Latest / All Mom Does Podcast with Julie Lyles Carr / RAISING THEM WELL: Tired Dad with Jon Gustin (From the Archives)

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RAISING THEM WELL: Tired Dad with Jon Gustin (From the Archives) · All Mom Does Podcast with Julie Lyles Carr

0:01
Speaker 1: Purposely Your Life, God's Purpose. Listen at purposely dot com.
0:17
Speaker 2: We're back with the All Mom Does summer series. Raise
0:20
Speaker 2: them well, you know, some are supposed to be about
0:23
Speaker 2: a time of taking a break and maybe getting a
0:26
Speaker 2: little bit of a reprieve from all the stuff you're
0:28
Speaker 2: doing all year long when it comes to school time.
0:30
Speaker 2: But let's face it, parenting is pretty exhausting full time.
0:34
Speaker 2: And when I look back in the archive, I wanted
0:36
Speaker 2: to pull this episode back up because there's somebody we
0:40
Speaker 2: talk to who we don't often talk to when it
0:42
Speaker 2: comes to parenting fatigue, and that's the dad's So take
0:45
Speaker 2: a listen to my friend John Gustin as he talks
0:48
Speaker 2: about what his experience has been in becoming a dad
0:50
Speaker 2: and fighting back the fatigue that comes with it.
0:56
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.
0:58
Speaker 2: Absolutely give the listener a little window into your world.
1:02
Speaker 2: What is your life like?
1:05
Speaker 3: Oh, my life is full of we're busy.
1:11
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:13
Speaker 4: So I have a daughter who's nine years old and
1:16
Speaker 4: my son is six years old, and it's gone by fast,
1:20
Speaker 4: and we are in the season of parenting where it's amazing.
1:25
Speaker 4: I love this season that we're in with our kids.
1:29
Speaker 4: They are really growing up and turning into grown people,
1:35
Speaker 4: and they're learning so much, they have interests, and we're
1:41
Speaker 4: just busy with the sports right now. It's we got
1:44
Speaker 4: something every single every single night after school, so they're
1:48
Speaker 4: in school full time. They come home and we're off
1:52
Speaker 4: to jiu jitsu, to softball, to girl Scouts, to a
1:58
Speaker 4: birthday party on the weekend, and to events around town.
2:02
Speaker 4: And we're busy, but we're loving it. And that's exactly
2:08
Speaker 4: why I'm tired. I'm tired from I'm tired from this
2:11
Speaker 4: parenting journey, not of this parenting journey. So it's it's
2:16
Speaker 4: been a wild ride, but super grateful for it.
2:20
Speaker 2: I love the way that you use those prepositions that
2:22
Speaker 2: you're not tired of the parenting journey, you're tired from it.
2:26
Speaker 2: And John, I always laugh because a lot of times
2:29
Speaker 2: the things that we are tired from in our parenting
2:31
Speaker 2: journeys are the very things that we are using our
2:34
Speaker 2: own grown up calendars and our own grown up money
2:37
Speaker 2: to sign all these little people up for all these things.
2:40
Speaker 2: But there are also other places that we get really
2:42
Speaker 2: tired as well. And that's one of the reasons I
2:45
Speaker 2: was so excited to talk to you, because John I've
2:48
Speaker 2: had some amazing guests on who've talked about their experience
2:51
Speaker 2: with fatherhood, the things they're wanting to do. They've talked
2:54
Speaker 2: about how we need to be looking at some of
2:56
Speaker 2: all the things that we're engaged in and doing and
2:58
Speaker 2: all the rest. But I just love that you've come
3:02
Speaker 2: across the line going I'm a tired dad, and that's
3:05
Speaker 2: the name of your new book, The Tired Dad. We
3:07
Speaker 2: talk a lot about fatigue with moms, and boy, as
3:12
Speaker 2: a mom, it is for real. You know, there's mononucleosis,
3:17
Speaker 2: this other whatever, But I'm telling you there's a phenomenon.
3:20
Speaker 2: For moms. It for sure feels like something viral that
3:23
Speaker 2: you're extremely tired. But when I think about dads, we historically,
3:28
Speaker 2: over several generations had more of a model where dad
3:31
Speaker 2: leaves for work in the morning, Mom's the one really
3:34
Speaker 2: running kid life. And there are some family structures in
3:37
Speaker 2: dynamics today that still run in that way, and those
3:40
Speaker 2: each have kind of their unique dynamics and things that
3:42
Speaker 2: are going on. But I do see that dads, you know,
3:47
Speaker 2: a lot of them, are way more involved today than
3:49
Speaker 2: they have been in generations past. As you started thinking
3:53
Speaker 2: about this topic of the tired dad. As you started
3:56
Speaker 2: looking at your own fatigue when it came to all
3:58
Speaker 2: the things you were doing with your kids, what did
4:00
Speaker 2: you start to notice about this generation of dads who
4:05
Speaker 2: seemed to be more hands on.
4:08
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was so that's how I grew up.
4:10
Speaker 4: You know, my dad worked a lot, and my mom
4:14
Speaker 4: worked a little bit, but she was home.
4:17
Speaker 3: It's just kind of that traditional thing.
4:19
Speaker 4: My dad was great at playing catch with me on
4:22
Speaker 4: the weekends and showing up to sports events and very
4:25
Speaker 4: involved in that. But you know, he wasn't big on
4:28
Speaker 4: cooking dinner, her breakfast and just like those little things,
4:32
Speaker 4: which was fine.
4:33
Speaker 3: That was just the dynamic.
4:34
Speaker 4: I thought it was normal and it was completely fine
4:40
Speaker 4: with me growing up like that.
4:42
Speaker 3: But when I.
4:42
Speaker 4: Became a dad, and I didn't know about any of this,
4:46
Speaker 4: Like I didn't know about the you know, dads that
4:49
Speaker 4: were more involved in their kids' life, with the domestic
4:52
Speaker 4: labor and everything. It just happened naturally for us. So
4:55
Speaker 4: me and my wife are both have been self employed
4:58
Speaker 4: since we met fourteen years ago. We've been married thirteen years,
5:03
Speaker 4: twelve years almost.
5:04
Speaker 3: Thirteen and.
5:06
Speaker 4: We before we had our first born, we discussed that
5:11
Speaker 4: we wanted to raise our kids. We didn't want to
5:13
Speaker 4: put them in daycare because it's extremely expensive, and we
5:17
Speaker 4: just thought, why don't we just make that less money
5:20
Speaker 4: and be with our kids more, rather than be with
5:23
Speaker 4: our kids less and make more money just to pay
5:25
Speaker 4: for that. So it just didn't make sense for us.
5:27
Speaker 4: So we're fortunate enough to where we could do that dynamic.
5:31
Speaker 4: And I would work really early in the morning, come home,
5:36
Speaker 4: go back to work while she was at work, so
5:39
Speaker 4: somebody was always with the kids or at the time
5:42
Speaker 4: just our newborn, and I was always involved in domestic labor.
5:49
Speaker 4: It was very you know, it's never fifty to fifty,
5:53
Speaker 4: but it was I don't know what percentage you call it,
5:58
Speaker 4: but it was like when things needed to get done,
6:00
Speaker 4: they got done. I would take them to doctor's appointments.
6:03
Speaker 4: I would take them to all this stuff. And then
6:05
Speaker 4: I realized, well, this is not how I grew up,
6:07
Speaker 4: this is not how my dad was. And my dad
6:09
Speaker 4: would come visit and be like, eh, you're so more
6:12
Speaker 4: involved than I am. You're so more aware of what
6:15
Speaker 4: your kids need, and you're just you know, it's getting done.
6:20
Speaker 4: And then I go to the you know, the park,
6:23
Speaker 4: and I would see some moms, but I also see
6:25
Speaker 4: dads and Okay, this is interesting, and so I just
6:29
Speaker 4: started talking about it, and so many other dads related,
6:33
Speaker 4: and people related that this was a dynamic that was
6:38
Speaker 4: more common than I thought, and that was just our situation.
6:44
Speaker 4: And then also just talking about like like you were saying,
6:48
Speaker 4: we've talked about mom's mental load a lot, and it's
6:52
Speaker 4: very and how hard motherhood is and obviously delivering a
6:59
Speaker 4: human being out of your body is insane, and I think,
7:04
Speaker 4: I don't know if it's underrated, but I am still
7:08
Speaker 4: amazed when I see my kids and see my wife
7:11
Speaker 4: and go.
7:11
Speaker 3: What, how did this work? How did this happen?
7:15
Speaker 4: And my wife dealt with postpartum after our firstborn, and
7:19
Speaker 4: I had no idea what that was. No one told
7:21
Speaker 4: us what that was. They kind of sugarcoated it or whatever.
7:25
Speaker 4: They said, you know, she might get a little sad
7:28
Speaker 4: for a little bit, but it was more than just
7:31
Speaker 4: sad for a little bit. It was very weird. The
7:35
Speaker 4: marriage dynamic changes. It's a huge transition. I was dealing
7:41
Speaker 4: with all these things mentally as a dad in the
7:44
Speaker 4: same differently than my wife was, but in a same
7:49
Speaker 4: pressure mental load fear, worry, feeling disconnected from my wife,
7:57
Speaker 4: all this stuff I was dealing with, but I kept
8:00
Speaker 4: it held in because I knew what she was going through,
8:03
Speaker 4: so I didn't want to say, oh, well, i'm struggling too.
8:06
Speaker 4: That just didn't feel I didn't feel worthy of that,
8:10
Speaker 4: if that makes sense. But there's so many other dads
8:15
Speaker 4: that felt like that. And when I started communicating with
8:20
Speaker 4: my wife and we started communicating together and not against
8:24
Speaker 4: each other, you know it, it was a beautiful thing.
8:28
Speaker 3: We learned so much about each other.
8:29
Speaker 4: We learned so much about the mental load on both
8:33
Speaker 4: the father and the mother and how there's some differences
8:36
Speaker 4: but there's a lot of similarities too. So it was
8:42
Speaker 4: I didn't think anybody else would relate, and obviously, just
8:46
Speaker 4: putting my story out there, there are a lot of
8:49
Speaker 4: dads that relate. And it's because moms are women, are
8:55
Speaker 4: more expressive, they feel more comfortable, and I think because
8:59
Speaker 4: it's was talked about so much, they feel okay, we
9:02
Speaker 4: can talk about this. We're not alone in this. The
9:04
Speaker 4: dads felt like they were alone in the struggles. So
9:07
Speaker 4: as I was talking and being more vulnerable in my experience,
9:12
Speaker 4: other dads were being more vulnerable in their experience, And
9:16
Speaker 4: I think, who is that?
9:19
Speaker 3: Renee Brown? Is that how you pronounced Rene Brown?
9:22
Speaker 4: She's great and she was I saw a Ted talk
9:25
Speaker 4: or something that she did, and she was talking about vulnerability.
9:29
Speaker 4: How your vulnerability is someone else's freedom. It gives them
9:32
Speaker 4: permission to be vulnerable, and it frees them from that
9:36
Speaker 4: burden of holding everything in which dads do so much.
9:41
Speaker 4: And so I was like, that's interesting. So my vulnerability
9:46
Speaker 4: as a dad expressing myself gives other dads the permission
9:50
Speaker 4: to do it as well, and also just makes them
9:52
Speaker 4: feel less alone, which is that It exactly why I
9:55
Speaker 4: wrote the book, exactly why I do my content is
9:58
Speaker 4: just to like you. You were saying in the beginning
10:01
Speaker 4: introducing me that the arm around your shoulder that I
10:05
Speaker 4: think dad's need and I think that I needed when
10:09
Speaker 4: I first became a dad, because no one was talking
10:12
Speaker 4: about it.
10:13
Speaker 2: Right, You're able to step into a place that I
10:16
Speaker 2: think is really incredible because it feels like for a
10:21
Speaker 2: number of generations we had women who were exhausted and
10:25
Speaker 2: trying to say, hey, seriously, I'm drowning over here. Whether
10:28
Speaker 2: I am solely focused on maintaining the home, and doing
10:31
Speaker 2: all the things with the kids. This is too much
10:34
Speaker 2: for one person to be trying to do. Or we
10:37
Speaker 2: have a case where so many women are working and
10:40
Speaker 2: they're having to make it work while also still shouldering
10:44
Speaker 2: a much higher percentage of domestic life. What I see
10:48
Speaker 2: happening with you that's really beautiful is because you were
10:51
Speaker 2: already in a dynamic where those things were collaborative, they
10:55
Speaker 2: were shared, There wasn't a competition piece to it going no, no, no,
10:59
Speaker 2: I really need to understand my reality as a wife
11:02
Speaker 2: and a mom before I can understand your reality as
11:05
Speaker 2: a dad. You don't know what it's like to sit
11:07
Speaker 2: at the pediatrician's office for three and a half hours
11:10
Speaker 2: when you know you've got a zoom coming up because
11:13
Speaker 2: they messed up on the schedule. You know, there are
11:15
Speaker 2: different scenarios and things that I think sometimes if you
11:18
Speaker 2: haven't walked it, you simply can't know. So to me,
11:21
Speaker 2: there's sort of this. There's the group that has been
11:24
Speaker 2: more if you will, traditional or whatever you want to
11:27
Speaker 2: call it, where the wife is running everything at the house.
11:31
Speaker 2: Then there's the group of people in your situation where
11:34
Speaker 2: you were building businesses together, you were making intentional decisions
11:38
Speaker 2: about the kinds of time and what you would be
11:40
Speaker 2: doing in terms of both running your family and your household.
11:44
Speaker 2: And then there's this little valley in between where I
11:48
Speaker 2: think that's where we feel a lot of the competition
11:51
Speaker 2: tick up and that need to want to be understood
11:55
Speaker 2: for both, and yet sometimes it can be hard to
11:58
Speaker 2: see perspective from both. So you're you're a great trail
12:02
Speaker 2: guide for those who were going, Okay, how do we
12:05
Speaker 2: begin this conversation? And I think one of the great
12:07
Speaker 2: things that you did that helped level the playing field
12:10
Speaker 2: was you are all in when it comes to sharing
12:14
Speaker 2: that load and running family life. What do you find
12:18
Speaker 2: for you is a place of some of your fatigue
12:22
Speaker 2: that you can identify that you can say, oh, this
12:24
Speaker 2: is what this one is. I know, for example, in
12:27
Speaker 2: my mothering, I would hit a certain point of being
12:30
Speaker 2: so overstimulated. Now, to be fair, John, we have eight kids,
12:35
Speaker 2: so that was just going to be that you know,
12:37
Speaker 2: that is like every you know, electronic device in the
12:40
Speaker 2: house on blaring different kinds of music from every device.
12:44
Speaker 2: I mean, it was that just it's going to come
12:45
Speaker 2: with the territory with that many kids. But that overstimulation
12:48
Speaker 2: was really a point that I realized, I just from
12:52
Speaker 2: a sensory perspective, am going to need to put myself
12:55
Speaker 2: in time out for a minute because everything's firing. But
12:58
Speaker 2: it took me a lot of years and a lot
13:00
Speaker 2: of kids to figure out that's what was going on,
13:03
Speaker 2: because it felt like, I think I'm angry, I think
13:06
Speaker 2: I'm frustrated, I think I'm this, I think I'm that,
13:08
Speaker 2: And I began to realize, Hey, if I can at
13:11
Speaker 2: least give myself a little bit of breathing room on
13:14
Speaker 2: this sense of being over stimulated, then maybe I can
13:17
Speaker 2: re engage and I don't feel quite as frustrated or
13:20
Speaker 2: I don't feel that sense of pressure rising. What was
13:24
Speaker 2: it for you that you found, Hey, this is the
13:26
Speaker 2: thing that actually probably is depleting the battery the most.
13:33
Speaker 4: I think you know it was, well, let me just
13:38
Speaker 4: say that it wasn't always not a competition there. Me
13:44
Speaker 4: and my wife have been have been through the phases. Yeah,
13:48
Speaker 4: we have been through the phases of parenting. We really
13:53
Speaker 4: I don't think with eight kids, do we really know
13:56
Speaker 4: what we're doing here? No, but we know the intention
13:59
Speaker 4: being beIN it. Right, So I think your intention as
14:02
Speaker 4: a parent, I always say parenting is hard for good parents,
14:04
Speaker 4: And if somebody comes to me and asks if they're
14:07
Speaker 4: a good parent, they've already answered that question because you're
14:10
Speaker 4: asking because you care, and because you care, that makes
14:14
Speaker 4: you a good parent. So you're not gonna get it perfect.
14:17
Speaker 4: You're not a perfect parent. You're gonna be overstimulated completely.
14:21
Speaker 4: That's one of those overlaps. I completely relate to that.
14:24
Speaker 4: My wife completely relates to that. It's just I remember
14:27
Speaker 4: one time. It was during twenty twenty or whatever, when
14:31
Speaker 4: the world was going crazy and my son was born
14:36
Speaker 4: in twenty nineteen, right before December of twenty nineteen.
14:40
Speaker 3: He was crying, My three year old daughter was crying, screaming.
14:46
Speaker 4: We just looked at each other in the middle of
14:48
Speaker 4: this storm and we're like, we're going through it right now,
14:52
Speaker 4: Like we are, we are going through There was like
14:54
Speaker 4: a defeat of like, there's no fixing this, there's just
14:59
Speaker 4: accepting it. And with eight kids, you know that the
15:02
Speaker 4: mess and stuff, You're just like, what's the point.
15:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm just gonna have to accept that.
15:07
Speaker 4: So that was a big battle for me, is just
15:09
Speaker 4: kind of accepting the chaos, embracing the chaos, and both
15:16
Speaker 4: me and my wife mental load with work and the
15:20
Speaker 4: kids and stuff was the same, so we were going
15:24
Speaker 4: through kind of the same thing. But we figured out
15:28
Speaker 4: that the competition wasn't helping anything. Right, So some days,
15:34
Speaker 4: you know, I'm eighty percent, she's ten twenty percent. You know,
15:38
Speaker 4: some days I'm twenty percent, she's eighty percent, And you
15:42
Speaker 4: just gotta kind of work as a team. And when
15:45
Speaker 4: we started the team aspect and understanding that, Okay, I'm
15:49
Speaker 4: gonna do things differently than you. Maybe you're going through
15:53
Speaker 4: something today that I'm not going through. And when we
15:56
Speaker 4: found that middle ground of okay, it's me and you
16:00
Speaker 4: versus whatever's going on. It's not me versus you plus
16:05
Speaker 4: what's ever going on and saying, oh, well, I'm doing
16:08
Speaker 4: this more than you're doing this.
16:09
Speaker 3: It's like who cares?
16:12
Speaker 4: And that changed everything for us, and it was killing
16:15
Speaker 4: the ego on both sides. It was trying to understand
16:20
Speaker 4: that we just do things differently and to accept that
16:22
Speaker 4: and then to make up for the loose ends on
16:26
Speaker 4: a you know, whatever needs to be done, and sometimes
16:30
Speaker 4: I do things better than she does, and she does
16:32
Speaker 4: things better than I do, and that's okay, But you know,
16:36
Speaker 4: I agree. Being self employed, I had to cancel clients
16:42
Speaker 4: to take my feverish kid to the pediatrician and sit
16:46
Speaker 4: there for three four hours.
16:48
Speaker 3: You know my wife has done that, So it's all.
16:51
Speaker 3: That's why I'd never related to this, and I will.
16:55
Speaker 3: I do say that.
16:57
Speaker 4: I think what's changed the whole game of the family
17:02
Speaker 4: dynamic is dad's stepping up and being an emotional provider
17:06
Speaker 4: as well as a financial provider, not just a financial provider,
17:11
Speaker 4: because what we're talking about with those old dynamics of
17:14
Speaker 4: the dad was just a financial provider and that was it.
17:18
Speaker 4: And I think that's pretty part for the course now
17:23
Speaker 4: and or I mean it's part for the course on
17:25
Speaker 4: both sides, and you get more moms are working. So yes,
17:29
Speaker 4: financial providing is important obviously, but emotional support is also
17:36
Speaker 4: very important, and you can't have you know, I guess
17:40
Speaker 4: you can't have one without the other. You need both
17:43
Speaker 4: of those to function as a full functioning family dynamics.
17:46
Speaker 4: So I never understood. I did have people say are
17:50
Speaker 4: you going to babysit the kid? Who are you babysitting
17:53
Speaker 4: the kids?
17:54
Speaker 3: Ask what?
17:55
Speaker 4: I never understood that, like my kids, I'm babysitting my kids?
17:59
Speaker 3: No, I'm responsible for my kids.
18:01
Speaker 4: I'm being a father to them, or you know, being
18:04
Speaker 4: at the park or being at the grocery store, going
18:07
Speaker 4: to Trader Joe's with them on a weekend.
18:09
Speaker 3: What are you doing? And you know, just people saying, oh,
18:13
Speaker 3: you're so great.
18:14
Speaker 4: I've had people call me a good dad because I'm
18:16
Speaker 4: eating dinner with my daughter at a restaurant, like, yeah,
18:21
Speaker 4: I am a good dad, and yeah, this is a
18:23
Speaker 4: sweet moment and everything.
18:24
Speaker 3: But my wife wasn't getting that right and that's the
18:29
Speaker 3: weird part.
18:30
Speaker 4: But I'm like, I just don't I don't relate to
18:33
Speaker 4: this clueless dad of not taking their kids to the
18:36
Speaker 4: doctor and saying.
18:39
Speaker 3: Oh, I don't know how tall you are. I don't know.
18:42
Speaker 3: Ask your mom, you know, ask her mom.
18:44
Speaker 4: It's like, we're in this together as a team, and
18:48
Speaker 4: we're raising human beings together. So and the emotional connection
18:57
Speaker 4: and the communication I have with both of my kids, and.
19:02
Speaker 3: It's beautiful.
19:03
Speaker 4: And I think that that's the game changer with dads nowadays,
19:08
Speaker 4: is that they're really showing up in a different way
19:11
Speaker 4: than just financially providing.
19:16
Speaker 5: You think that you are in the final round of
19:20
Speaker 5: getting all this parenting done, you've got kids who are
19:23
Speaker 5: in high school, you're starting to think about college, and
19:26
Speaker 5: you're thinking, this is it.
19:28
Speaker 2: I'm Julie Lyles Carr.
19:29
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19:31
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19:34
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19:39
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19:42
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19:43
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19:48
Speaker 2: but that's not where the story ends.
19:50
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19:53
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19:55
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19:58
Speaker 6: obviously is going to deep impact what your young adult
20:02
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20:04
Speaker 2: So for your kiddos, I want you to consider what
20:06
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20:07
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Speaker 5: Parents, Yeah, you are getting into some of those final laps,
20:44
Speaker 5: but you definitely want to make these last laps count
20:47
Speaker 5: in a big way when it comes to the legacy.
20:50
Speaker 2: Of your parenting. So be sure and check out for
20:53
Speaker 2: your student. George Fox dot edu. That's George Fox dot edu.
21:02
Speaker 2: I love that you've got this phrase, emotional provision. I
21:06
Speaker 2: think that's really powerful. I think it's something that is
21:09
Speaker 2: hard to put words in context around. I think sometimes
21:12
Speaker 2: when husbands and wives are having these conversations, when moms
21:15
Speaker 2: and dads are having these conversations, it does drift understandably
21:19
Speaker 2: into domestic chores. I mean, yes, of course, but I
21:23
Speaker 2: think even deeper than that that is hard to identify,
21:27
Speaker 2: and you've given us language for it, and I really
21:29
Speaker 2: appreciate it. Is this emotional provision perspective, because there has
21:34
Speaker 2: been for a long time a sense that whoever is
21:38
Speaker 2: providing financially is sort of or financially in the most
21:44
Speaker 2: tour the bank account. So maybe one spouse has a
21:47
Speaker 2: part time position or doesn't make as much even though
21:49
Speaker 2: they're working full time, the one who's making the most
21:52
Speaker 2: is the one who gets the most outs when it
21:55
Speaker 2: comes to the pediatrician visits and you know, the chores
21:59
Speaker 2: and all that kind of thing, and that's a whole issue.
22:01
Speaker 2: But really nobody gets to opt out of emotional provision.
22:06
Speaker 2: And I think that's a really beautiful way of saying that.
22:09
Speaker 2: Do you feel like when it comes to your own
22:11
Speaker 2: level of fatigue of being tired, is it something that
22:15
Speaker 2: at this point we power through, like the fact that
22:19
Speaker 2: barbies are going to be our roommates for certain seasons,
22:22
Speaker 2: like we're just going to have to accept their barbies everywhere?
22:24
Speaker 2: Or is there are there things that you feel like
22:27
Speaker 2: dads can be doing when it comes to a level
22:30
Speaker 2: of self care that are going to be important so
22:32
Speaker 2: they can show up with a bit more vibrancy. I mean,
22:36
Speaker 2: because you're so right, John, bottom line, these seasons when
22:39
Speaker 2: we are in it with the kids, and we've all
22:42
Speaker 2: been through those seasons where one gets strep throat, the
22:44
Speaker 2: next one gets a tummy bug, right, is the one
22:47
Speaker 2: coming off strep throat And we have these cycles where
22:49
Speaker 2: everybody's sick for six weeks, Like you know, we've all
22:51
Speaker 2: experienced those things when we're in it, but broadly, when
22:55
Speaker 2: we're not in that kind of moment, how do we
22:59
Speaker 2: exit at a certain level of fatigue and at the
23:03
Speaker 2: same time do what we can so that we can
23:06
Speaker 2: show up bigger, better, stronger, more patient, all the things.
23:12
Speaker 3: In a perfect world.
23:13
Speaker 4: I would love to give an answer that just fixes
23:16
Speaker 4: that problem. But there's been seasons and years of parenting
23:20
Speaker 4: where we're running on empty and we're still going, We're
23:23
Speaker 4: still showing up. And like I said, that moment where
23:27
Speaker 4: me and my wife just looked at each other like
23:29
Speaker 4: we weren't doing any self care at that time. We
23:32
Speaker 4: were just surviving, you know, surviving, not thriving. There are
23:36
Speaker 4: seasons like that. But I think the most important thing,
23:41
Speaker 4: and yes, it's important to maybe have that some sort
23:46
Speaker 4: of hobby. It doesn't have to take up a lot
23:48
Speaker 4: of time, but something that gets you out of that
23:50
Speaker 4: role as dad and worker would be great. And there's
23:56
Speaker 4: some seasons where there's just really there just wasn't enough
24:00
Speaker 4: time for it. So I would do like just little things,
24:04
Speaker 4: even if we had an hour at the end of
24:07
Speaker 4: the night. But sometimes even that was hard. So I
24:10
Speaker 4: will say this is the really I guess the only
24:14
Speaker 4: advice I can give for hard seasons and really all
24:19
Speaker 4: seasons is perspective that nothing lasts forever, that the hard
24:25
Speaker 4: seasons don't last forever. It gets better as you know,
24:30
Speaker 4: the newborn phase where they're not sleeping through the night
24:33
Speaker 4: goes away, and then it never really comes back that
24:36
Speaker 4: same way years later, right it you know, they they
24:41
Speaker 4: need I guess they need you less and less as
24:44
Speaker 4: time goes on and it gets better. And that is
24:49
Speaker 4: I think the most powerful thing we have is perspective,
24:52
Speaker 4: perspective of time.
24:53
Speaker 3: Passing and just.
24:57
Speaker 4: Knowing that it, you know, going to look back one
25:00
Speaker 4: day and be like, yeah, that was a chaotic time
25:03
Speaker 4: and we're going to laugh. And it's so hard to
25:06
Speaker 4: have perspective in the middle of the storm, it really is.
25:10
Speaker 4: But I think when we do, it changes everything.
25:13
Speaker 2: Right, being able to have somebody by your side, to
25:16
Speaker 2: be able to say, like you said, you know, wow,
25:18
Speaker 2: we're in it right now. I mean, and I have
25:20
Speaker 2: to say, there are those moments that we can look
25:22
Speaker 2: back where you know, everybody was puking or whatever was
25:26
Speaker 2: going on, and they are some of our weirdly john
25:30
Speaker 2: most treasured family stories, like some of the craziest stories
25:33
Speaker 2: where things went completely sideways, and it's part of the
25:36
Speaker 2: family lore. It's part of the family humor. So believe
25:39
Speaker 2: it or not, even in that incredible fatigue, that's part
25:43
Speaker 2: of what you're building. Tell me what someone can do
25:46
Speaker 2: who's listening, A mom who's listening, what can she do
25:49
Speaker 2: when she says, Okay, I've listened to the episodes on
25:53
Speaker 2: mental load and trying to share things. I haven't really
25:57
Speaker 2: moved the needle. My spouse is telling me that he's
25:59
Speaker 2: all so really tired. I am feeling the need for
26:03
Speaker 2: some more support. I don't want it to feel like
26:05
Speaker 2: a competition. How can someone How can a mom approach
26:11
Speaker 2: this conversation in a way that is productive, not blaming,
26:16
Speaker 2: not finger pointing, with respect to the fact that dad
26:20
Speaker 2: is also tired. How if there is a place where
26:24
Speaker 2: things need to improve or there needs to be some help,
26:28
Speaker 2: how do you have that conversation?
26:30
Speaker 4: Well, So, the number one reason why dads don't fully
26:34
Speaker 4: open up to their partners is two reasons. They don't
26:40
Speaker 4: want to make their partners feel like the foundation is
26:43
Speaker 4: cracking or the foundation isn't stable. They want to keep
26:48
Speaker 4: that area safe, so they just bottle it up and
26:51
Speaker 4: they're not going to express any struggle that they're going through.
26:54
Speaker 4: The second is that they fear that they're going to
26:58
Speaker 4: be viewed differently by their partner and maybe it's going
27:03
Speaker 4: to be held against them in some sort of way.
27:06
Speaker 4: So I think safe, honest communication is key. I mean communication,
27:13
Speaker 4: and not just communication, not just saying, oh, how are
27:16
Speaker 4: you today, but effective communication saying hey, I can see
27:21
Speaker 4: you're struggling. I am your I am your teammate, I
27:26
Speaker 4: am here for you, I want to grow together. I
27:30
Speaker 4: want to make sure you're okay, like, let's really talk
27:34
Speaker 4: about this. And I think also on you the mom's side,
27:40
Speaker 4: that maybe they are fearful that the foundation is breaking
27:43
Speaker 4: and they're fearful to even ask that question because they
27:46
Speaker 4: don't want to feel unstable or that they're losing control.
27:50
Speaker 4: But I promise you it, whatever problem is there, it's
27:56
Speaker 4: always best if you both are fighting against it than
28:00
Speaker 4: just one having that burden. And I think dads are
28:04
Speaker 4: burdened by this, this perception that they need to carry
28:10
Speaker 4: the world on their back and not say a word
28:13
Speaker 4: about it, not say how heavy it is, not say
28:16
Speaker 4: that they're they're about to collapse, not saying that, because
28:20
Speaker 4: it's like it's admitting weakness, and the strongest thing you
28:25
Speaker 4: can do is to admit that you don't have it
28:28
Speaker 4: figured out. The strongest thing you can do is be
28:31
Speaker 4: vulnerable and say I need help, because what's it? What's
28:37
Speaker 4: it matter? If you can, okay, I can, you know,
28:41
Speaker 4: truck through the mud, but I'm dying inside. That's it's
28:48
Speaker 4: not useful to your to your partner, it's not useful
28:50
Speaker 4: to your kids, it's not definitely not useful to yourself.
28:55
Speaker 3: So we need dads, like dads are so so.
28:58
Speaker 4: So important to the family dynamic just as much as
29:01
Speaker 4: moms are. And without a healthy dad, without a mentally
29:08
Speaker 4: healthy dad, it's the family's going to suffer, even though
29:12
Speaker 4: you may not think that. And it also the cream
29:15
Speaker 4: rises to the top eventually. You can hold it in
29:17
Speaker 4: for twenty years, but it's going to show its ugly
29:21
Speaker 4: fangs at some point, you know. So we we we
29:26
Speaker 4: need fathers to be okay, we need moms to be okay,
29:30
Speaker 4: and a lot of the time we just can't do
29:32
Speaker 4: it alone. And I know I that's coming from somebody
29:36
Speaker 4: who has an amazing wife, an amazing partner, a teammate.
29:41
Speaker 4: We've been through our tough seasons and it could have
29:44
Speaker 4: went another way, but we you know, we did what
29:49
Speaker 4: needed to be done, and it wasn't what it was all.
29:54
Speaker 4: It wasn't what we imagined it to be, but we
29:58
Speaker 4: did the work. And for the single moms the single
30:02
Speaker 4: dads out there, like, I don't know if I have
30:05
Speaker 4: a direct answer for them, but I know that we
30:09
Speaker 4: need to just we need to do our best to
30:12
Speaker 4: be there for our children in whatever that looks like.
30:16
Speaker 3: And you need to be okay, right.
30:19
Speaker 2: Most importantly, I think you're right that these conversations do
30:22
Speaker 2: have to happen now, even even tired, even saying I
30:27
Speaker 2: don't know what can change. I don't know, because I'm
30:31
Speaker 2: in a season of life where I'm watching marriages who
30:33
Speaker 2: successfully got through raising kids, who got them, you know,
30:37
Speaker 2: through college, whatever whatever the launch was, that are now
30:42
Speaker 2: coming apart because those conversations were not had in the
30:46
Speaker 2: raising of the kids. And again, there was so much
30:49
Speaker 2: heart and sacrifice and everything that went into raising the kids.
30:52
Speaker 2: The kids are kind of great, Yeah, it was it
30:55
Speaker 2: was the relationship that suffered. And so I think you're
30:59
Speaker 2: so right to have those conversations to get a trusted
31:02
Speaker 2: therapist involved in those conversations if that needs to be.
31:05
Speaker 2: Because we have more information than ever about some of
31:09
Speaker 2: the challenges and the disappropriations, if you will, sometimes we
31:15
Speaker 2: have more dads who want to be involved. I mean,
31:18
Speaker 2: this is all a whole new phase, a whole new dynamic,
31:21
Speaker 2: and sometimes you need somebody to help guide you through.
31:24
Speaker 2: That's why I'm so excited about your new book, The
31:26
Speaker 2: Tired Dad. Tell the listener where they can find the book,
31:29
Speaker 2: what it's about, what they're going to find in the
31:31
Speaker 2: book when it comes to this idea of dads who
31:34
Speaker 2: are love and raising their kids, but are also confronted
31:37
Speaker 2: with all that comes with it, the chaos, the fatigue,
31:40
Speaker 2: all the stuff.
31:42
Speaker 4: Yeah, so it's a it's my one hundred reflections. So
31:46
Speaker 4: I was going to do a daily book to do
31:50
Speaker 4: like little daily passages, but what I really wanted I
31:54
Speaker 4: wanted to expand a little deeper into these reflections. These
31:57
Speaker 4: are things that were written on my note note app
32:01
Speaker 4: at midnight, putting my kids to bed on a rough night.
32:06
Speaker 4: It's a very real, authentic kind of look into my
32:14
Speaker 4: mind as a dad the past ten years and my
32:17
Speaker 4: struggles that I'm talking about my vulnerability, my things that
32:20
Speaker 4: I went through as a kid that showed up later
32:23
Speaker 4: as a dad, and just my reflections of fatherhood thus far.
32:30
Speaker 4: And I will say it's also important. It is called
32:33
Speaker 4: The Tired Dad, and it seems like it's this dad's book,
32:37
Speaker 4: and it absolutely is for the dad's. Moms would benefit
32:41
Speaker 4: from this book so much too, to maybe understand their
32:45
Speaker 4: husband's more.
32:46
Speaker 3: And also there's going to be stuff.
32:48
Speaker 4: Because there's such an overlap with the mental load with
32:52
Speaker 4: motherhood in my life that moms will find encouragement in
32:57
Speaker 4: it too. But most important, I think it will make
33:01
Speaker 4: you will make moms understand their husbands more and maybe
33:05
Speaker 4: what they're going through that they don't know. So it is,
33:08
Speaker 4: like I said, an arm around your shoulder that I
33:10
Speaker 4: needed when I first became a dad. It's for all
33:12
Speaker 4: phases of parenting. I have stuff in there about what
33:16
Speaker 4: I desire for my kids as they get older into
33:18
Speaker 4: adulthood and what I think that we need to be
33:21
Speaker 4: doing now when they're young to have that come to
33:24
Speaker 4: fruition later. So it's just a it's a it's not
33:28
Speaker 4: a it's not a parenting manual. I am not a
33:30
Speaker 4: perfect dad and I've learned from a lot of mistakes.
33:34
Speaker 4: I've made a lot of mistakes in my whole life.
33:37
Speaker 4: I've made a lot of mistakes, and I've struggled with
33:40
Speaker 4: self belief. I've struggled with insecurity, I've struggled with ego
33:44
Speaker 4: and and everything. We've had marital problems, and I've been
33:50
Speaker 4: drowning in parenthoods. So it's all in there, just my
33:53
Speaker 4: reflections and my journey, my stories that I think it
34:00
Speaker 4: I think is going to help a lot of parents,
34:02
Speaker 4: especially dads.
34:03
Speaker 2: That's awesome and it's going to be out just in
34:05
Speaker 2: time for Father's Day, So be sure and check that out. John,
34:09
Speaker 2: Where can the listener go to interact with you? Find
34:12
Speaker 2: you on the socials all that kind of stuff.
34:15
Speaker 4: Yeah, My website's Tired dad dot com. If you google
34:18
Speaker 4: the Tired Dad, all my stuff comes up. But at
34:21
Speaker 4: the Tire Dad on every platform Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube,
34:27
Speaker 4: Me and my wife have a podcast called the Tired
34:29
Speaker 4: Dad and Tired Mom Podcast where we talk a lot
34:31
Speaker 4: about our marriage, journey and parenting a lot of relatable
34:36
Speaker 4: stuff there.
34:38
Speaker 3: So yeah, absolutely find me.
34:41
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, John Gustin, thanks again for a really illuminating
34:45
Speaker 2: conversation and a way in which, hey, when we're in
34:48
Speaker 2: the trenches of parenting together, the ways that we can
34:51
Speaker 2: sympathize support each other. That it's not a competition, it
34:55
Speaker 2: is a team sport. So thank you so much for
34:57
Speaker 2: your thoughts today. Thank you for having me me absolutely okay, friend,
35:02
Speaker 2: you know what to do. Rebecca puts together those show notes.
35:04
Speaker 2: Go check those out because you're going to find links
35:06
Speaker 2: to all the things that John has been talking about.
35:09
Speaker 2: And I love it too. When you head over and
35:10
Speaker 2: check out Allmandes dot com, you're gonna find a whole
35:13
Speaker 2: world there of people to come alongside you again, that
35:16
Speaker 2: arm around the shoulder going through the same kind of
35:19
Speaker 2: things you're going through, with all kinds of inspiration and encouragement.
35:22
Speaker 2: I hang out the most, usually over on Instagram. Go
35:24
Speaker 2: check me out there Julie Lyle's car and I love
35:27
Speaker 2: it when you slide in. Send me a message, let
35:29
Speaker 2: me know the topics, conversations, guests that you would like
35:32
Speaker 2: to see, because hey, we do all this for you.
35:35
Speaker 2: All Mom does is about you, so we want to
35:37
Speaker 2: know what's on your heart. And I'll see you next time.
35:40
Speaker 2: Here on the alman does podcast