That approach works, and it works especially well when a household is stable. But separation changes the terrain.

Fathers aren’t raising the same child in the same environment anymore. You’re not just dealing with disrespect.

You’re dealing with disrespect filtered through separation, shifting homes, possible outside narratives, loyalty binds, new adults, fractured routines and a child who may be trying to make sense of two worlds at once.

In that sense, you’re often dealing with a different version of your child than the one you helped shape originally. That’s where the other lenses matter.

Ross Greene reminds us that some behavior isn’t defiance but overwhelm, and Gordon Neufeld reminds us that disrespect can be a sign of disconnection, not contempt.

None of these frameworks works perfectly on its own. The reality is more complex. The work becomes learning when to hold a line, when to slow down, and when to reconnect, sometimes all in the same afternoon.

You don’t amputate a foot because you have a headache. You diagnose first. Then you treat what’s actually wrong.

When Your Child Pulls Away and Stops Letting You In

Withdrawal is the hardest one. There is no noise to respond to. No clear moment to correct. Just distance.

Short answers. Fewer messages. They retreat to their room instead of slamming doors. These children experience just as much emotion as the loud ones. They simply do it internally.

Children quickly learn what escalates a situation.

If they’ve seen:

They may decide, often unconsciously:

“Silence is safer.”

If a child senses that expressing anger risks connection, they suppress it to preserve the relationship.

Withdrawal becomes protection of attachment.

Some children feel caught between narratives.

If they sense:

They may withdraw to avoid choosing sides. Silence feels neutral.

As kids grow, especially after divorce or tension, they start building an inner world that isn’t fully shared with you anymore.

They’re asking questions silently:

That thinking doesn’t always come out as conversation. It can come out as distance. Silence can be processing.

The fathers who maintain long term connection do something subtle. They stop chasing responses. They keep offering presence.

Withdrawal doesn’t mean you failed. Often it means something is forming quietly.

This is where patience shows up. Fathers who practice this often notice something unexpected.

Their own reactions soften. They stop needing immediate results. They become less reactive because they trust the process.

Patience here is not waiting and hoping. It’s what you do while you wait. It’s showing up at the game even if your child barely looks at you.

It’s sending the message even if you don’t get one back: “Saw this and thought of you.” “I’ll check in again next week.” 

It’s continuing to build your own life. Patient fathers don’t freeze while they wait. They keep becoming steady men.

What These Moments Are Teaching Both of You

Daydreaming, disrespect, and withdrawal look different, but they are teaching the same lesson underneath.

How do we stay connected when things are not smooth.

Children learn this by watching how you respond when connection is incomplete.

Some of us were never taught these skills. We were taught to comply, perform, or be corrected.

So when we slow down with our children, we are often learning alongside them.

That matters.

A child who sees a father willing to pause, adjust, and stay present learns something far bigger than homework habits or manners.

They learn that relationships don’t require perfection to survive. They require consistency.

That lesson lasts.

And long after the drifting stops, the tone improves, or the distance closes, what remains is the sense that home was a place where conflict did not end love.

Until next time,

Barkim