Traditionally, father’s functions in the family are associated with the formation of the child’s social skills. If the mother is primarily responsible for ensuring the child’s everyday and emotional comfort, then the father rather prepares him for the skills necessary for the outside world - achieving goals, overcoming obstacles, defending his own opinion. But more modern psychological research undoubtedly points to the special significance of fatherly love on a par with maternal love. Unfortunately, in Russia, fathers still have difficulty recognizing and advertising their feelings. Based on many years of experience in psychological practice, I can note that no more than 30% of dads come to consultations about children alone or together with their wives. Whether stereotypes that prohibit men from showing their own weaknesses and asking for help, or actively taking part in raising children, or normal male employment are to blame for this is difficult to judge. Most likely, this is a complex of interrelated reasons. True, this does not make it any easier for anyone. Acquaintance with this family began with the arrival of mother and son. Wonderful, glorious - but terribly exhausted by the endless problems of study and upbringing. Forgetting about love for each other. There are many such families. So many. Perhaps this is the sad norm of life - when feelings fade into the background, hiding behind irritation and resentment. Even so, I personally completely disagree with this. Simply because I know how to see love where my clients don’t see it. And they turn to me precisely with the goal of finding each other in their hearts - which means they also disagree. I call such families lost. Along the way, they forgot where they were going, what was really important and how to fight for it. I love such families very much - for their potential and ability not to give up. Despite the fact that with the birth of her youngest child, the mother stopped really seeing her eldest son. And he learned to use educational problems in order to receive her undivided attention. Actually, it was precisely the difficulties with doing homework, which guaranteed to provide the family with daily scandals, that became the reason for our meeting. Teaching my mother the educational system over and over again turned out to be a completely useless exercise. She nodded happily... and did nothing. Just like a wonderful boy, for whom this whole story was very beneficial - for the sake of completing the lessons, my mother made any concessions and manipulations. Therefore, at a certain point we started talking not about lessons, but about relationships. Mom and son thawed out, learned to communicate without shouting and mutual insults. Slowly. Over and over again. And then dad came. Previously, I knew very little about him - except that, in my mother’s opinion, he was extremely demanding of his son, was quick-tempered, and was practically not involved in raising the child. Upon meeting him, he turned out to be a pleasant middle-aged man, wearing an excellent business suit, demonstrating his achievements in the field of corporate jurisprudence. Let's return to the beginning of this article - “Traditionally, father’s functions in the family are associated with the formation of the child’s social skills.” This is exactly where dad started. From him came the ninth wave of discontent, claims and impossible demands. All this without aggression - rather with pain from the fact that everything is not going well. It was this father’s pain that became the starting point of our real work. In the presence of my dad, I told my son about my father’s feelings. Dad, too, actually. Because none of them knew it. In such situations, children, as is right, turn out to be more sensitive than adults. Despite the fact that it is difficult for a child to formulate his condition and its causes, compared to an adult, it is much easier for him to show what is happening to him. Having heard about what happens to dad when lessons are not learned over and over again, the son tensed like a string and pressed himself into the back of the sofa. The pope continued the stream of complaints and discontent. Until I asked him to look at his son and try to understand what was happening to the boy at the moment. And then the same thing happened - magical.