‘I felt like a third wheel’: Fathers’ stories of exclusion from the ‘parenting team’

This research reports on the perceptions of 27 fathers involved in five focus groups which were conducted in late 2009 on behalf of Tweddle Child and Family Health Service in Melbourne. The fathers in this research highlight their encounters with services that frequently presume they are secondary or part-time parents. While cultural assumptions about paternal incompetence sit comfortably alongside portrayals of fathers as helpers, these fathers resisted the assumption that they were secondary players or as one father put it ‘the third wheel’. This research set out to identify barriers and opportunities in relation to fathers’ engagement with residential parenting support programs. It found that these fathers believed themselves to be part of a parenting team and that lack of recognition of this fact impacted on their level of engagement with support services.