4 Steps to a Healthy Father-Son Relationship

August 16, 2026|Rick Juliusson

What Joy I feel to have two grown boys who not only love me, but LIKE me. We like spending time together, enjoy old routines and new adventures, want to talk and play and hang.

I fly into Philadelphia for a quick weekend with our youngest, and he drops everything to be with me. On the way home from the airport he’s already heart-sharing about love life, career & life choices, health concerns, new friends. He proudly shows me around his new pad (his first non-dorm digs) and new South-side ‘hood, introduces me to friends and coworkers (“You guys are identical!”, more than one comment), makes me breakfast and lets me take him out to the tapas bar he’s been coveting. We play (soccer and cribbage, World Cup finals, cycling). I help (moving the bed into his new apartment) and mentor (creating a post-school budget and travel/work scenarios). When I try to slip away at 3am, he stumbles out of bed for one last goodbye hug.

Then it’s a long drive up the coast to New Brunswick for a similarly-blissful month with our eldest and his fiance. With more time we can space it all out while they also carry on their normal work and personal lives, but at the core they too want to share their lives, enjoy time together, grow our relationship. We regularly cook with or for each other, or check out their favourite local cafés. Shop from their favourite farmers market vendors. Play (soccer, swim at the falls, watch Silo, bird-walk along the marsh, local music festival). Help and mentor (taxes, new photography website, even help him purchase a 2017 Chevy Bolt EV).

a Healthy Father-Son Relationship should always taste this sweet!

I have a different but equally healthy relationship with this son

Where did this come from?

I didn’t have this with my father. We loved each other, of course, but time together could be awkward unless we were chopping wood or renovating a basement. As someone in my men’s circle commented when I brought this to them for exploration, “We men get along better side-by-side than face-to-face.”

I wrote the How-To title of this post as a joke, because (a) there can’t be a simple four-step procedure to parenting, and (b) I’m no parenting guru. I feel blessed and lucky to have two such wonderful human beings as my sons, and give credit primarily to their unique spirits and personalities. I also credit luck, economic wealth & privilege, extended family and supportive communities, positive friend circles they’ve created, and of course their amazing mother who balanced all the too-muchness of me that needed balancing.

But since I promised four steps, here’s some thoughts on a few things I worked hard at, and continue to try to improve at, that I believe have contributed to our relationship, both as children and now as adults: Want, Prioritize, Respect, Enjoy.

1. Want it.

2004 - We’re visiting “the ancients” - my Nana and her twin sister Ella. The boys are both on my lap, giggling, playing with my face, burrowing into my chest, whispering secrets. The twins surprise me by expressing concern - “This isn’t how it was done in our day.” I ask what harm they fear at my boys being so connected, and they don’t have an answer, just an ominous “We’ll have to see how it turns out…”

I’ve always wanted, and expected, to be in deep relationship with my young and grown children. But this hasn’t always been how dads are expected to be, and still isn’t in many (most?) cultures. Dads are strong, protectors and disciplinarians, hard-working breadwinners and models of stoicism - let mama do the child raising. Archie Bunker and Father Knows Best have been the models, not the 1980’s Heathcliffe Huxtable. Attachment theory may have started in the 1950’s, but didn’t hit mainstream until Dr. Sears published The Baby Book in 1993, and Gord Neufeld’s bible of attachment parenting wasn’t until 2004 (Hold On To Your Kids(opens in new tab)).

My own dad was already breaking away from how he was raised - much more play with us, no hitting, trying hard to control and shelter us from his addiction problems. I honour that the efforts he made to break the mold laid the foundation for the further evolution I have worked towards. And I look forward to someday seeing how my grandchildren are raised with some of these influences, modified by however my boys choose to parent differently and even better.

When I used to lead men’s circles for new dads, the one real piece of advice I gave was to reflect on how they were raised. Especially by their dads, because our default when we’re tired or frustrated or at a loss is to channel that male energy/modelling. Identify the good patterns you wish to continue and build upon, and the negative patterns you will have to consciously work at to curb and change. There are many things I would change, but overall I hope I mostly succeeded at parenting with my dad’s creativity, humour, musicality, work ethic and strength; while layering in more touch, emotional connection, vulnerability, flexibility and Joy.

Healthy Father-Son Relationships across the generations, evolving — 3 Generations of Juliusson Dads

2. Prioritize Attachment

Having set deep, authentic relationship as our goal, our number one consideration in any interaction with our children was therefore to make them always feel secure in their attachment to us. Responding to their jokes, misbehaviors, achievements, tears, boredom, snuggles in a way that affirms and builds our relationship, making them feel secure and safe and unconditionally loved.

In practice, that meant spending as much time together as possible - including the decision to derail my career train and become what I called a play-at-home dad(opens in new tab), a privilege that many work-three-jobs-to-put-bread-on-the-table parents still do not have. It meant saying YES! whenever possible. Taking time for play, touch, listening, doing chores together. Being fully present, attentive, involved, responsive.

With our grown children, we continue to prioritize our relationship with them. When one of them landed in the hospital(opens in new tab) last year, we immediately flew back from across the world to be at his side for as long as he needed us. We regularly write and chat online, and block out our travel lifestyle around regular chunks of time together, either where they live or bringing them to us. (Acknowledging again the immense economic privilege in everything I’m writing here.) We could be doing Sarah’s knee-replacement recovery work in any romantic place in the world, and we choose to do it here in romantic Moncton where we can have this precious time with Galen and Cai.

3. Respect (more than just a little bit)

As parents of children, we tried to honour and encourage their autonomy, strength, individuality. They still needed guidance and boundaries, of course (especially as adolescents, the time when we tend to make the mistake of reducing our active parenting and boundary-setting), but with space to explore and develop their unique personalities and values.

Now that they’re in their 20’s, it’s time to sit back a bit further and enjoy watching those unique personalities and values blossom into the world. There’s still a parenting role for us (as I wrote after our Christmas together in Morocco(opens in new tab)), but more at their invitation, and always with the understanding that we are just providing perspective and reflection to help them make their own decisions.

In our case it’s made much easier by the fact that we are continually impressed by the quality and integrity of the life choices both of them are making. Showing this same respect and space for a grown child on an unhealthy path must be an agonizing dilemma.

4. Enjoy!

Not sure if this is a step or an outcome. For the past 24 years I have enjoyed my boys. Revelled in their Joys, laughed at their goofiness, got down on the floor and rolled with them. I know I’m glossing over the very real stress and fear and utter exhaustion of parenting, but at the core we have to down and out love and enjoy them, big or small, or what’s the point? And if we’re really lucky, they’ll enjoy us too and want a full weekend or a full month to share their world.

Father's Day

PS - In my old blog I published an ode to my own dad(opens in new tab), and in another post I shared a poem I’d written even earlier. Only the first stanza is about dads, but it circles back nicely to how the traditional role of dad as protector and strength was and still is a loving role.

his hand was heavy, calloused-touch
his laser eyes would spark and pierce and sing
he rumbled rough and hairy in the dark
to lock out daemons, save me from the night
and his banner over me was love

her eyes would swim a rippled wake
her touch could draw my name in autumn fire
she breathed in yesterdays in painful shivers
and whispered through tomorrow's deepened shadows
and her banner over me was love

His eyes are diamond-sparkled waves
His breath the clap of cornstalks stiffly bending
His touch of fingers drawn through tussled hair
of cloudy curls set soft on untamed vision
and His banner over me is love