Father's Touch - Luke Tanner
Photo by Sophie Rook, 2021
When reaching out to comfort my children today I hope to build a bridge of trust and affection that will offer them security now and in the future and which enables comfort to pass from one generation to another.
Our children's capacity to soothe themselves grows from experiences of being soothed. They come to feel more at home in themselves when we, attuned to the rhythm of their bodies, meet their needs for comfort and pleasure through different ways of being in touch. These relationships, shaped by caresses, embraces, holding hands, bites, kisses and tickles will become their safe haven. Our children will come to know what comfort and security look, sound and feel like from this haven of touch. This knowledge will be their map to well-being for the rest of their lives. In time, this sense of safety will come from within and our children will feel secure enough in themselves to make journeys without caregivers. Exploring the world around them , they will discover and develop more skills and abilities and, through trial and error, develop their own ways of coping with stress and excitement. The primitive strategies of being rocked, held and soothed will be supplemented and replaced with more grown-up ways of coping with difficulties. As our children become more self-reliant and autonomous they will make new adult relationships that will be a source of comfort and support.
Throughout our children's adult life, their experiences of being comforted and cared for will shape the way they comfort and care for friends. Some of the playful squeezes, bites and tickles that excite them today, will kindle hidden desires that may arouse (or shock!) their future lovers. Their experiences of being rocked, held and caressed will shape the way they come to soothe their own children. They will trust in the compassion of a future generation that they will one day depend upon, to the extent that they were able to trust in the care they received from a generation that has passed. This trust is the final gift that our touch may offer them.
Growth brings both gains and losses. In time my own children will lose their nearest and dearest as partners, parents and friends pass away. In old age, they may lose their capacity to see, hear or make sense of things. In the very last years, months or days of their lives they may lose their ability to soothe themselves. Their autonomy and independence will become nothing more than a bitter-sweet memory.
At this time in their lives, they may find themselves entirely dependent on the kindness and compassion of strangers. What matters then, is not simply that there is someone around who is willing and able to help them, but that they are willing and able to be helped. If this stranger reaches out to comfort them, when anxious and alone, they will welcome this touch, if it feels like a safe haven familiar to them. Touch, that is in someway, mother or father all over again.
As we celebrate our capacity for autonomy and independence we must remember that this very capacity is born of our vulnerability and dependency rather than in opposition to it. It is a capacity that is always bound to be lost. It can never be owned. It can only be borrowed. Passed on from one generation to another through our touch.
With touch, the most I can hope for is that my children feel in some way held throughout their lives, when with others and when alone. That they are able to pass this safe haven on to another generation. And that when I have long passed away they are able to accept the comfort and love of another freely without fear or suspicion, simply because they need it.
Luke Tanner is a Body Psychotherapist and the Author of Embracing Touch in Dementia Care. A Person Centred Approach to Touch and Relationships.