My father has always been one of the most important people in my life.

It wasn’t just my mother on the pool deck or at the soccer field or on the baseball field or at the school plays or in the gymnastics arena, it was my father, too. My parents worked in perfect unison, neither one of them missing a thing. Not one single thing.

Throughout my entire life, and this is absolutely making me tear up right now as I write this, but regardless of what sport I participated in or what activity I was doing at school (or out of school), my father always would say to me, “I’m proud of you, kid.”

5 words, but the most powerful 5 words in the world for a child to hear from their parent.

It didn’t matter if I didn’t do my best time.
It didn’t matter if my team didn’t win.
It didn’t matter if I didn’t win the trophy.

All that mattered what that my father was proud of me.

Looking back at my childhood, it’s incredible to see just what my father did for me and my siblings. My father wouldn’t just come to my softball games, he would coach. My father wouldn’t just show up at my high school swim meets, he would be a timer. My father wouldn’t just watch a school play, he’d be the one helping create the props and working backstage to make sure everything was perfect.

My father was that guy. That parent that participated in everything we did because he loved it and wanted to support us.

I’ll never forget showing up at softball practice when I was 8 years old. I didn’t know anyone on the team and I was so nervous and so intimidated. The team I was on was filled with older girls, so I was the youngest, by far. I drove up to practice feeling sick to my stomach, only knowing that my coach’s name was “Dave” and that there were 11 other girls on the team (none of which were in my grade).

My father got out of the car with me and walked over to my coach and introduced himself, I saw them talking to each other and was wondering what my father was saying to him. I was HOPING he wasn’t letting on that I was scared and terrified to be with all these older girls.

That didn’t happen.

Coach Dave called all the girls over to him and announced, “I just wanted to let you guys know that we have an Assistant Coach, too. This is Coach Barry.”

Words can’t describe how I felt in that moment. My father would be with me at every practice and every game. I don’t know if he truly knows (till this day) how much that one experience meant to me throughout all these years.

My father is my anchor. There’s really know other way to describe my feelings for him. He’s that true gem and I know I got blessed in the parent department. My parents make me want to be the best parent in the world because that’s how they are and have always been to me throughout my entire life.

P&G’s “Thank you, Mom” campaign is one of the most powerful campaigns I have ever seen in my life. It touches me in such a incredible and powerful way.

As Father’s Day is approaching, I want just take this moment to also thank the Dads. Dads like my father. My father dreamt the bigger dream for me throughout my whole life… from the time I was a child to a teenager to a young adult to now a mother of my own. My father is still that person I want to call when something amazing happens in my sons’ lives, in my personal life and in my work life.

And even though I’m 34 years old and a mother of 4… you know the first words out of his mouth?

“I’m proud of you, Kid.”

Well, I’m proud of you, Dad. And I love you.

Honor your father this Father’s Day too, with at P&G’s “Thank you, Mom Facebook page!” Head over to the Thank you, Mom Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com.thankyoumom) and honor your father. Share what makes him so special and what you’d like to thank him for.

Celebrate your father with P&G!!