Originally published on wcbv.com
Nate Parrilla isn't shy talking about the nerves he felt as a first-time father. The Dorchester dad shared that he's been through trials in his life.
"You don't want the same that you went through for your kids,” Parrilla said. “You always want better for them, so I was extremely nervous."
Parrilla’s son Xavier is nearly 22 months old. He said some of his initial worry about being a parent has lifted, thanks in large part to the Children's Trust and its Healthy Families initiative.
Steven Pascal is the director of home visiting for the Children's Trust."It's a home coaching program that's voluntary for all first-time parents ages 20 and under," he said.
Pascal said the primary focus of the nonprofit has long been to reduce child abuse and neglect. He said involving fathers is key.
"People's default always tends to be towards mom, so we train practitioners on the importance of engaging co-parents equally,” Pascal said. "When dads are involved prenatally, we know the health outcomes for those babies are better. Later on in life for those children, we know that social emotionally, they do much better, and academically when they hit school-age."
Parrilla said he didn't have his own father to learn from.
"I didn't have my dad around,” he said. “(He) passed when I was 12 years old, so I had nobody to teach me."
He said having a home coach has helped.
"He's told me many times, ‘It's on the weekend, you got a question? You can call or shoot me a text,'” Parrilla said.
Healthy Families also works to foster connections between the fathers they serve.
Enijah Mclean, another participant in the program, became a dad during the pandemic, in the middle of stay at home orders.
"It made me feel kind of isolated,” Mclean said. “I had a kid at a young age. It helps to know there's someone out there who's going through the same thing."
Pascal said success is shown in the program’s statistics.
"We saw a reduction in reports of child abuse and neglect for those parents in our evaluation that had previous reports of child abuse and neglect,” he said. “It was a 35% reduction."
The Healthy Families program offers supports to new parents starting in pregnancy and continuing until the child turns 3.
Find more information here.