Mentor program will include young fathers

Jonathon Tanner doesn't go out a lot. The 18-year-old spends his days changing diapers and refilling sippy cups for his 16-month-old son, Darin. But he was not always so adept at child care.

Tanner said he was "clueless" when it came to children. When he found out his girlfriend, Ashley, was pregnant, he knew he would need help, especially because most of his friends were just as young as he was and turned out to be unsupportive.

The young Jackson couple found the support and education they would need to raise a child from the Missouri Mentoring Partnership's Young Parent Program, which educates parents younger than 21 with a child no older than 3.

The current program is geared toward mothers, as is the case with most of the parenting programs in the area, but the Missouri Mentoring Partnership recently received a grant that will help start a "Dad's Group" aimed at keeping young fathers involved in their children's lives.

Tanner initially went because Ashley started going to the mentoring meetings in Cape Girardeau.

"It was strange at first for me, but once you get into it you kind of warm up to it," he said. "They really try to help you lay down the foundation for what you are going to do with your life."

There is "definitely a need for a father's program and fathers support," said Barb Gleason, clinical supervisor with Building Blocks, a young mothers program at Southeast Missouri Hospital.

She said she sees several 15- and 16-year-old girls come in for help with pregnancy and has seen teens as young as 13. Gleason often refers young mothers to the mentoring program and knows how important a father figure can be to both a young child and a young mother.

"The girls I see desperately want the father of the baby involved," she said. "They just don't know how to keep them involved."

That's where the new Dad's Group will help, said Charles DiStefano, director of the Missouri Mentoring Partnership for Cape Girardeau and Bollinger counties. The grant came from the Children's Trust Fund. It is part of $1.5 million awarded to 58 community-based child abuse prevention programs in Missouri. The Children's Trust Fund is Missouri's foundation for child abuse prevention and works through grant distribution, education and awareness.

The five-year grant cycle awarded to the local Missouri Mentoring Partnership gives the program $23,950 a year for two years, three-quarters of that amount the third year and then smaller and smaller percentages of that amount the final two years.

"Dads have always been involved in the program," DiStefano said. "But it's always been geared toward the mom."

DiStefano said a young father tends to stop being active with the child if he and the mother break up.

"What we're looking for is a program that will encourage a relationship between the dad and the child," he said.

DiStefano said they will begin working with the fathers who come with mothers now and branch out once the program gets going, taking suggestions and referrals from community programs such as Building Blocks and Parents as Teachers. They are hoping fathers from the community will pitch in and offer mentor services.

The Missouri Mentoring Partnership teaches nutritional information and how to handle different learning stages of the baby. The program will encourage communication between parents whether they are an active couple or not.

David Hines, the new youth specialist at the local Missouri Mentoring Partnership, said being in a group of peers and having an older role model will help younger parents deal with the weight of having a new child.

"A lot of times the peer pressure comes from guys who don't have kids, and they're telling the guys who do have kids to go out and party," Hines said. He said having a peer group with similar responsibilities will give them support.

"Whenever you go from video games and sports being No. 1, and now all of a sudden this girl who you may or may not like is about to have your child, a lot of times it is easy for them to walk away because they don't have the maturity to stick in there," he said.

Tanner is one of a handful of fathers who attend the mentor events with the mothers. He said he would like to see more dads involved.

"Don't be afraid to ask for help and direction," he said. "For God's sake, don't give up."

charris@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 246