Fatherless homes can have an effect on a young person’s future

(WHTM) – When a child grows up in a fatherless home, it can have an effect on the young person’s future.

The U.S. Census Bureau says 17.8 million kids live without a biological, step or adoptive father in the United States. To put that into perspective, that’s enough children to fill New York City twice.

“I find it kind of alarming and kinda sad too,” said Captain Terry Wealand with Harrisburg Bureau of Police.  

The National Fatherhood Initiative says kids without a father at home are more likely to have behavioral problems, go to prison, commit a crime, 279% more likely to carry guns and deal drugs, two times more likely to drop out of school, the list goes on.

“Families are the breadcrumbs steppingstones to who we all become later on in life,” said licensed clinical social worker Alaysha Rector.

Alaysha Rector works with kids, teens and families in the Midstate, noticing kids in strained homes struggling with self-identity and figuring out how they fit into this world.

“I see a lot of kiddos that don’t necessarily have positive relationships with fathers, not be able to interact with an opposite, opposite, sex because they’re not really sure, you know, what those roles are, what that feels like, what’s healthy, what’s not healthy. I see oftentimes it affects, you know, the partners that kids choose later on in life when they become adults and that could be from what they didn’t have, that can be from what they did have and maybe it wasn’t the heathiest,” said Rector.

Wealand and Rector say this to parents.

“It’s ok if you’re in a relationship that doesn’t work out but if you bring children into this whether you’re a mother or father you kind of have a duty to be a parent,” said Wealand.  

“Realizing that regardless of what happens in the family unit, both parents play a role in the development of that child. They both have importance,” said Rector.

Rector adding if your kids don’t have that male role model in there life, it can be found in others.

“Local Boys and Girls Clubs, sports activities, your pastor. I mean, a lot of these characteristics that we look for in a father are present in other human beings as well,” said Rector.