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Single dads: fathering and mothering: New York policeman and Georgia businessman master dual roles

Ebony, June, 2002 by Glenn Jeffers

THE 10- and 11-year-olds ran amok in Alfonso Morrell's house the week after Easter, and playing group baby-sitter wore him out. The 42-year-old New Rochelle, N.Y., police officer half-expected it, especially after parents in his boy's school learned he had switched shifts to have the week off. But watching the kids was a small price to pay, Morrell says, when one of those children was his 11-year-old son, Justin.

At a time when the term "single-parent families" is synonymous with single-mother families, Morrell is a single father who cooks, cleans, washes and disciplines while providing a masculine role model for his son. He's been doing all this ever since he was awarded sole custody of Justin when the boy was 5 months old. "I realized that I could never be a substitute for his mother," Morrell says. "But I have to be the good guy and the bad guy."

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Another single father who does it all is Dr. Forrest King Jr. of Duluth, Ga., a former physician who owns and operates Premier Management Group in Atlanta. King has sole custody of sons Joseph, 7, and Forrest III, 12. Since his divorce two years ago, he has played both nurturer and disciplinarian, though he says his sons, "still won't eat my cooking."

Fathers like Morrell and King are shattering the myth that Black men are unwilling or unable to take care of their children. Tens of thousands of fathers are taking up the responsibility, and, according to the U.S. Census, men head 8.2 percent of Black family households, up from 5.6 percent in 1994.

Despite being "the fastest-growing family structure," there are few support systems to help single fathers with the unique challenges they face, says Roland Warren, president of the Gaithersburg, Md.-based National Fatherhood Initiative. "There is a social, emotional and even economic infrastructure that is built around single mothers that single fathers don't have," Warren says. "Certainly, that can make being in that role much more challenging."

Sometimes, single fathers will rush into a marriage with a woman in order to provide children with a surrogate mother-figure and have someone to share the responsibility, Warren says. But this could have detrimental results to some children, he says. "Kids tend to do better in situations where the father doesn't remarry," he says. "Children have difficult times working through some of the issues, especially when an adult comes in for a short period of time and then a new adult comes in. That can be tough for kids to deal with because they have to connect, then disconnect."

With both his mother and sister living in the southeast United States and no one to help him raise Justin, Morrell, the New York police officer, married and produced another son and a daughter. The marriage temporarily provided Justin with a mother-figure, but the son, Morrell says, suffered after the relationship ended. "If I could have had a positive role model for a mother, I would have [remarried]," Morrell says, adding that Justin's mother last saw the boy when he was 3 years old. "One of my greatest fears is how his perception of women, of Black women especially, will be affected." Morrell says dating has been difficult, but not for lack of trying. Because Justin takes precedence over anyone else, Morrell has had to apologize a few times for breaking a date. "Women don't seem to take it that well when you say, `I can't get a baby-sitter,'" he says. "You don't think about [what single mothers go through] until it's a man who can't get child care."

Morrell says he has no complaints or regrets. The bond between father and son is so close that after he was involved in a shootout, Morrell says he sent Justin to live with his sister's family for a year, hoping that the time would familiarize him with his aunt's family in case something ever happened to him as the result of being a police officer. However, neither did well with the separation, Morrell says. They missed each other too much. "I can do no wrong in his eyes," Morrell says. "I can discipline him and he'll just come and hug me. And I need to be around him, too."

In another case, Dr. King, the 47-year-old Georgia father, says his children have adapted well to his twin roles as the disciplinarian and "mother." Only the household aspect of parenting has caused Dr. King problems. To that end, he hired a full-time housekeeper to help with the cleaning and laundry chores. "It was a role I never anticipated filling in my life," he says. "There were many things that I had to step up and do; shopping for clothing, for example. It was hard for me because I never go shopping."

Aside from the cooking and shopping for clothes, Dr. King says he has settled into life as a single parent. One reason for that has been the amount of time he's been able to spend with his children, a luxury he can afford because he works for himself and can set his own schedule. After graduating from Emory University with a medical degree, King sold his private practice and retired from medicine in June 1995. He started his business management firm later that year. "Being financially independent is a plus in my situation," King says. "That is one advantage I have."

Single dads: fathering and mothering: New York policeman and Georgia businessman master dual roles

Ebony, June, 2002 by Glenn Jeffers

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