My daughter has severe anxiety when my husband has business trips out of town. When bedtime hits, she just cries and cries. She doesn’t quite understand why she’s scared or why she’s sad or why she feels like it’s scarier without Daddy, but I understand. As I comforted her tonight I got to thinking about how much daddies do for their children without even realizing it. 

My daughter knows Daddy and Mommy are her protectors, but when Daddy is gone she can sense the tension I have from having all of the nighttime protector duties on my shoulders. Even though she knows I protect her, Daddy is the one who looks for bad guys and monsters in her room when she is scared and the one who looks through the whole house if Mommy hears a noise. Daddy is the one who locks the doors every night and who isn’t afraid to go outside when it’s dark, just because. Daddy is the big strong man who isn’t afraid of anything in her eyes. 

RELATED: A Daddy is Strong When No One Else Can Be

I think some dads, maybe even most dads feel inadequate to an extent in their role as a husband and father. Some dads don’t see how important their role as a parent plays in the child’s entire life. I know my husband feels that, and I have to remind him often how much he is needed, worthy, and loved. 

We need their strength. Their ability to push past fear and look danger in its face. Their gentleness with their wife and children while still being so strong. Being able to carry in 10 bags of groceries at once, lifting their 60-pound child above their head to touch the ceiling, or moving furniture for their wife for the sixth time that day. Searching the entire house for bad guys when everyone else is too afraid to. Their ability to give their child security by just being there, knowing their daddy would do anything to keep them safe.

RELATED: Love is Patient and Kind and a Lot Like Your Daddy

This is just a small part of why daddies are so needed from childhood to adulthood and on. No one makes a child feel as safe as a good dad does. 

Daddies are so important, and I wish they could see themselves through the eyes of their children if only for a day, to see how amazing and how very needed they are.