Daddy, What Does &$@*# Mean?

I’m firmly middle-class and Christian. And while I drop the odd swear-word (usually in traffic), our household is neither a prissy one nor a cussin’ one.

But we live in a colorful world and speak a colorful language. So I wasn’t entirely surprised when my 7-year-old  asked me one morning, “Daddy, what does c**t mean?”

This is the lad who – as a first-grader – was advised by a second-grader to Google-search images of “boys having sex with girls”! So this is not the first time we’ve had to navigate these waters…

But I must admit, I had one of those “How do I field this one?” moments.

When in doubt, I’ve tried to make it a policy to be affirming and answer the question as simply as possible, while adding my own message. Sometimes, I’ve gotten it horribly wrong, sounding like a cross between Ned Flanders and Principal Skinner. This time, it went a little something like this:

Me: “Where’d you hear that? …

Him: "I dunno."

Me: "Ok, well, first, it’s probably the rudest word there is and us Aldins don’t say that. Second, you asked me what does the word mean. Well, do you know what a vagina is? No? (Quick matter-of-fact anatomy lesson follows...) So this word is a rude word for that like d**k (I knew he knew that word) is for penis, but worse. Does that answer your question? … Ok. Mate, I’m really glad you asked me ’cause if you’d asked your teacher or Grandma … (then I ham up a horrified-old-woman-reaction – sorry Grandma – it gets some laughs) – You can always ask me anything, buddy.”

Him: “Ok, Dad and I won’t say that word. Ever.”

And five years later, he never has...

...to my knowledge...

That's What 6 year olds do!

Six years ago, I sat down with Jacob, a mate of mine who’s a psychologist. I began complaining about how crazy-making my youngest son’s behaviour was becoming in the evenings.

(Now, 6 years later, I can’t remember what the heck he was doing that was getting me so worked up).

He patiently listened to me describing the situation and anguishing over my inability to stop my son from doing whatever it was he was doing. When there came a lull in my whining, my friend leant forward and simply said,

“Pete. That’s what 6 year olds do.”

It was all I needed. It was epiphany. It told me that I was stressing about something that was normal. That I needed to put my energy into directing my son’s energy rather than trying to

shut it off. It was a vital reality check, a calming thought.

This kind of self-talk helps me overcome Gen X anxiety around having perfect kids.
AND Gen X guilt over not being able to make the kids perfect. (It’s stupid when you verbalize it, but it’s what many of us suffer with).

What do you tell yourself to calm yourself down, to give your kids some grace, to be more positive and proactive around them?

Memories

Another year ended huh? I bet it’s been a doozy. You had ups. You had downs. You had victories. You had disappointments.

And so did your kids.

So, how will each of you remember it? Will you remember it? What will mark the completion of a season, what will cement the lessons learned from its events, what will bring healing from its conflicts and pains?

Sometime late in the year, I heard someone mention the idea of capturing each year’s events and themes in a kind of family history. It got me thinking…

The Aldin family could certainly benefit from such a tradition.

And so the idea I came up with a few years ago was to keep a permanent record of the  years in the form of a ‘book’. For all I know, it’s been done before. But not by our family. And hey, it only lasted a couple of years :) ... but your family might make it work better. (I think I waited til the kids were too old to get caught up in the idea).

Each of us gets to answer the questions below, and choose two digital photos that represent our favourite memories of the year just gone. Then on New Year’s Eve, we’ll read our answers and “talk story” about 2011, before placing them in the book.

The questions can be very simple:

• My favourite movie this year:
• I really enjoyed going to the __________ because _____________________.
• Three cool things about my birthday:
• My holiday:
• A cool thing that God did:
• My achievements:
• The hardest thing I had to do was…
• Something I wish didn’t happen:
• A funny thing I heard:

2011 has been an incredibly emotional year for us, full of the extremes of  frustration and celebration, conflict and making new friends, villains and heroes, kids celebrating milestones and my wife and I both changing jobs, etc etc. What was yours like? And do you have a family tradition to close out the year and leave a record for your kids for later ?

Tics

Not ticks like a dog would get but tics like a twitch...

Occasionally between the ages of 4 and 8, our Youngest Son would start blinking like crazy. Sometimes to the point of making a little headtwitch with it. He’s such a cool guy, it pained us to see it happen. It seems to have settled down now. Each doctor we took him to said it was probably an allergy, though we’ve not been able to find what out what kind. It's since disappeared...

However, I found information like the following both reassuring and helpful in terms of responding well to the ‘behaviour’ while it was happening.

NOTE: The following information and advice is taken from the Raising Children Network…

Tics are muscle spasms that cause jerky movements, such as blinking, twitching of the face or jerky movements of the arm or shoulder, that seem out of the child’s control.

• The movement may start because of discomfort, e.g. blinking a lot may be caused by eyesight problems, and nose twitching may be caused by an allergy.
• A child can usually stop a tic for a short time if asked, but it sometimes comes back when she is not concentrating on stopping it.
• Sometimes tics are caused by health problems such as Tourette syndrome.
• Tics may be triggered by stress in the child’s life, e.g. learning difficulties, family problems.
• Tics can be very distressing to a child, and some children with tics are made more unhappy by being teased.
• If there is no underlying health problem, it is important to try to deal with any stress in the child’s life.
• Relaxation exercises may help.
• If the tic is very distressing for your child, and it does not go away after a few weeks, seek help from a health counsellor.

I’m going to add one more suggestion. Don’t make a big deal of it with the child. It often reinforces the behaviour rather than stopping it. It can make them feel helpless in the face of it and if it is stress-related, that will exacerbate the problem. The best piece of advice from the list above for me was about dealing with the stress. If our son’s blinking thing wasn’t allergy related, he was (at that time) quite prone to getting very stressed about things (the complete opposite to our Oldest Son) and so perhaps our work on removing his stressors and helping him with stress-management has been of benefit there.

Pregnancy Birth & Baby Hotline (Australia)

Launched on July 1, 2010, Australia’s Pregnancy Birth & Baby Hotline is a new service which aims to give women, their partners and families somewhere to turn for information and support on everything from reproductive health, pregnancy and birthing, through to their child’s first birthday.

The important things for readers of FoF is that male partners and new dads are one of the main focuses of the service. Hotline management said in a recent email to me, ’There is a growing understanding that dads need as much support during the early years of life as mums do, so there are two specialised male counsellors available on the helpline as well as trained staff who can provide information on local support networks and services for dads.’

To which I say, ‘Finally.’

See number in image above.

Pete Aldin talks Fatherhood

Hi there Dads and Mums everywhere. Below is the link to the recent interview with myself and my work colleague Steve Reid, at Christian radio program Family Life Australia.

We chatted mainly about why the Freakedout Fathers website was created, and what might stress Dads out (as well as what can be done!).

Enjoy!

http://familylifeaustralia.sermon.net/da/2734463/play

Even Dads Need to Defrag

I'm a life coach. No, no, don't close the window, hear me out!!

A Dad I was coaching (you don’t know him, folks, he’s never commented on this blog, stop guessing!), once lamented about the complete lack of time in his life to think, plan, pray. He lacked ”time away from the noise” as he put it.

Now this man deeply loved his wife and four kids, he loved his work. But he was the kind of guy (I think most of us are) who needed regular space just to clear his head, get some focus, think and even not have to think!

His wife and youngest child had health problems. His job meant 9 hours straight of interacting with people at way beyond the surface level, always giving out. He lived only a few minutes away from home and the trip home was nowhere near enough time to “change hats” from Worker to Dad.

Fellas, if you’re lucky enough to be living with your family (ie., not divorced or separated), and regardless of whether your wife is working or at home, whether you are a SAHD or a “working” Dad like my friend above (as if stay-at-home parents don’t work!), you need that time out that my friend was missing. (So does your wife, by the way).

I suspect this is why many men make the detour to the pub or bar on the way home, or actually stay back in the office when everyone else has left, just to have some peace and quiet where they don’t have to listen carefully, respond, mediate, etc etc. Unfortunately neither of these solutions is really meeting the need. You need time to relax and refresh, to let go of one role before taking on the next, a way to chill out…

Now don’t give me that crap about being too busy. If your wife said she’d been too busy to take the car in for its scheduled service 18 months ago, you’d go postal on her, so be consistent here dude…
Here’s some thoughts on the how and the what:

1. My coaching client above decided at first on ten-minute walks around the carpark at work during the day. He did this because his wife wan’t yet in a place to accept him taking a 30 minute detour anywhere on his way home at night. His workplace understood: most of them just thought he was exercising, while his mangers knew what he was up to and that he would come back into the office with a clearer mind.
2. A bunch of coaching buddies and I have a monthly practise, some of them call it a Refocus Day, I call it a Defrag Day. Some of them hike. I mix it up between a favourite sheltered cove/beach nearby and coffee shops, where I can just stare at the water, think, drink good coffee, read, plan, etc. Again, my coaching client above revived his own practises of halfdays away praying in the forest at a favourite spot by a stream.
3. One of my friends’ Dads had a great routine each night. He would come home, kiss his wife, say hi to the kids and then retreat to the lounge room with a paper (or occasionally with nothing) and just sit for 20   minutes. In that time, his wife enforced the rule that no one was to disturb him. And when he came back into the family space 20 minutes later, he was fully present with them.
4. This will take talking through with your partner, so get ready to sell it, to be vulnerable, to not be immediately understood. These go with the territory. But this is worth calmly persisting with…
5. Like most things to do with your inner world, you’re only going to get suggestions from me rather than a formula. You gotta try some things out, talk some things out, find your own solution here. The important thing is defrag your head and your life regularly and both will run better.

If you want to read a little more about this, try these posts:

• The Gift of Shabbat
• The Other Side of Midlife: Midlife Numbness
• Recovering from Mid-life Numbness
• and Being Doing