The Real Dad Podcast
Each week, these four fathers cover a wide range of "Dad" related topics, from the joys of watching your child grow up to the challenges of balancing work and family life. With their unique blend of humor and authenticity, Dave, Joey, Brian, and Mark provide a refreshing perspective on what it means to be a dad in today's world.
Tune in for the laughs, stay for the heartfelt conversations about the struggles and triumphs of parenting. Whether you're a seasoned dad or a soon-to-be father, "The Real Dad Podcast" is the perfect place to connect with other dads and get the support you need.
Join us on this journey of fatherhood, and subscribe to "The Real Dad Podcast" today!
The Real Dad Podcast
Unfiltered Friendship: The Art of Taking a Jabbing
When life floods your basement, parenthood doesn't stop. One dad's weekend disaster opens a candid conversation about managing crises while still showing up for our kids, complete with insurance nightmares and children who see a flooded basement as the world's most exciting indoor water park.
The swimming lessons saga continues with a breakthrough moment – a child finally excited to participate – only to be nearly derailed by the unpredictable emotions of siblings. This rollercoaster perfectly illustrates how even the smallest parenting wins can quickly transform into complex emotional negotiations that leave us questioning our approach.
Vulnerability emerges as the episode's powerful undercurrent. From one father's experience with siblings therapy revealing unexpected barriers between even the closest family members, to wrestling with daughters' growing independence around clothing choices, the conversation delves into territories where perfect answers don't exist. The dads share their struggles with projecting their own insecurities onto their children while trying to break generational patterns.
Perhaps most valuable is the honest examination of male friendship and emotional support. These fathers exemplify the rare but vital practice of men allowing themselves to be vulnerable with each other, challenging the notion that men must navigate parenthood's complexities alone or solely rely on their partners for emotional processing.
For parents trying their best while feeling overwhelmed, this episode offers the gentle reminder that intentionally working on yourself may be the most powerful gift you can give your children. As one dad suggests, simply listening to parenting conversations like these is evidence you're already succeeding at the thing that matters most – actively choosing to parent, not just have kids.
We have a very unique and special group and I know that a lot of people have their group that is willing to call you out on something and you'll be willing to take it. I just find it hilarious. I love it that we do that.
Speaker 2:It's not an age thing. I think it's a person thing. There's certain groups that they will jaw at each other and you'll rip into each other, but there's lots of groups where people are walking on eggshells around each other, I'm sure right.
Speaker 3:Where you don't think you can do that to each other. Yeah, that sucks, yeah, that's no, that's no fun, because you know when joey ends up ripping on you're like wow, we're getting into this like just even the good people have gone a little dark here. Welcome to the Real.
Speaker 1:Dad Podcast. I don't want to wake your sleeping baby, but I'm Dave and I know how to juggle and I can also make balloon animals.
Speaker 2:I really wanted to come in with a yell Hi, I'm Joey. My claim to fame in high school was I could do backflips while standing on the ground. My email was backflipjoey.
Speaker 4:At hotmailcom. Of course it was.
Speaker 3:That totally just changed my. I think she didn't know about me. My name is Brent. I was going to pretend to be Mark, but I can't. My email at one point was DJ Fat Fuck with a PH.
Speaker 2:That was not my PH on the fat or PH on the fuck.
Speaker 3:PH on the fat, come on, I don't even know. Yahoo and AOL maybe.
Speaker 2:I don't even know a.
Speaker 3:Yahoo and AOL. Maybe that's something that I don't know, that anyone knows. In my life, I also was going to share that I hate my name. That's what it was going to be that I've hated my name my whole life.
Speaker 2:We're going to unpack that that's fine, dj Fodfuck's way better.
Speaker 3:Shut up.
Speaker 2:Shut up Sorry.
Speaker 4:My name's Brian Jensen. Hi, brian, I am a part of the Real Dad Podcast as well. I don't have a fun fact for you. Apparently, I should tell you that I have two tattoos. That's all I've got. If you made it this far. Welcome to the Real dad podcast this is gonna get dad a disaster for volumes I really hope two blue shirts can just like play with those we're just gonna mess with people's ears.
Speaker 1:Yeah, they're gonna like jack it up. It felt like I was getting tickled, though, is that what asmr? Does it gets you in all the fields the moment of trying not to laugh when you have to try to be quiet and hold it in.
Speaker 1:I can still remember when I was a kid, a teenager, we did these Christian day Bible camps with kids. They were like day camps outside, where we would play games and do skits and a bunch of different things and parents would come drop their kids off skits and a bunch of different things and parents would come drop their kids off. And this is one night before and we were meeting at this church. That was like hosting it, because we would go to different townships to do it in. And we're standing in this circle all holding hands and the person saying a prayer and our leader of our day camps let one rip beside me, and it was one of those moments when you are trying so hard not to burst out laughing, but you feel like your face is going to explode and then, when you finally do like, snot comes out of your nose like oh my gosh like a good laugh is something so hard to stifle.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's like trying to get rid of a yawn. Yeah, your face gives it away.
Speaker 1:So we have brent with us here again today thank you, thank you very excited to be here, as always you're transferring from number one fan to, like, honorary member almost I think like oh yeah, you've had enough episodes that it's true. Like you're not getting paid, don't, don't get that in your mind but it's pretty awesome.
Speaker 3:I get, I get really excited. I said, yeah, christy, the guys just messaged me about the podcast and uh, I was like is that cool?
Speaker 2:and she was like you already know, you're going I mean thanks for the pity I was I guess.
Speaker 3:I was like, well, I know, but like yeah, I am going. It's not like it was the right thing to do, Exactly.
Speaker 2:I wanted to make sure there was an absolutely not in play, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like you didn't have like a special date planned for us on this special Monday.
Speaker 2:I mean still would have probably.
Speaker 3:Is it Monday? It's Monday it is Monday.
Speaker 2:yes, we record on Monday nights.
Speaker 3:I can tell you we uh we lost track of days. Uh, cause Saturday, saturday morning. Cause, for those of you who are a part of my life circle, you would know that our house is a bit of a. It's a bit of a rollercoaster, it's a bit of an adventure. Um, the guy that owned it before his name is Larry Uh, and the house is filled with Larry's Larry isms uncle Larry's a lot of a lot of DIY disasters. He was great at trim work. He had a lot of nice finishing touches. So when you walk into the house it's quite nice. You see all the trim and the crown, it's great. But then when you realize that he had no idea what he was doing with every other aspect of DIY, it becomes a bit of a liability.
Speaker 3:So Saturday morning I'm like what is that sound? And I thought that Christy had turned on like a rain soundscape to help her sleep and I was like what? And she's like what are you talking about? And I'm like that's a weird sound. I don't know what that is. So, coincidentally, our kids had also let us sleep in for once.
Speaker 3:So this like saturday at 9 am, nice, okay, so, which means the disaster that I'm about to tell you about has gone on much longer than what it usually would so I come down the stairs and I'm on my way to the basement uh, because it's just a really weird zone, and I take a step off of the beautiful stairs that brian jensen did for us and the first step onto the carpet was really wet, where I thought the cat had pissed all over the carpet. I was like that's a lot of piss. And then, second step, more wet, more wet. The carpet is soaked. I look into the sump pump room and there's water literally spraying out of the sump pump. The main pump had failed. We don't know if the impeller, I believe, may have burnt out because it's been running like crazy.
Speaker 2:We had four days of rain.
Speaker 3:We got a lot of water there, as is, so the water had backfilled up a grade across the laundry room. We have crawl space, which is a fairly large footprint of a side split. It had filled that entire room up about four inches and then that had overflowed up out into the only finished little area. So we have spent the last three days having insurance through. Yeah. We got a sub pump in, we got it cleaned out, and so today we were there while insurance goes through your entire life's worth of stuff.
Speaker 1:Damn. So it's been life's worth of stuff, damn.
Speaker 3:So it's been a shitty couple of days, did.
Speaker 1:Lockdown Environmental, come in for the cleanup.
Speaker 3:So we wanted to. So the guy's known by everyone. It's unbelievable. So the insurance person calls us. They're from this company, great. I say, well, how does this work? Do we have to use you? I said we actually have a family member in the industry. She goes oh well, do you mind me asking who it is? And I said, oh, lockdown, environmental. Oh, justin, and pine.
Speaker 2:We love those guys.
Speaker 1:I was like oh fuck off like of course you do, actually do you have someone else?
Speaker 3:but they said that they were the, the preferred person, so they couldn't do it just and talk to them about a couple of things. But, uh, no, so we are working through another company, um, but it's not. It's not easy, it's a lot, and how do you?
Speaker 1:because, like you walk down and find that disaster, you have to deal with that. That's like emergency. Emergency, I mean, it's already beyond repair, there's nothing, not much you can really do, but then you also have to deal with your kids throughout the rest of that weekend as well. How did you, or did you at all manage to like temper that rage of the house flooding and falling apart and still parent? Yeah, it didn't go well. It didn't go well.
Speaker 3:So my thought on the drive here is I was like I should tell the guys about this. Uh, it's that. Kids, um, they just can't read a room like we said like four times this weekend, like can't you just get a sense of this?
Speaker 3:yeah and it's weird because it's just their world, like they don't realize, like I think I think emmet, our oldest, is a little bit upset about their stuff being in bags but not realizing about, like, the magnitude of what we're having to go through. The kids have been it was a very challenging weekend because they also think it's awesome. So they want to go like up and down and we're like trying to keep the upper portion of our house in reasonable shape, the downstairs destroyed and the kids want to like traipse it all over the house, so're like yelling at them to like stop going downstairs, but it's wicked downstairs because there's water everywhere, uh it's a
Speaker 3:water park in our house yeah it was a disaster um, so that was really hard. And then the other thing that's been really, um, even in the next couple days hard to juggle. I'm not so much attached to our stuff, uh, but my wife is very like sentimental, yeah. So there's a lot of stuff, excuse me, that is could be wrecked, that could get thrown out. Yeah, that means a lot to her, so she did not irreplaceable by insurance.
Speaker 1:I remember my cousins had a fire in their home and they lost just about everything and they said the pictures were one of the hardest things, because you can't replace them right where yeah, I mean nowadays you've got things backed up on the cloud, hopefully, but those kids papers from like or like the mother's day presents or father's day presents, that yeah.
Speaker 3:There's workbooks from daycare and stuff, yeah to toss, so she's she's having a tougher time with that. Um, I don't by any means not care, but just we're different people in that Right. So over the next couple of days, like today, they came, they had bagged everything and they then went through it and they laid every single item out and took a picture of every item and then they re-bagged it again Like dildos like everything, everything.
Speaker 1:What was weird?
Speaker 3:because I was using Joey's blankets to try to soak them all out, and I didn't know.
Speaker 1:I was like do I wring it?
Speaker 3:out.
Speaker 2:And Joey was like no, you can just wash it.
Speaker 3:They're handy, so it's been a shit show. That's my long and short of my big story. It's still going on. It's still going on, but that's a weekend. Well, it writes off a whole week and then the workers are there and you can't even go out. You're stuck there. So you're trying to spell each other off with the kids and the kids don't get it, because kids aren't smart and no they're not, they're just they're not aware, not aware of their surroundings, yeah, that's very kind.
Speaker 2:I'm very fortunate that I've never had to go through that kind of thing. I don't know if it's just in our house, but even in our old house I'm surprised we never had it. But I guess it's just because of the geography of where it was, because we had, like the old farmhouse, but also the basement was very much a dungeon basement that was all concrete. So everything just Right. But I was going to say it is an opportunity to go full. What's her? Marie Kahn? Is that the organization lady?
Speaker 3:Oh, we're pretty pumped about it. There is, there is some silver linings. Does this bring you meaning?
Speaker 2:Yeah, to bring you joy.
Speaker 3:That was the thing. Does it bring you joy, If not?
Speaker 1:but you would be more.
Speaker 3:I have to say that to Christy. Yeah, after how many items?
Speaker 2:Each item. Does this bring you joy? No Gone.
Speaker 4:I tried that recently. Okay, so my wife likes to save kids' artwork, okay, and there was a pile on our office desk that had been there for probably more than a year, and so one day I'm just cleaning up, I'm trying to do something good and organize, because we have the kids' birthday parties coming up. So I'm trying to get something good and like organize, because we have the kids birthday parties coming up, so I'm trying to get everything tidied up. So I went through the stuff and I was like, well, we don't need that and we don't need that.
Speaker 2:Big mistake, your biggest mistake was not doing it quietly, without showing anybody.
Speaker 4:Well, I did it pretty quietly but, she saw that I had organized those things and she's like you don't know, you don't know, like I mean, I thought I did a pretty good job guessing, so I. Then she got all the stuff out of the recycling bin and she so I just I stood there and watched her go through it. I'm like I want to see what you pick yeah, that I thought was garbage and I'm pretty sure she just grabbed a couple things just to make a point that you actually wanted to keep that.
Speaker 3:Like that's terrible, you don't want that be honest with yourself, that's definitely our dynamic as well.
Speaker 2:Like I'm very much like why bother? There's a couple of things that we like still are on the fridge that we have kept, so it's like they made the fridge. They can stay, but very much I'm as soon as the kids go up to bed and meg's out of eye shot, it's gone it's literally for one moment, like 20 years from now exactly yeah, that's all it's for?
Speaker 4:yeah, it's like look at what you did when you were like six yeah, we've got one bin that has some of our like couple things so like from when we were younger and stuff too.
Speaker 1:Um, but my wife made fun of me because, like I, would I the things I pick and choose to keep and throw out, throw her off. She's like I don't understand.
Speaker 1:There's no rhyme or reason to this, where I'm like I don't know, should we keep this? And she's like I don't understand. There's no rhyme or reason to this. Where I'm like I don't know, should we keep this? And she's like oh, we could probably donate it. Yeah, throw it in the bin. Eh, she's like, but why? Like I can take it to the store. I'm like no one's taking it to the store. She's like I'm literally going there tomorrow.
Speaker 4:Yeah, throw it in the bin right kid like well yeah, you never know when the kids are gonna need it or maybe the grandkids might want it or something. I still have a keepsake like I have all of the yearbooks like from high school I said those and like all my rugby jerseys from high school, like stuff like that. But the notes in the yearbook are cool to go back and read through um, what was the other thing?
Speaker 1:oh, I had all my old like trophies and stuff. So she convinced me to throw out a bunch of those. And then I had kept a couple that had like pictures on them or that were championship ones and I'm like she's like you can let go of these, dave like you don't, you don't need these anymore the glory days, yeah, the nostalgia. And then we've got your royal highness with his crown, still probably in that box.
Speaker 4:Sorry, I think I got a crown. I had to throw that in for my wife.
Speaker 1:She's like the fact that none of you have called Brian your Royal Highness or is that your Majesty?
Speaker 2:I think is what she said.
Speaker 1:Your Majesty, we need to continue calling him.
Speaker 4:Your Majesty, I think one of the co-op kids, or no. The new employee called me that once and Joey's like you. Have one opportunity to call him that, and that's it Because he hadn't met Brian yet.
Speaker 2:And Joey's like you have one opportunity to call him back and that's it because he hadn't met Brian yet. And he's like when I see him, I'm going to call him prom king and I'm like you get one. When Brian says he hates it, he's not lying.
Speaker 1:I thought I would bring a little follow up on the swimming lesson saga.
Speaker 4:Okay, very good it's been a roller coaster so far.
Speaker 1:I listened back to our last episode.
Speaker 3:How many weeks is this swimming? Is this two years?
Speaker 1:There's four left maybe, but I had mentioned that we've got a long weekend coming up and then we'll be back at it, so just see how it goes. Daughter comes into my room this morning before we've even woken up, already in her bathing suit just ready to go to school in her bathing suit she was that excited fired up for swimming lessons. This has been.
Speaker 4:She went today great had a great time, but we all know, oh, she did go, okay she went I was gonna say we all know what happens before school.
Speaker 1:Does not translate, yeah, no but see, that's the thing about having three kids is one of them's gonna fuck with your day right, yeah, so our daughter's excited about going and our other daughter, aria, is deciding that today is her day for a meltdown.
Speaker 1:Um, my son was starting soccer. I had to drive drive him. Abby's going to swimming lessons, so Aria has to go with Joy to swimming lessons. I don't want to go. It's going to be so boring. This is the worst day, typical middle kid syndrome, because her sister and brother are both getting to do something and she doesn't, and she feels left out and excluded and I'm like, so she's having these big emotions and it's at crunch time now, like it's, like you couldn't. You couldn't have dealt with these emotions an hour ago.
Speaker 1:We're really, we're gonna bring them up when it's time to get into the car like this is the convenient time I could have had patience a half an hour ago. Yeah, yeah, but I thought to myself what would joey do? That should not become a thing.
Speaker 1:No, but I did and it was like our past conversation was really helpful as far as just kind of uh, when you had kind of helped mark talk through with how maybe he could have handled nav with the missing swimsuit type thing. I'm like I know that this isn't ideal for you right now. I know that this isn't something that you're really looking forward to and you think that it's going to be boring, but right now we really need to show up for your sister because mom and I are freaking out because she finally wants to go. But if you start blowing up and that causes her to start blowing up, then we've got an issue kind of thing.
Speaker 3:So I'm like.
Speaker 1:I value your emotions and I want to be able to talk to you about this, but right now we just need action and we need to go through this and you need to get in the car and go with mom. Right, joy was able to handle it all, but there was a moment when my daughter aria was freaking out and then it's abby's swimming lessons and she came down. I went up to the bathroom to be like peace, I'm out like good luck and I hear abby start going.
Speaker 1:I'm like, oh crap. So I get out. I'm like what's going? She's like she's freaking out her bathing suit. So she changed like three different bathing suits and was freaking out about all of them and I'm like, what do we need to do here? What? What's bothering you about this?
Speaker 3:one, and it's like you're just putting it on and you're just trying so hard.
Speaker 1:Go into her this one and this one. How about we combine them? Do you want to wear a long sleeve into this? Just like okay, and like put it on and then went and I was like okay, we made it all that to say why do we put our kids in things? It just makes our own lives more difficult right, there's nothing easy about it.
Speaker 3:No, I'm all about holding my kids back like as soon as they like.
Speaker 2:Oh, you're pretty good at that try something new.
Speaker 1:Don't go and pigeonhole yourself and you're just doing this once.
Speaker 2:If I only let you try everything once.
Speaker 3:You'll never be good at any of them.
Speaker 4:It's great, that's perfect yeah, so then it's cheaper that way my wife to make something special for aria.
Speaker 1:After let her pick, like they went to get dinner together, and then they went to the store because the bay is closing down. They've got a big sale apparently, so she came back with clothes. So she did like a little fashion show for me when she got back with what she had got on sale perfect.
Speaker 1:So no, no, not perfect there were bathing suits on sale and apparently my wife said hey, aria, this is your size, do you think this? You would like this? So aria comes waltzing in the room. She's like before she came in. She's like dad, don't be mad she's like dad don't tell me. She's like came in, she's got like a bikini on, yeah, and I'm like what did you let her? She's like, it's just for the cottage, don't worry.
Speaker 1:So then I was like putting on the nice dad like part of me is like that is showing way too much and I'm like I didn't want to disappoint her that she needed a win here. Yeah, like looks great, sweetie, like I wish it was covering up more, but you look great and as long as you're happy. So then she leaves and puts on the next outfit and she's coming back in. She's like dad. Now if you weren't mad about the other one, it's okay, because it also came in pink and came in wearing the same thing in pink, so I was
Speaker 1:like laughing my ass off because her comedic timing was so perfect and then I just look at my wife and she's just like I think like I am purely taking my wife's lead on this because I have never lived the female experience Right. I have never lived the female experience right. Um, but like modesty is a hard subject as a dad to be able to like know how to handle. Yeah, and with your daughter getting older, one knowing how men are and two, wanting to protect your daughter, you feel that modesty, or like being more modest in what you wear, is the way to do it right. But I don't know like that whole feeling and concept like she's getting older. And there was a tiktok today that said, like for you parents who are raising adolescents now that are turning, getting going to be turning into teenagers, like basically take everything you learned with your younger kids and throw it out the window, because you got to start over with a whole new strategy. And I was like fantastic a whole new world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because, like, when they're younger, you get to control what they wear. Right, as they get older, they want to have and like even you see it in younger ages where they want to have an like, a say in what they wear and start to create their own style or something like that um, and then the weather gets warmer and the shorts get shorter and the belly tops come out and you're like what are you? Why? Why can't we just wear sweaters and jeans like that? It's a great year round 12 months a year.
Speaker 2:It is a hard one and like each of us has daughters, so each of us is going to go through it and like, yeah, I totally agree, it's a very difficult thing to have an opinion on, but you are like you're gonna have an opinion on it either way. Like you're the dad of that daughter. Like it's not as if, but it's not imposing your will on your daughter. That is the maybe the issue that past generations have had. Right, it's something that I know I'm going to have to deal with with murph, like she is very much that extravagant person who likes a big personality in a big wardrobe. Like she already loves crop tops. Like you're eight, you already love crop tops.
Speaker 2:Super sweet, I love this for me, but for me it's all very similar. Like I'm very much following meg's lead and very much, um, yeah, making sure that we just stay in communication about it and how we both feel about it. Um, but also, yeah, just wanting to make sure that what the motivation is behind these different things. Right, like right now for murph, I think it's still just very cute. Like she wants to, I think, maybe look like some of the older girls that are at school. She wants to fit in. She just likes how it feels.
Speaker 2:It's not anything to do with other people's perception of her yeah so that's where I think it gets interesting to be able to navigate and be able to actually talk to your daughter about those things.
Speaker 1:Um yeah, I think a lot of it comes down to wanting to act older, right where it's like you would see somebody older wearing that. So then, me wearing it means like I'm older now, like look at me, I'm, I'm grown up, and it's like, no, just be a little kid, damn it that's a conversation that christy and I have a lot is.
Speaker 3:Why do, uh, does it seem like a lot of parents are always wanting their kids to grow up fast? Like why can't we just let kids be kids? It's from everything, from the shows that they watch or the video games that they play. Like why, why are we rushing them out of this one chance of being a kid? Why do we feel the need to expose them? Or if we don't, like we might choose to not expose our kids to certain things, but then they don't necessarily have as much to relate to their school peers, because their parents don't necessarily see it the same way, and and we just don't understand what is the rush Like? Why is there the need to have our kids become an adolescent?
Speaker 4:yeah, I don't know if it's that, oh, go ahead. I was just gonna say I'm not a judgmental person, but when my six-year-old son at the time comes home and says that their friends were like watching a horror movie at home, I'm like right what are you doing? Like, and then, yeah, sharing all the stuff with my son, who has a crazy imagination, and it's like he might as well have just watched the movie himself at that point, yeah, right, like oh, come on. Yeah, just go back to watching bluey, please.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's the greatest show on earth. I know I was. Actually. We were at, uh, michael's craft store. Oh, I was a good dad, I'll tell you this, I was very excited about this. But, uh, anyways, we were at Michael's Craft Store. Oh, I was a good dad, oh, I'll tell you this, I was very excited about this. But anyways, we were at the Michael's Craft Store and as we were walking out, they had bluey stuffies and I was going to buy one to put in this studio.
Speaker 2:If you guys would have it, I would happily do it. I didn't know if you had it.
Speaker 3:Absolutely Good. Dad win my daughter Everly. She rides horses, which is good and bad. It's terrible because it's expensive, but I hate how much I actually really enjoy watching her ride. She's quite good. It's been in my wife's family. Actually, she made my wife cry the other day and we started like why do you love horses so much? And she was like well, my great grandma, and then my grandma and then my mom. And now it's my turn.
Speaker 3:christy was literally I said it was very sweet so she was supposed to have a horse show on saturday. It ended up getting rained out because of three days of rain. Right, it was soaked up there, uh. But we had already arranged for the boys to go for a sleepover at grandpa's, so she then had the night with just us, which doesn't happen very often, and she was like what do you want to?
Speaker 3:do and or was like what do you want to do? Or I was like what do you want to do? And she's like, well, let's. Emmett had just done this thing where he was decorating this box but it had like stickers and glue and all this stuff all over it and she was like I want to make one of those. And I was like we can do that. And it was like almost borderline like a yes day, which I know you said you've done.
Speaker 3:I don't think I can bring myself to do it. I can't say yes to everything because it seems like it would go off the rails. Yeah, very quickly, because I'm not dave kenny, I'm not fun. Uh. So we went to dollar ram and we got everything that we could from dollar ram and then they didn't have some things and we went to michael's and we decorated these boxes together. We sat at the table. I wrote like family and uh, and then we the things that you think are going to work out. And then we're like, oh, let's watch a horse movie. So we were going to watch, uh, sea biscuit. I don't know if you've seen it. I have a great movie, long story, short, not what I remembered. A lot of bad stuff happened in the first like 15 minutes.
Speaker 3:She cried like the whole. This was the biggest disaster. It went from the Great Depression, so she was seeing all these people like homeless. Then it went on where the kid steals the dad's car, crashes and dies and the dad is holding his dead son in his arms. And then Tobey Maguire's in a boxing ring. He's getting beat up and he's bleeding it was the biggest disaster.
Speaker 1:I'm like is this, this? Why do parents expose their kids?
Speaker 3:He's irresponsible parents.
Speaker 2:Maybe just check out an animated film. Long story short. We got out of that.
Speaker 4:Balling her eyes out. What a rollercoaster for the kid though Super dash, just a disaster.
Speaker 2:What are you exposing me to?
Speaker 1:I've always found, at least growing up like Ben, growing up was that like we had kids earlier. So we are like the younger parents and he was the oldest when a lot of the kids that he was in class with had siblings, so they were often watching or exposed to what the siblings were watching. And then I know firsthand from having three that our youngest is definitely like exposed to different TV shows, movies and stays up way later than her brother did when he was that age.
Speaker 1:Like she is reaping the rewards of being the youngest, but like when you are in class, it is hard to be able to relate to kids and stuff sometimes because they're talking about shows that your parents aren't letting you watch yet where now abby, being our youngest, she's probably seeing shows or movies and telling kids at school about them when their parents are like why is that kid watching that?
Speaker 2:already, but meanwhile, yeah, why can't they just stick to bluey for? Their whole lives, yeah we're doing our second cycle, our second go-around to bluey now, and I am very much enjoying it.
Speaker 4:So good, it's just the greatest show I think ever made I've also felt like my youngest is way less bothered by stuff than and maybe that's just because of like early exposure to, I think so like he's way less bothered by, like leo, my oldest, it was like he would run out of the room if there was anything even close to scary would come up on the screen and then he'd be like, is it off now? And then he'd like slowly come back, but the youngest is just like whatever he's unaffected.
Speaker 1:I think crew's just bound to be your chill guy. He is just so good with it.
Speaker 2:Chill guy for life that is the youngest kid though yeah, because I remember getting exposed to horror movies and stuff like that, way too young for sure, but a lot younger than I'm sure my siblings did. We watched Tremors the one with the worms that are under there. I remember watching it. I would have been grade one or kindergarten, but I remember we were all over it.
Speaker 3:Kevin Bacon, kevin Bacon, kevin Bacon.
Speaker 1:With the elephant gun. Yeah, yeah, great movie.
Speaker 2:And here I am, five or six years old, just loving every minute of it.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I don't know what it is.
Speaker 2:It's that youngest kid's interim it is. This is a good spot to talk about our sponsors. Thank you, regal Ideas, for sponsoring the real dab podcast. They make the most innovative aluminum exterior railing on the market, something for every price range, whether or not you're just getting into it and you want something like classic rail that comes in at a fantastic price point because it is pre-assembled. The one, two, threes of regal ideas or, if you have a little bit more in your pocketbook, crystal rail.
Speaker 1:Nothing between you and the view we'd also also like to thank the Kawartha Home Hardware Group from Bridge North, Copacabana, Lakefield, Lindsay or Millbrook. Thank you for your support of this podcast. Their sponsorship was a year long sponsor that is rounding close to an end, which is a little sad. We might have chats to see if they can continue on or not, but I just want to thank them for supporting us throughout this year because we've had a lot of great conversations and we appreciate that support a lot.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Can you let Joey do that. I'd read his was way better this is way like if you're if you're thinking of revisiting that with them. You're going to want to, just because I was listening to Joey's ad read, going like man that because I was listening to Joey's ad read going like man, that voice is sultry.
Speaker 4:I was loving it and I like to home heroin.
Speaker 2:I'm going to look at a swine model and be tip, tip, tip, tip, tip.
Speaker 3:I have these big, grand ambitions of telling you about my flood story and then being like but you know who I'm going to use to help fix up all of the damage from the flood is the home hardware group there you go.
Speaker 4:But it is a lot more personable If someone's listening to that already on one and a half or two times speed it's going to be like Joey's was giving like pilot voice.
Speaker 3:I felt like I was on a plane. It was beautiful Listening to the instructions. It's very calming.
Speaker 4:It's a very structured ad. I liked it.
Speaker 1:This is a good point. At what age do you accept chirping? Well?
Speaker 3:Our group is relentless. It is, but it's so special.
Speaker 1:There's got to be a stat out there that we're better off than other people for having friends that chirp you. But we have a very unique and special group and I know that a lot of people have their group that is is willing to like call you out on something like that and they'll be, willing to take you is. I just find it hilarious.
Speaker 2:I love it that we do that yeah, and that's where it's not an age thing, I think it's a person thing yeah like, yeah, there's certain groups that they will jaw at each other and you'll rip into each other, but there's lots of groups where people are like walking on eggshells around each other, I'm sure, where you don't think you can do that to each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that sucks.
Speaker 3:That's no fun, because you know, when Joey ends up ripping on you, you're like, wow, we're getting into this Even the good people have gone a little dark here.
Speaker 4:One of us.
Speaker 3:What an asshole. He doesn't say it often, but when he gets to him you're like, oh wow.
Speaker 4:I grew up doing it. So this is my dilemma from last night. I have a question how many episodes of a show do you have to watch with your wife or your partner before it becomes your show and not just my show? I'd say I made an assumption last night.
Speaker 3:Again, here we are with assumptions communication people way wrong he's sitting on the bed just shuffling papers.
Speaker 4:All the kids aren't working, while his wife's trying to watch a show she thinks that I wasn't thinking about her, but believe me, I thought about the whole scenario, yeah, and I decided to go with the wrong choice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, you were just incorrect.
Speaker 4:So I had watched the first three episodes by myself. Okay, she jumps in on like episode four and five, yeah, and I didn't know that she was like invested in it, so you watched the next one. So then last night she fell asleep on the couch so I'm like, oh, I'm just going to put this show on, right I. Then last night she fell asleep on the couch so I'm like, oh, I'm just gonna put this show on, right. I get like three quarters of the way through the episode and she like pops up all of a sudden. She's like are you watching that show? I'm like, yeah, no it wasn't our show.
Speaker 4:She's like well, I anyway, she got up just enough, just long enough to get mad at me and go back to bed.
Speaker 2:Perfect. Maybe she's just startled, maybe she's just like a salad.
Speaker 4:She just woke up on the wrong side of the couch, that's it, I was hoping that she'd wake up and she'd forget all about it, but I don't think that's the case.
Speaker 3:It's hilarious that happened tonight. Chrissy wanted to watch a show, or Chrissy was like, oh, you could just finish it, that'd be great. And she was like, well, but I thought we'd watch it together and I was like no, like I'm quite happy if you finish it. And she's like, well, it's not that bad. And I was like no one is saying it's a bad show, I'm just saying like I'm okay to miss it, yeah, like. I would love for you to enjoy the rest of this show. Don't wait for me.
Speaker 2:It's got this and this and this. I was like yeah, okay it's great, Just wait just wait, I would love to watch it. I'll finish it by myself later. Let's just watch it again. Just watch the whole.
Speaker 1:let's run it back. Are you guys people that watch shows together often, or do you have your own shows that you watch separate from each other?
Speaker 4:Mostly together, okay, but we do have our separate shows.
Speaker 3:It's like a combo. Yeah, american, american, primeval christy wanted nothing to do with that show I haven't started.
Speaker 1:Oh, it's fantastic. I don't get much time to watch my own shows. Yeah, I end up taking that time to play video games instead. Um, so we usually watch our shows together, but then she, if anything, has more shows that she watches without me. So I'm the one that's coming in and jumping in like I think she had been watching the Circle, and then I was like like what's this? Okay? And then like another one, like oh crap, you watched ones without me. Like all right, come on give me the update.
Speaker 1:That and, like Love is Blind, definitely snuck into that. And then we watched the rest of that season together Like I would have known what was going on, but two episodes I don't know if that's enough.
Speaker 4:That's what.
Speaker 1:I'm saying Did you talk about the show outside of watching the show? No, Okay see if you're talking about it at dinner or the next day.
Speaker 3:After you watched the first one with her, did she say let's watch another one?
Speaker 4:Well, we did. We watched two, but it wasn't like a, did she?
Speaker 3:click the watch the next button before the timer ran out.
Speaker 4:It never came up.
Speaker 2:Did she ask for a rundown of the first three episodes?
Speaker 1:so that she could understand the show better?
Speaker 2:She didn't.
Speaker 1:She's just gaslighting this isn't looking good for.
Speaker 4:Maddie, my calculations were correct, you probably fucked up earlier in the day.
Speaker 1:This is just the way it came out. This is hiding behind something else.
Speaker 2:Final question Is she a multi? For me is she a multi-screener, so does she have a phone out while a show's on Sometimes? Did that take place during her two episodes? Yes, oh yeah.
Speaker 1:Sorry, maddie, you're not showing investment. I'm out. I'm sorry, matty, you're not showing investment.
Speaker 4:I'm out. Brian is correct, I've got one more.
Speaker 3:Are they half-hour episodes or hour? I think they're hour.
Speaker 4:That's a long time, though 44 times 2.
Speaker 2:88 full minutes.
Speaker 4:Of her life invested Well, partially.
Speaker 2:You guessed and you guessed wrong.
Speaker 4:The moral of the story is, don't assume, yeah, but it's super fun trying though.
Speaker 3:But it's a hard one to fall asleep.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it is.
Speaker 2:You gotta roll the dice every now and again On a completely different subject that we can now get into. That's I'm glad you had. Something is um, we had our first uh, siblings therapy, which?
Speaker 2:I think was very interesting, so first group session for me not all the siblings not all the siblings, there's too many of us for that shit um, but yeah, with my two closest siblings in age, josh and joy. So dave's wife, um, and my brother, um, not something that'll go as far into, I guess, because it doesn't, because it involves other people I'm not going to share as much about, I guess things that kind of got shared, especially on their part, um, cause that's not my place. But I did find it really interesting to be able to have, um that type of setting. Um, a group session in therapy with your siblings was really cool and something interesting to be able to walk through, especially as someone who's gone through therapy, uh, as an individual, um, I just something that I thought was really neat that we were kind of able to talk through and almost realize together is that, like we're really close so me with joy and Josh, like we've been connected and we've been really tight, um for a long time, like even when we were kids we were pretty close, cause we were the tightest ones in age Um, but realizing that even though we're really close, there still was this barrier of vulnerability, um, that had kind of never really been crossed. So even though we are siblings and we know each other really well and we trust each other. Um, you still realize that that trust, even in and of itself, has a depth to it and it has a stopping point, um, or at least it it did in because of the settings and how we would interact with each other.
Speaker 2:So, like, very much a lot of the time spent together was with our spouses and it was in a setting where we'd hang out, we play games and we'd chat, and we realized that nothing really was off the table when we would have our discussions at night. We'd talk politics, politics, we'd talk religion, we'd talk about anything, and we were able to connect on it and, I think, be pretty open with our opinions on things. But we never really got into the depths of kind of like who we are and really vulnerable with each other before, or even talk about our experiences with our parents growing up. I think that was one of the bigger things is not really sharing with each other. Yeah, how those relationships affected us, um, yeah, what they mean to us and how they still affect us today, and that's kind of the things that you're not really going to talk about unless you have a reason to talk about them.
Speaker 2:Um, and that was kind of the uh contributing factor to why we did this, with my dad going through what he's going through, kind of coming closer to the end of his life.
Speaker 2:Um, our, my therapist, and my brother, caesar as well, um was very much wanting to have us in because she said she's just seen it time and time again where, um, it ends up causing a rift in the family, between the siblings, between the sibling and the other parent, whatever it may be, may be, they're just often it didn't doesn't seem to matter, in her opinion, how much you think you are already resigned to the fact that that parent is going to pass, how much you have come to peace with it.
Speaker 2:If you haven't actually talked to your siblings, if you haven't actually found a common ground and talked experience and fleshed things out, then there is always opportunity for there to be something that is a rift between you, whether it be how you're dealing with it on your own, how the other siblings think you should be dealing with it, whatever there's a thousand different things that it could be. Um, and I definitely, like I, I already see the importance of that and that's with my two siblings that I think I feel the closest with and that I think we have probably the closest shared experience of parenting through our parents. Um, and even just being able to have that, that setting, to be able to talk things out and find that common ground with each other, was really cool and I really very much enjoyed it and would recommend uh questions.
Speaker 3:Uh, first question you mentioned it is the same therapist that you're already seeing. Yes, and you were saying that josh already had seen her as well, correct? So this was just joy's first time going to her and she brought the. She, being the therapist, brought it up to you as an idea of something.
Speaker 2:This is something you should consider so no, she's way smarter than that. Because she don't bring up things to me, or josh, because then it won't happen. So what she brought it up to was our wives.
Speaker 3:Oh, because there's mag still seeing her.
Speaker 2:Yeah mag sees her as well. Um, so she had brought it up to them to say that she would just love to be able to have me and josh and joy in on a session to be able to chat through things, because all of this is happening kind of within our family. So, yeah, then our sisters Nope, that was too many words Our wives get together with joy or sister on a regular basis just to have dinner and hang out and chat. So they had brought it up with joy and kind of talked with her about it, about her level of interest, and she was very much on board and came out and I think she very much enjoyed it.
Speaker 3:Can I just say it's pretty like admirable and cool that in your short explanation of that situation, um, that you were able to say that yourself and your wife and we know Murph as well have all taken the opportunity to like go and chat with someone just about life or what they're going through or about how to handle emotions. And I don't know if there's a lot of people that can say, like all of the members of their family minus Coop, who's too young right now to take advantage of something like that, or be confident enough or appreciate the value in going to see a therapist for what could be a small thing or it could be a big thing yeah, absolutely I've.
Speaker 2:I've definitely seen the good lord, would you?
Speaker 1:clear your throat.
Speaker 2:Already I feel like I don't have to, and then I start talking and it's an issue.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna drink some water now I was gonna say I think one of the big things that holds people back from doing therapy is the cost.
Speaker 1:Is the cost?
Speaker 1:And like speaking to my wife specifically about it, because we've had some great conversations through this time um, and my wife is a very good reflective person, she's also the kind of person who would learn to do something herself so that it would be cheaper.
Speaker 1:Right, and like she's almost like therapizing herself in a way to like justify not needing it, because she she really is great at being able to break something down and see it for what it is, but she has a hard time spending money on herself or something, and right, so, like the cost of therapy, she like struggles to spend that on herself, like whether or not she feels that she's worth it or not, and I'm like, well, I mean, that'd be a great thing to talk to a therapist but it's like it is a cyclical thing, like it is a difficult thing to be able to to do yeah, absolutely, and I think one of the things that changed my mind for it and I've obviously talked about this before was that switch of it's not for me and that's what made gave me the ability to do it, because in reality it is like I go to therapy for myself, but my motivation became I want to do this so that I can be a better dad for my kids.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so then that kind of helped me remove that part or that reason or that maybe excuse right, because now it's okay, this isn't no, any longer about me and spending money on myself. It's about investing in how I'm going to parent my kids, um, and that has made that part of it very, I'll say, easy. But I don't want to say easy because I'm also in a place where I can, um, as far as the money side of things, it's it's a hard profession.
Speaker 1:I'm just gonna go in on the finances of therapy. It's a hard one to justify the cost to though. Yeah, like you go to a dentist and you get an x-ray and they're using this machinery that costs lots of money and you can be like, okay, I can get why it's that much money. You had to buy all this expensive stuff. But a therapist you're just sitting down and talking to, so you're literally paying for that person's time and what they're able to do, but you're you're not getting an experience like a concert or something like you're just literally tearing yourself apart, like tearing yourself open, not apart. Like you're tearing yourself open, making yourself vulnerable and paying like a shit ton of money to do it well, and they have different rates, right.
Speaker 3:So when you're looking into a therapist, they each have like a different hourly rate. So there's some that, like, would consider themselves more valuable um than others.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely but like I can see the value in it, like what you have gone through and who you are now like I was even saying to my wife that, like it, I find timing interesting, that you were able to have started this therapy journey just through the podcast because we were talking about it, and then you're like, hey, I'm gonna give it a go and see what it's like. Yeah, but that you're in a position now to be able to handle the big emotions and feelings that not only you, your mom, our family is experiencing through this. So you are in a place where you are able to handle this much better than you probably would have a few years ago.
Speaker 2:A thousand percent, yeah, I would have absolutely just buried everything that the family is dealing with behind something, probably burnt myself out trying to do everything I can to help mom through all of it and ultimately probably ended up resenting her quite a bit for that. So I can definitely see how I would have dealt with this much differently through that and still very much needing therapy to navigate it and seeing the value in that, in being able to talk to somebody who's outside of it. I think that's what has been interesting for me is that viewpoint of therapy for me and how much that's changed, where it is very much for me just having somebody in my life that, yes, I have to pay in order to go talk to her, but it's somebody that I can just go and talk to about things like that is what it is in essence, right. It's just it doesn't matter what the subject is. I know I can go and I can have a discussion and it's never going to be met with any kind of defensiveness or judgment.
Speaker 1:It's completely unbiased exactly.
Speaker 2:It's somebody who's outside of the entire situation. I can just be completely vulnerable, open and honest, and it's never going to be met with any kind of emotion because of the fact that they are outside of my life. She holds it doesn't matter to her what's happening in my life. And even that is kind of we've talked about it before with the concept of, like you go in to have a baby and you come out and you realize my whole world has changed. Nobody else has.
Speaker 2:It kind of gives you that bit of that perspective, because you realize that you're talking about all these big, heavy things and this shit that you're going through and you kind of have that moment where you realize like none of this actually matters to this person because she has her own life that she lives and she has her own stuff that she does. But she also talks to hundreds of different people that are also going through their own life and their own perspective. So that kind of in and of itself is helpful for me. But yeah, I can't say enough good things about it. Through my experience I know that everybody has their own experience with therapy, if they do do it, and I'm sure that there's tons of negative experiences out there as well. Um, but I found a therapist for me that works really, really well and it has been, I'll say, life-changing for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a lot of ways the one thing that's opened my eyes from talking to you about therapy and even just the last podcast episode, because I listened to it today when I was on my drives and it helped me a lot again, listening to myself talk about the issues that I was going through with my son and realizing how much I am projecting onto my kids, um, based on my brokenness.
Speaker 1:So, like me feeling like a undisciplined person right, who that's always been something that I kind of struggle with, and wanting to be more disciplined, um, I'm wanting my kids to have that or to show that. So, like my son, he went up to bed, he had brought his phone and I found him that he was like watching youtube shorts on his laptop and stayed up till midnight and I was like, dude, you can't be doing this. And like we had a chat. And then today I chatted with him a little bit more but I had listened back to the podcast and realized one of the big reasons why I'm wanting him to fight through this is because I'm wanting him to be more disciplined, because it's a part of me that I wish I was better at. So then I said to him like this is why I'm reacting this way and, like I, want you to gain a skill that I didn't have. We didn't grow up with the ability to carry our TV with us everywhere we go. We had one TV in our house that was probably like a 25 inch TV or whatever a 30 inch might have been the biggest 400 pounds yeah yeah
Speaker 1:and I didn't have the ability to have a phone in my room or a TV in my room. That wasn't so. I was more. I didn't have that as a kid and then, as I grew up and that technology became available to me, I didn't have and nobody had taught me the discipline to put it aside. So I am very much addicted to my phone or, um, like it can get caught in scrolling or playing video games too late.
Speaker 1:Now that I'm an adult and I have all that free will to make those choices for myself, right, um, and I have a hard time denying myself of those things. And I was saying to him, like I want to be able to give you the skills to understand the why where, like right now, your brain is developing. Like, yes, as an adult it still might hurt you, but like as a kid, watching this short form content late at night, like it's not good for your brain. Like you can see the physical reaction when you do something that's not good for your body, but your brain you can't see what it's doing to it. Um, but just realizing through all of that talk of, like, how much the thing that I don't like about myself is what I'm projecting on the kids when I get frustrated with them, like why can't you just do this?
Speaker 1:it's like well, you can't do it like get your own shit together and like why can't I do this exactly?
Speaker 2:because he probably literally said that to yourself.
Speaker 1:Yeah, why can't I do this exactly because he probably literally said that to yourself why can't I just do this?
Speaker 2:and it's like I don't even know how to teach him how to be more disciplined, because I don't know how to be more disciplined myself and I think that's a lot of the struggle for our generation is we almost couldn't have been taught how to deal with the things that we've had to deal with through teenage, 20s, 30s because of the technological revolution that happened yeah, after our parents kind of parented us right where, like, we had gone through the parenting stages and we had gone through being a kid and then all this crap happened.
Speaker 2:Yeah, now it's like, yeah, we never got a playbook because nobody had a playbook and we were very much a generation that kind of has just been taken advantage of through that. Right like it's. It's all of it is advertising in some way. Right, it's people just grabbing our attention, whether it's for a product or they just want our attention to watch their video so that they can get money. Right, and we're just hooked right into it and there's not much we can do about it other than to try to figure out how we deal with it ourselves, yeah, or through experts that do exist out there, but again, it all has to be us led. It wasn't led by our parents.
Speaker 1:So then, that's, I think, the struggle that a lot of us are going through now yeah, because then the deeper question that I ask myself is why is it a part of me that I don't like? So it's like why am I frustrated about that, about myself like, why am I beating myself up about that? And then I'm like I don't know. So it's like I would. I've been considering going to see this valerie lady after uh all these conversations, why not just first?
Speaker 4:I've heard dave say get the whole family there.
Speaker 1:I just like the last episode really hit me, um, just in the skills you've gained, I think, right in the, the knowledge you've gained as far as, like that reflective. I've thought of myself as a very reflective, observant person and I'm willing to challenge myself on things or reasons, or why did I say something? Did I say something wrong? Like did I mess up a situation? And like, analyze that. You're very introspective, yeah, so I. I've always been able and my wife is very good at we've always been able to work things through, so there's never been a big issue that I've needed it for. But I think that's why your journey has been interesting to me, because like, yeah, you didn't think there was a big issue, you needed to as well, but it's also helped you gain tools, gain knowledge about yourself, and then that, in turn, is making you a better dad, making you a better friend, right?
Speaker 3:well, because the reality is good lord while joe, while joe is talking, joking, um, maybe that's why we shouldn't question the price, like maybe it's not that the person's skill set is that they just sit and talk and listen, maybe it's that there's a valid they can value how far or how much impact they can make on someone's life.
Speaker 2:There's a certain aspect of the stress level, too, right, that they would deal with and that ability to, I know, even just within our industry. Right, like you charge a certain amount. If we're charging way less, we could buck ourself out for years because everybody would want to use us, because we're charging five thousand dollars to do a bathroom, but the reality is we want to do the best that we can for the people that we want to work with, where I think that's very much the case in their industry as well. Right, you want to work with certain people and you want to help people with their lifestyle. Um, this is kind of the first time I'm kind of thinking through this.
Speaker 2:Right, like I'd imagine, she doesn't want to work with as many people that are struggling with certain things right but she wants to help people that want to make a difference in the world and want to better themselves and better themselves as a parent and stuff like that we talked me and my wife talk about in the aspect of like, we joke that we're some of her favorite clients because we most of our shit is together we're dealing with a lot of our past and how we were parented and the struggles that that gives us now and wanting to be better.
Speaker 2:Um, rather than struggling with some of like, maybe the heavier stuff where it's like, yeah, you wouldn't want to deal with that every day, you wouldn't want to deal with people are dealing with heavy addiction and heavy feelings of suicide and stuff like that. Like that would be really hard as a career path. Right, you'd want to get into more people who are just trying to become better humans. So I think there's an aspect of that as well. Um, but yeah, just to go back to before I started choking again, I think that could be part of the frustration if you are a very introspective person and that's where a lot of that frustration can creep in of like right checking yourself and why can't I figure that out and why that can still be such a frustration.
Speaker 2:Because you're like I'm introspective, I've always been able to figure it out right, where in reality, you've always just been able to get to the next step or get through or justify things in a certain way in your head. Like that's a lot of the things that I've kind of learned, because I I relate to that like I've always thought of myself as very introspective, um, because of a lot of other factors that just made me more secluded to myself. Um, because I figured as there's a lot of pieces to that but I don't know what to do. Uh, because of the way that I went through childhood and I kind of made a decision in my head that if I'm just easy, then I'm not a stress on my mom specifically. So if I'm an easy kid, I'm not another reason that my mom will be emotional, so I will just be easy and stay to myself.
Speaker 2:So that kind of forces you into this being a more introspective person. I'll deal with it myself, I'll figure out how to get through things and navigate them on my own, but then when you take that into adulthood, then you're not letting anybody else kind of help you through things and you're not accepting help, then you're. Often I found that I would find ways to blame myself for things so that I could just bury them and move on to the next thing where, in reality, you should be able to have conversation and be able to deal with things within your relationship and share blame with people when you need to right um.
Speaker 3:So those are the pieces that have definitely made a big difference for me going through therapy so far, but very much a journey that's going to continue for me do you find that, as we begin to be like, more self-reflective or think more about what's what's best in our lives or what we're going through, is there a place where we start to find, um like, more conflict? Because we start like, either whether it's setting boundaries or just the fact that we're starting to speak our mind or say what we need to do for our own best mental health, that as soon as we're not doing the joey as a child, the I just want to be easy that we are finding more conflict or disagreement so that is one of my biggest struggles right there.
Speaker 2:So it's funny that like dave shares that, like he listened, like listening to the that last episode and then me walking through that with mark that was one of the hardest things that I can think of doing is like trying to give that type of advice to mark about him and walking through a situation with his kid, like I was selling saying to meg when I got home from that episode that like I was proud of myself for being able to speak up and actually talk about something like that, because that is one of my biggest struggles.
Speaker 2:I don't want that conflict.
Speaker 2:I'm very much conflict avoidant so it's difficult for me to say something like that.
Speaker 2:That's kind of advice based, because I'm terrified of the pushback I'm terrified of well, I don't think that would have worked or that's dumb and I don't agree with gentle parenting, right, like I'm terrified of that, of that pushback, and I'm terrified of that conflict because I do think that it does open you up more to that. But I think if it's done in the right way and always brought up with that sense of vulnerability, in that sense of this is my opinion, um, and in end of the discussion. So then that's kind of what is helping me to be able to do it more, because then if that is met with conflict and defensiveness, then I know that I can just move on. Because if I'm going to open up a discussion with somebody that is truly vulnerable and I just want to make our relationship better and I want to give advice, but I also want to be open to the discussion, and it gets shut down and met with defensiveness and it's like, okay, you're not ready to hear this right now and you're not ready to have a discussion.
Speaker 3:I'm going to move on Because as an outside listener to that, I wasn't in the room when you recorded this but I kind of, in knowing you and knowing Mark and I could visualize how that conversation went. But I think it went really, really well. Number one kudos to you for actually like being able to be confident enough in yourself or what you're feeling, to say it. But you and Mark have a relationship of like, trust and love and you approached it with such grace and he would know that you're coming at it from love and zero um, like I know you, like I know this is right, or I told you so kind of approach.
Speaker 3:He's not going to see any of that and he from, at least from my listening I don't know what happened afterwards he seemed very receptive to it and you, you almost asked permission first. You were like if I can, yeah, and yeah, I think you said if I can, and he was like sure, and even that drops a little bit of a barrier, like you're it. When you said if I can, he already knew that you were going to challenge him on that, right, but he was comfortable enough in that situation that he was willing to hear it out. And if he did disagree, he could disagree also, like respectfully, like whether you're like, if you're not ready to hear this, well, it might not necessarily be that he's not ready to hear it, it could also be when he hears it, it might be something that he still just disagrees with, and that's totally.
Speaker 1:Everyone's allowed to parent how they want absolutely yeah I don't think enough guys have relationships like not even close, and do you think that we ask our spouses to be too much sometimes in that if you don't have outside relationships that you can talk to people about those things, do you rely on your spouse to be your confidant, like your therapist, your friend, your person that you're watching your show is like you're doing things with like do we rely on them to be too many aspects of things? Um, because we've lost relationship outside of our spouse relationship that's a random thought.
Speaker 2:Absolutely be the case. Yeah, especially with guys where I think you have that just coughed right I was like, just I don't know, where this is coming from.
Speaker 4:This is ridiculous I was willing to power through it.
Speaker 2:Brian hasn't spoken for 40 minutes and you're hitting me with that but I think it often does happen like that's what the research shows anyways that you often have women who, even when they get married and are in a monogamous relationship, they still have best friends, they still have friends outside of that, where a lot of men, especially when you get past that 40, 50, 60 years old, they would say they don't have a best friend and they probably don't even have that many friends, right?
Speaker 3:So then I don't doubt at all that that very much becomes the relationship between husband and wife, anyways you're complaining about work with them You're ways you're complaining about, work with them, you're complaining about kids with them you're complaining about but I might almost challenge that where and maybe this is just our ridiculous group, but we're so lucky where we actually have I think most of us would say we have more guy friends than our wife has girlfriends, and maybe that's the rarity.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, maybe in the grand scheme of things, um, or at least when you think how many like um, brides are still in contact with their bridesmaids versus grooms or their groomsmen, yeah, like, in regards to those close friends, um, which which person ends up staying closer to them? And but it's always hard because in in our world, anytime I think about like lifestyles or friendships or relationships, I think we're a little bit of an anomaly and it's I always. I'm like, well, doesn't everyone do this? Like dave's over there being all introspective and and reflective and I was like, wow, that's really good. I was like, but I don't know that, a lot of like, when guys go out to the man cave and they just crush some beer and watch football, are they actually thinking?
Speaker 1:right? Are they afraid to think the difference between like numbing feelings and thinking through feelings too right? Like I definitely go through phases where I'm like I just need to not right now, like I need to not be too introspective, I need to not overthink things, I just need to laugh or I just need to like turn off, kind of thing too.
Speaker 4:I would say that I would say probably a lot of people that don't have these types of relationships probably don't even find that in their partner because they're not used to being vulnerable in that way. I would say, like I would say, it's probably pretty common for someone not to have that like best friend at home with them.
Speaker 1:Right too, yeah, like best friend at home with them.
Speaker 4:Right yeah, they're just your companion, like the person you're doing life with, but you're not really like being vulnerable with them very often Like how do you like unlock vulnerability then? Yeah, it's a choice, but vulnerability gets unlocked through trust.
Speaker 2:But trust is, I think, one of the sneakiest things that everybody thinks they might have that they don't actually have. I thought I was a much more trusting person before therapy, like I thought I had this blanket of no. I like I trust complete strangers and I have the ability to trust anybody.
Speaker 3:Well, you even just went on to say you and your closest siblings don't necessarily have the level of trust that you may have thought, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And that was one of the things that like that true trust where it's like, yes, I have, I think, faith that people won't hurt me in a, in a relational aspect right, I have a lot of people that I trust to that level. But like that deep-seated, I'm going to trust you with who I am, that through my journey has been like a nope. I haven't given anybody that like. I've come to realize that with myself and my wife, where it's like I thought I had that with my wife, where I was like, nope, I trust her 100 and completely we're going through, it's like no, there's very much still parts of myself that I was holding on to well, do people even trust themselves with themselves?
Speaker 2:yeah, there's a piece of that too and I think that, like, so, even that, like, that's a very scary thought, like and I'm very aware that that's a very scary thought to even share for people.
Speaker 2:And that is what, like, I recently talked to valerie in her one of her recent sessions, valerie's the therapist, um, and she was saying, like that is the biggest thing generally that does hold people back from therapy.
Speaker 2:Because when we talked about finances and obviously that's a massive factor, um, but in her opinion and through all of her discussions, because she generally does, like a consult with people that's free, um, and she said, without a doubt, on 99 of those consults, what people bring up as their biggest fear is that we're going to open up a can of worms that they didn't even know was there and they didn't want opened. And her response is always the same do you realize that saying is you're opening up a can of worms because the worms aren't supposed to be in there. The idea is to open it up and let them out. And that is what therapy is. It's just realizing the things that you've been intentionally or unintentionally burying. Yes, it's going to be difficult to go through, but you are better off going through it, because now the worms are out of the jar instead of shoved it out inside of you, right?
Speaker 1:Unless you're going fishing, then you'd like to have the worms in the jar to be able to go fishing.
Speaker 2:Fishing worms are easier to take out.
Speaker 1:Fishing is very meditative, though Fishing is a good therapy session.
Speaker 3:It's legit. We probably should clarify as well, especially when Dave and I were going on about it you can't put a price tag on your mental health, right? Yeah, so yes, but.
Speaker 1:I get why it would be a barrier.
Speaker 3:It 100%. Might want to hinder you, but I'm sure there are resources out there and there are ways around it to try to figure it out. Because, yeah, like Joey has gone through a lot, but there's a lot of people who not downplaying what joey's going through that that might need it a lot more and you would hope that that the cost of of going to a therapist is not necessarily going to stop someone from getting the help that they need yeah, I think, like people who are choosing to listen to this podcast, I hope, are hoping to become better parents.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and like we are choosing to listen to this podcast, I hope, are hoping to become better parents and like we are trying to become better parents.
Speaker 1:And the reason why we have these conversations is because we all experience similar aspects of parenthood through different avenues, whether it's tantrums or dinners or bullying, whatever that might be and we even all bring our own childhood experiences to the table and how we wish things had have been handled right, and I think therapy just helps, gives you some of those tools and work through some of those things.
Speaker 1:So, like a tiktok I saw before I had come here today was talking about the switch of parenting from parenting kids to parenting adolescents and how, like, you have to throw everything that you learned earlier out the window and you're starting fresh. Um, and one of the things she said is that you're losing control as a. When you're parenting kids, you are in control of the things that they watch and do and dress and see, but as they're getting older, you are handing over that control to them. And she said one of the best things you can do is work on yourself, because then you can continue to mirror and they can see how you are reacting to things. But if you're not in a good place yourself to be able to appropriately react to situations or handle situations, then how?
Speaker 1:that that's what they're learning and that's what they're seeing yeah so I think that's why we bring this up, and I hope people can get a little bit of something out of these episodes for themselves, um, and maybe encourage them to talk to somebody, whether that's just a friend. I think what you said, too, in the last one is that this is therapy.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So I think like being able to.
Speaker 1:Yes, we might not open up our full selves Um able to. Yes, we might not open up our full selves um one, because we're recording this and it's being sent out, but to me there isn't that full level of trust to be able to like open that yourself fully too.
Speaker 3:But you can still open that circle a little bit, right whether that group of friends can circle in and narrow in to that like a little bit more of yourself that you can share vulnerably the power of not being alone, I think is huge yeah I think this podcast that's one of the biggest things is basically, every time I listen, every story I completely relate to right and it's a really, really great, especially when they're hard stories, um like, or some of mark's stories from last week or last episode that, um, yeah, like when you realize that someone else is going through something really, really hard, there's a lot of comfort in company yeah, absolutely, and I think the other, the only other thing I wanted to add to that was like, if you've made it this far, especially in this episode, or if you've been in this, episode if you made it past the whispering I made that sound worse than I wanted to.
Speaker 2:They're like a rent walker.
Speaker 2:See you later uh, more, I should go last just so it's a surprise, uh, more, just if you're someone who listens to this up to this podcast, you're already doing great as a parent because you're trying, and that was one thing that we went through in the last therapy session as well is, in her opinion, it's very much. You either are someone who just has has kids or you're a parent, and a lot of generations in the past just had kids. That was a part of life. You had kids, but then you were just the adult who provided for those kids. It's much different to be a parent, because to be a parent is very intentional. It's a shitload of work, like we've talked about time and time again, and even just listening to us is you being a parent because you're listening to other stories and you're trying to get a grasp of how you can be better at it, which means that you're doing awesome, in my opinion.
Speaker 3:Well I'm all about holding my kids back. Like, as soon as they like like wow, you're pretty good at that, Try something new. Like don't go and pigeonhole yourself into just doing this one sport. If I only let you try everything once, you'll never be good at any of them. It's great, that's perfect.