Men & life stages · Individual therapy · Chicago
Therapy for fathers in Chicago
Fatherhood can change your routines, priorities, and sense of responsibility. You may feel love and commitment alongside exhaustion, uncertainty, or a fear of repeating patterns you grew up with.
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What you may be noticing
- Feeling stretched between work and home
- Judging yourself against an ideal of fatherhood
- Having little space to consider your own needs
Your experience may look different. These examples are starting points for a conversation.
How we can work on this
Individual therapy can help you explore how you respond under pressure and what fatherhood means to you. We can consider expectations, emotional awareness, and practical ways to make room for recovery and support.
I am Sam Rustum, LCPC. My work is collaborative: we will discuss your priorities, choose a starting point, and check whether our approach is useful to you.
Fatherhood in the moments that test your patience
You might hold things together all day and hear yourself become sharp over something small at home. In a session, we could return to that moment without reducing it to a judgment about what kind of father you are. What had happened earlier? What did you need? What did you expect yourself to manage without help?
We can look at the expectations you learned growing up and which ones you want to keep. Perhaps being dependable has come to mean never showing doubt, or needing time alone feels selfish. Understanding those expectations can help you communicate more clearly with a partner, ask for support, and respond to your child with greater awareness of your own reactions.
A practical step might be naming that you are overloaded before an argument begins, returning to a conversation after taking a pause, or making an explicit agreement about recovery time. We would review what felt possible and what got in the way. The focus is your emotional life as a father, including parts of your identity that extend beyond parenting.
Questions you may be asking
Can I talk about feeling angry or resentful?
Yes. We can explore those feelings and how you respond to them. Being able to discuss a reaction honestly gives us a place to understand the needs, pressures, and expectations around it.
What if I want to parent differently from my own father?
We can consider what you experienced, what you value now, and the moments when old patterns appear. You can choose a specific response to practice rather than trying to change everything at once.
Can we discuss my relationship with my partner?
Yes. Individual therapy can include how you communicate, share responsibilities, and handle disagreement. We will focus on your experience and the changes you can make in that relationship.
A place to begin
Let’s make room for what you need.
A free 15-minute consultation gives us a chance to talk about what is difficult, answer your questions, and consider whether working together fits what you need.