Tag: Atlanta

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood

Third Time’s the Charm

Best DadAfter three visits to the pediatrician, my son is finally starting to feel better. The problem stemmed from the fact that it was I, the father, who has taken him in each time to see the doctor. See, the thing is, if you’re not a “father” then you may not understand it when I say that doctors don’t put much stock in what dads “think” about their kids. Call it ignorance about today’s dads; call it ambivalence…whatever; the truth is that unless a doctor can physically see or hear the symptoms that a “father” claims his child has, it simply does not exist.

For whatever reason, mothers are these perfect little diagnosers who only bring their children in when it’s an emergency, as compared to fathers who apparently run right in with the child at the first sign of a fever.

So it was that I was profoundly ecstatic when after our name was called, and I cradeled my sick son in my arms and walked to the back where the waiting rooms are, that my son started hacking like there was no tomorrow. Immediately, no fewer than six women turned towards the sound and upon seeing my pudgy little blonde-haired, blue-eyed son coughing his lungs out, all crinkled up their foreheads in a concerned look and let out a collective, “Oh…”

I knew in that instant that I was FINALLY gonna get some satisfaction “up in here.” I looked around and said as loud a could be, “See, I’m not imagining it!”

The doctor, upon hearing the cough, feared the worst and thought perhaps the cough had travelled into his lungs, but thankfully that was not the case. The diagnosis: a sinus infection, for which I blame myself of course. I’ve had a deviated septum corrected and my sinus cavities roto rootered out, and I continue to be plagued by polyps for which only a daily steroid spray is my last defense (even as I write this, the bumps on my forehead indicate the signs of an ongoing struggle against an infection and I can “smell” my own sinuses, which indicates that indeed, I am not right in the head (that’s so gross!!)).

After this little episode during which a father was shown to not be completely inept with a child, and as I quietly sat with my sick child in a tiny little room and kept him relatively happy for 30 minutes, I’d like to think that maybe my stock has gone up at the pediatrician’s office. I would like to imagine that somewhere in my son’s chart the pregnant doctor who saw us wrote:

 “Child was brought in by an especially astute, caring father.
Child was given 10-days worth of Amoxicillin at 400mg for
a sinus infection.”

“Oh and also: dispensed a size 2 diaper because the aforementioned
father forgot the diaper bag.”

Ah credibility. So hard to earn…so easily lost.

Categories
Dad Blogs Fatherhood Society

Adios John Wayne

A friend of mine is having some difficulties with her son in school. From the surface, it looks like a simple case of ADD, but it’s really more complex than that. At the same time, in my oldest son’s daycare class, there are a couple of “problem” boys with similar behavior patterns. In at least the case of my friend, I know the problem isn’t a lack of discipline, which might be the logical leap most people would make looking in on the problem from the outside.

Couple this with some observations I’ve made in my own household and I’ve concluded that, as suspected, boys in our society have become an unknown, and unfortunately, untolerated breed.

No no…think about it. Some statistics courtesy of the U.S. Census Bureau:

  •  As of 2002, there were 687,000 + daycare centers, employing more than 750,000 workers. This means that a lot of these so-called “centers” are actually in-home daycare centers since the average daycare facility employs 20+ caregivers.
  • Including pre-schoolers, there are more than 12 million children cared for in these centers.
  • Also as of 2002, 9.2% of all U.S. households are run by single mothers.

Now I don’t have the numbers for the percentage of workers in these centers that are women, but I’d bet it’s somewhere near 99.99%. Add that number to the total number of children being solely influence and raised by women and it doesn’t take a crystal ball to see that a large portion of our young boys today are being raised by someone who is ill-prepared to understand the needs of boys as they grow up.

Just as I wouldn’t begin to pretend to understand the life-stages of a girl, is it right to expect women to understand the mind of a 3-year old boy without someone there to help them understand? Is it any wonder then that in our daycares and schools (and even our single parent homes) young boys are being reared and disciplined based upon a woman’s understanding of how that child should be behaving?

I say no! Just as it wouldn’t be right for me to tell a 6-year old girl that she shouldn’t play Suzy homemaker with her Easy Bake Oven because it might foster stereotypical behavior that would stifle her ultimate potential as a woman, is it fair for a teacher to force an energetic young boy to sit still and color in a misguided belief that he’s somehow wasting his energy on a frivolous pursuit at football greatness?

It’s sad, but we’ve gone the other way in our desire to “equalize” the playing field in the workplace. And that’s really what all this is about isn’t it? Making sure that when children grow up, they have the same earnings potential whether they are a boy or a girl? Would anyone still give a rip if it was a given that girls did so and so and boys did such and such when the grew up? Would we still be putting record numbers of children (57 per 1,000 for boys and 37 per 1,000 for girls source) on attention deficit drugs if nobody gave a flip whether or not boys could sit still and paste beads on paper plates or girls could play video games without it ending in tears. I somehow doubt it.

Yet here we are and who ends up suffering for it? The very ones we’re trying to “help.”

Years ago when my wife and I were newly married, she would often come home and complain about work at which point I would offer advice in an attempt at “fixing” it. Finally one day she said, “I don’t need you to fix it…I just need you to listen and be supportive.”

Teachers; well-intentioned single mothers; most of these boys aren’t broken, they just need a little understanding. And for the love of all things holy, let them play tackle football for goodness’ sake!

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Life in these United States Society

Frighteningly Validating

I’m not sure how I found it, but there is a series of Web sites where one can anonymously post “confessions” about things. There’s one for moms (http://www.truemomconfessions.com/), one for dads (http://www.truedadconfessions.com/), one for people who toil in an office environment (http://www.trueofficeconfessions.com/) and for whatever reason, there’s one for tree huggers (http://www.truegreenconfessions.com/).

Now before you jump over and check them out, let me warn you: THEY ARE ADDICTIVE.

One might immediately read about these sites and think to oneself, “Well, that’s nothing but a way for mental voyeurs to get off,” but in reality, the idea is genius, and of course as a reader, it’s interesting to see if other people are thinking the same things you are thinking.

But there is a dark side to confessing one’s secrets…sometimes your worst fear is realized–that you are alone in your situation. Sometimes when you post, such as the guy who wrote, “Dear Daughter, I’m sorry I ever hurt you,” other people are either too ashamed to publicly empathize (by clicking the “me too” button) or they want to distance themselves from such an obvious confession that they pretend not to see it at all.

Overall, the dad’s confessions are pretty obvious–not enough sex, tired of paying child support, I want to have non-missionary style sex, etc.–so for me, the mom’s confessions are the real cream of the crop.

Primarily, you have SAHM (stay-at-home-moms) complaining about how much their kids drive them nuts or how much they hate their husbands. Some days the vitriol is really almost too much. I don’t know how far-reaching this site is (I have seen posts with decidedly British language used), but a college student looking for thesis fodder would be in hog’s heaven as you get women from all walks of life socially, physically and mentally. Among the daily confessions, one can find women with eating disorders and (lots of) women having affairs. There are also lots of women who have had it up to here with being home all the time and years of jealousy and anger towards their families has built to extreme levels.

But while most of the confessions would tend to leave this writer saying something like, “Put down the prozac or bottle of wine; get off your ass and get a job,” every now and then a true gem of honesty comes out…

“I miss the passion in my marriage.”

In such a simple, yet touching confession, so much is expressed. It is these confessions that I admit may have changed my life. We are all guilty of “the rut.” You know what the rut is right? It’s doing the same thing over and over and over until it’s ingrained in your day-to-day to the point that you don’t see anything else. You don’t see that while you’re very helpful around the house, maybe you could hug your family more. You don’t see that even though your job sucks the life from you every day, your spouse is going through the same thing and needs someone to talk to about it. And perhaps…just perhaps you see that maybe you should spend a little more quality time with someone in your family even if it means not going to bed at a decent hour.

For these things I would like to thank all of the miserable women who have posted on TrueConfessions.com. Whether their husbands ever read their fantasies, dreams and desires; this one did and I am eternally grateful.

Categories
Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood

What Dads Want to Do with Their Free Time

I’m not sure what I miss most about the pre-children days. Is it the financial freedom that comes from not paying $1,600 per month for childcare? Is it the independence to just get up at random times throughout the day and go do something without having to pack for an entire flotilla of people and possible potty scenarios? Perhaps it’s the sleeping in on the weekend rather than the “up at 5:30 a.m.” scene we have going on every morning now with the baby (I’m trying to train him to go back to sleep, but when you walk in his room, he looks over at you and cracks up, it’s hard to just walk away). There are so many things that I miss that I’m just not sure.

But you know when you’re in the middle of something, that thing right there is always the worst “thing” or the most exciting “moment?” Well, that’s how it is with me and movies right now.

Before our second child, I had joined NetFlix. If you’re not familiar, it’s an online movie ordering system and for various price levels, you can rent a certain number of movies each month. The differentiator used to be that you kept them as long as you want…but of course, you’re still paying a monthly fee (I pay around $15 p/month and I can have out 3 movies at a time) so it behooves you to return them for your next batch. I say that used to be the differentiator only because BlockBuster and others now offer similar programs, but I’m avidly anti-Blockbuster and Hollywood video because both of them employ low-paid teenagers who apparently cannot scan in a movie correctly and for some strange reason, their corporate execs tend to believe their highly churned, low-paid workers over a long-time customer when it comes to figuring out what the hell happened to “Memoirs of a Geisha.” Like I’d want to keep that movie?

Anyway, I suspended my NetFlix account after our second baby was born because I rightfully figured I wouldn’t have time for movies. But then I started it back up a month ago because I suddenly had this hour of time from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. –the time between when we normally have all the kids in bed and the time I know I have to turn the lights off so I can mentally and physically be prepared to wake up multiple times in the night AND still function like a normal person at work the next day.

Finally, I got a movie in that I’d really been wanting to see, “Smokin’ Aces.” It’s a 100% shoot-em-up guy movie and figuring I’d be able to get in a good bit of it last night, I threw on the headphones and kicked back. Unfortunately, my wife decided to hold off on her shower tonight (cuz going to the gym in the a.m.) and was sending out “the vibe.” You know what I’m talking about–the vibe–don’t pretend like you don’t. So, I dutifully turned off the movie and gave my relationship the attention it deserves. Of course, by the time we were both ready for bed, it was 9:54 p.m. and I have to assume I’ll be getting up at least once in the night AND again at 5:30 a.m. so I turned the lights off and went to bed.

On the upside, I was right and I did have to get up at 5:30, so at least I made the right decision in that regard.

But that got me to thinking…movies. Man, what I wouldn’t give for a full day of doing nothing but catching up on movies that I’ve missed. Spider Man 3, Transformers, Smokin’ Aces even. This 1-hour I sometimes have can’t be counted on and there are few entertainment annoyances worse than having to stop and start a good movie. Especially when you think there’s a twist in the movie that you’ve somehow missed.
I don’t know…this too will pass I suppose. Maybe I’ll have to take a vacation day and force myself not to do work around the house and instead, load up on good movies I’ve missed–sans family! It’s sounding better by the moment!