I want to be my children’s best friend

Rafael Roselló is very clear about it. His family experience and his years of work as a professional lawyer and a professor of Civil and Family Law have shown him that in order to be a responsible father one has to get rid of old and negative ideas. “We have been conditioned to believe that raising children is a predominantly maternal role”. That is not true. “Some of us have to fight the socially-rooted idea that ‘anyone can be a father’ and understand that participating since an early age is the only way not to become a stranger to your own children”.

The lawyer has learned this and applied it while raising his children Rafael Alexander (8) and Marcel Abel (6), together with his wife Maylex Darias. “I want to be their best friend, to achieve the necessary balance between the needed authority and the respect to their personalities and opinions. I want to earn their trust, so they can count on me in their hardest times, in the pursuit of their dreams and aspirations”, he adds.

It has not been easy. At times, he even thought he was a stranger and that the natural bond created between his wife and his children from the very moment of conception, followed by nine months of pregnancy and then breastfeeding, could not be matched.

“At a point I felt dispensable, interchangeable, and that feeling grew stronger the first times I tried, unsuccessfully, to carry out tasks like putting them to sleep, which she did more easily”, he remembers.  

Although at the beginning he felt frustrated and tired, he went on and became a part of them. “It was a transcendental moment (more like a process) when I understood the importance of being present, of building a relationship from scratch, of making myself as indispensable and irreplaceable for them as they were for me. I discovered that the more love, attention and time I devoted to them, the more they gave it all back”.  

In that sense, Roselló thinks that being a responsible father means sharing in all matters: upbringing, education and development of his children. “As well as taking on the challenge of doing it democratically by respecting them as subjects of right. I am aware of all that”.

To this end, participation must be as comprehensive as possible. “Fathers can and should be directly involved in all the activities related to our children’s upbringing”.

However, according to Roselló, being a father has been a journey of mutual growth. “I did not assimilate this idea in an automatic and exemplary manner, but after several setbacks, mistakes and disappointments. Our own cultural and social stereotypes, inherited conceptions and previous examples have made us believe, mistakenly, that raising children is predominantly a maternal task, and fathers play the role of economic providers, in the first place, and then carry out some peripheral tasks: for example, we picture ourselves playing ball at the park more frequently than washing diapers”.

Among all the responsibilities, it is necessary to overcome those obstacles, especially the negative preconceptions associated to parenting roles. “People around you, what you have culturally learned, everything is telling you: ‘let the mother deal with it, I have to wake up early for work tomorrow’, and if you do not get over that, a gap starts opening and becomes increasingly harder to close. It takes awareness, love, understanding and education from both (father and mother) to overcome those situations and understand that without your active participation as a father, the family cannot function properly”.   

He stresses how difficult it is to shake off these ideas, it is an ongoing learning process: “one learns by doing, and the process is not exempt of family tensions and complex moments. Every day, I learn a little about the generosity, understanding, sensitivity and intelligence required to be a present and responsible father”.

However, it goes beyond that: “it is a process in which I have learned about myself, about the significance of having specific flaws, prejudices and reprehensible behaviours that children may see and seek to imitate. I like to think that since I have them, I make an effort to become a better person in order to be a better father”.

“My children teach me something every day, it is undoubtedly a two-way relationship. Their feelings are innocent, their love is unconditional, and that is a reality that makes me think and learn about my own affection and feelings”, he adds.

As part of that lifelong parenting process, he teaches at the same time he learns. His children encourage him “to be fair when making decisions to resolve conflicts between brothers and to be generous with my time”.

“They teach me how much love is necessary to be a supportive and loving father, and it is thanks to them that I can value the great work my fathers did with me, and still do”.

From a lawyer’s point of view, he analyses why so few fathers in Cuba have taken advantage of the paternity leave. First of all, he acknowledges how difficult it is, given the conditions in the country, to take on exclusive breastfeeding when the mother is working. On the other hand, “if the decision about who takes advantage of the leave depends on a mainly economic question, there are many aspects that need correction in order to guarantee that the approach is fair”.

He argues that there have been inequalities in the access to specific job positions, biases in the selection and promotion of personnel, professional development opportunities that, in the case of women, are limited by the care of children and the traditional assumption that house chores are their exclusive responsibility. These and other aspects have an influence on the low rate of paternity leaves.

Roselló, however, recognizes that the greatest obstacles are social and cultural. “It is necessary to fight against a cumulative experience of years in which women have predominantly and exhaustingly taken on household chores and the upbringing of children”.

Likewise, there is a lack of knowledge regarding the rights and benefits of a responsible fatherhood. “The pre-emptive and educational role of the Law, and Family Law in particular, must be strengthened. The media also play a fundamental role. In school settings, teachers must promote a legal culture among people, as the inevitable base to achieve a more just society, a happier family and a more fulfilled fatherhood”.