Episode 157: Lessons in Fatherhood

No need to whine, it's whiny palooza. Have some wine and join us on the whiny palooza podcast with Rebecca Green.

Welcome to the whiny palooza podcast. I'm your host, Rebecca Green. I'm a wife, mother of 3, and licensed clinical social worker. I also have 3 fur babies at home too. My passion has always been to help children and their families. I always dreamed of being a wife and a mother. Parents are always learning through their struggles, failures, and successes and joys. I am no stranger to this wild ride of parenting, and I know behind every great parent lies a team of supportive friends and family. I want to be part of your support system. I want you to know that you are not alone. We are in this parenting world together. Join me every week for insightful discussions with experts on parenting and marriage, as well as other parents who have found the secret to successes in parenthood. You'll learn tips and tricks to make life with your family better than ever. I hope you will follow along with me while we dive into what it takes to achieve a happy family.

Hello everyone, this is Rebecca Green, uh, for the Whining Blues podcast, and I have my favorite father with us today for our Father's Day special. Um, hello honey.

Hi honey, thanks so much for having me back again.

This is my husband Seth Green with us, and, um, I, I will introduce you to him every time he's on to tell you how fabulous he is. Um, Seth is a jack of all trades. He's my Renaissance— is that, is that the wrong way of putting it? I saw, um, my Renaissance man. Is that better? Yes, everything. He has a fabulous marketing business, Market Domination. He has an awesome silver financial planning business, Silver Spoon Financial, a publishing business, BMD Publishing. He has howtofindmoneyforcollege.com to help you find money for your children for college. So I am guessing everybody listening today needs him, including me. So thank you for doing this with me again for a special Father's Day special with the father of my children. So thank you for being the father of my children.

Oh, it was my pleasure.

You gave— you gave us— we gave us 3 amazing kids, so I will never be able to thank you enough for that. And it's not always easy, but it's a wonderful, busy, crazy, chaotic fabulous life.

Amen to all of that.

So I found something special. Um, I found the questions that our daughters asked me for the Mother's Day special. So I will ask you, I'm sure, some added questions, but what do you think about me using their questions?

I love it.

Isn't that so cute?

That is very creative. Excellent repurposing of content.

I thought that you would like my repurposing, and I thought it was so adorable that they asked me such wonderful questions.

And now I wish I remembered the— I listened to both their interviews. Now I wish I had remembered all the questions, but that's okay.

And I, and I may add more. And they were really thoughtful in their questions, and I think you're going to help people to be an even better parent. So Let's jump into their questions.

I am ready.

If only Ella would do this, but she doesn't seem very interested today. I think she is exhausted from her all-day theater day yesterday.

Yes, she needs a mostly chill-out day is what I tried to give her today.

Ella is, is currently vegetating, so I am in charge of her questions. She came up with some really good ones. I think I'm going to actually start with Lily's. What inspired you to be such a good dad?

Wow. So that's a great question. And don't tell me whose question is whose, because that will help me. All right. What inspired me to be such a great dad? I think all of you inspire me every single day. Obviously, you know, when we're kids and we're growing up, we see things our parents do and we go, oh, I want to do that. That's great. I want to do that with my kid one day. And then we see things that are negatively inspiring. We're like, ooh, I want to make sure I don't do that. I didn't like that as a kid. I wouldn't want to do that as a parent. So I think some of it comes from our upbringing, as it would for anyone. And then, um, you inspire me to be a better dad every day because you're such an amazing mom. And I have had a goal since I was a teenager that one day I would have kids and specifically have daughters. And I wanted to make sure that the only daddy issue I raise them with would be their challenge to find someone who measured up to me. So I try and, I keep that in mind every day and try and set the bar as impossibly high as I can. And then I think about how I wanted to be parented as a kid and try and do that with Max as a son, as opposed to versus a daughter. So I think all of you are my inspiration When I think about it now, I have gurus or people that I follow in lots of areas of our life, including business and relationships and communication and stuff. I don't have a parenting one, which says to me I should go get a parenting role model and go take some parenting courses and read some parenting books, and I might learn a few new tricks.

Wow.

I've never studied it, right? I study marketing or business or finance every single day. You see me, you're always listening to something. You're always watching something. You're always reading something. I realized, I never made a study of parenting and I probably really should.

And I wanna, I wanna respond to that, Seth, because you are married to someone who did and does, and I'm married to someone who studies a lot of different things. So I think that you and I teach each other a lot.

Absolutely. Right.

So you maybe never studied parenting, but your wife did.

I know when I ask you questions all the time and you are an excellent resource, but it's not the same as if The experts are always from out of the house or out of town, right?

Anyways.

Anyways.

Yeah, no, I think it's a great idea. What do you like best about being a dad?

Wow. The magic moments we create with them. The, you know, I try and find them all the time. Write them down in a journal of, I will treasure that forever. Like seeing Lily perform yesterday at the dance recital, or seeing Ella perform, or having an in-depth conversation or whatever about something, like, I— or some forced family fun that we make them do. I try and always find on a regular basis what magic moments did we create today.

I love that. What is your biggest challenge as a father?

Probably staying non-reactive, staying calm and cool and not having an emotional reaction to what is happening, and staying centered and grounded to be able to respond out of love as opposed to out of frustration or fear or anger or any negative emotion.

Right. And you've come a long way. So how have you done that?

Yeah, I'm totally different father than I was 15 years ago when Max was born. I think some of it comes with experience. A lot of it comes with practice. It's like any— you got to get your reps in. If you're weightlifting or you're doing a sport, you get better and better the more and more you practice. And we have 3 kids, so I get to practice a lot of skills every single day. Somebody's always got something to deal with. So I think a lot of it is practice. I think it's perspective. I think you get used to— you have a great analogy for this, like you graduate with your kids. Ooh, I'm done with elementary school. And now I'm in middle school and I'm redoing it with my kids, but you're doing it better differently because you're doing it as a parent. So I think I am always trying to improve my communication process, my parenting process, both with our kids and with you in our marriage.

I agree with that. And I love that you care about that and that you work on that.

Yeah, absolutely. Anytime we have a situation or whatever, I'm like, oh man, I wish I handled that differently. Write it down. How would I have liked to handle it? Okay, let's remember that, put that in my brain so that next time I actually do it that way.

I love, I love how you work on yourself.

Constant and never-ending improvement.

I'm very lucky. I'm very blessed. And one of the ways that we're better parents is when we take care of ourselves. So talk about your best coping strategies, and what you do for self-care.

Yes. So things I do for self-care, I go to martial arts several times a week, which, you know, it always feels good to hit things when you're allowed to. And it turns down the volume in your life. And you can't think about anything else when you're getting punched in the face except, ow, that hurt, I gotta block next time. That is a big help. Exercise helps. Learning something new for me helps, or engaging the creative part of my brain and learning a new magic trick or writing something that's not work-related helps. Listening to things and watching things help. So I think those are good coping strategies, at least for me. Obviously, there's taking a walk with you or the dog, going on a date, getting a massage, going to the chiropractor. All of those help. And I think they're all coping strategies. And I forgot the first part of the question.

No, you answered it.

Oh, okay.

Those are all good coping strategies. We have to fill our cup so that we can be good to our kids and our spouse.

You cannot pour from an empty cup.

Yes. And I wish that I knew that 15 years ago, because 15 years ago I thought it was selfish. I don't know about you. You've always been better at it than me.

Yes, I agree that you thought that, and I used to beg you to go to the spa and get your nails done or go get it, go get a massage. You have come a long way. And no, I never had— for whatever reason, I've never had that issue. Prior, making sure to take care of myself so I could take care of others is something I've always done.

You teach me, you teach me every day. I hope you know that.

Right back at you.

We have 3 very different children. And I, you know, I think that everybody listening probably knows that we have to parent our children differently. They all need different things from us. So how do you parent your 3 children so differently?

So I want to address that before I answer the question. I don't think everybody knows that. My— I'll throw my parents under the bus, but my dad used to say, well, we treat them the same. A lot. I remember hearing that a lot, like, oh well, if Josh did this, then you can do this. If he did it at 15, you can do it at 15. Like, they— I don't know, I don't necessarily remember as much my mom doing that, but my dad was big on everything will be— it will be even and it will be fair and we will do it the same. So I think your theory that we have to parent differently is a breath of fresh air, and not everybody knows that. So it seems like common sense to you, and common sense to me now after 15 years, but it certainly wasn't when— if you would ask me when Ella was born, I would have said— I probably would have echoed my parents because I didn't know any different. Wow.

OK, I didn't— I think that it's so common sense to me that I forget that maybe people don't know that.

No, I didn't. I remember for years and years them going— and I remember people asking my parents, like other adults having conversations that I overheard, and it was like, no, we do everything the same. We try and do the same for each kid. Gotta be even, gotta be fair. And you're looking at me like I'm crazy, but somebody else might look at you like you're crazy. So how do I parent them differently? So they all have different needs. So, I mean, am I giving specifics? Sure.

Okay, so if you have specifics that you want to share, sure.

So Lily is more like you and has a lot of feelings, and in my amateur opinion, she has a lot of intense emotions all of the time. So I've had to learn how to adjust to those. Again, my parents always wanted, you know, librarian and an editor/lawyer, calm house, everybody needs to be on an even keel, chill out, calm, you know, your kid calm down, slow down. So I've had to change that philosophy a lot, but especially for Lilly, because in relating to her helps me relate to you better. And I've learned from both of you that an intense negative emotion isn't the end of the world. And an intense positive emotion doesn't mean that you're a crazy person, like you can be really happy and you can be really not. So I think learning to respect that emotional roller coaster and be supportive of it and not react to it just because it isn't how I was raised or what I think should be felt in that situation. I'm not the arbiter. I'm not in charge of— I don't know how everybody should feel in every situation. I might think so. I've learned that I'm very wrong. So I think that's primarily my biggest goal with Lily is to help her on that emotional journey, not necessarily to stifle or subdue the emotion, but help her learn how to ride her roller coaster.

Oh, that's so good.

Thank you. Um, Ella and Max are, in my amateur non-master's degree opinion, are a lot more like me. They're a lot more laid back, a lot more chill, a lot more internal in terms of their emotional expression. So a lot easier for me to relate to. Um, how do you— Ella, I gotta ask her what she wants, what she needs, because she doesn't always express it. And, um, make sure she's okay. Sometimes, you know, she will do her chill out by herself thing for all day if we let her, and some days that's what she needs, and someday she needs us to pull her out and say, no, let's go do something, let's invite a friend over, let's go somewhere, um, to engage her. So I guess that's my answer to that question. And then Max is low maintenance most of the time, except when he's not, which is usually either, I'm hungry, I want some food, or we've learned bigger kids get different challenges than younger kids. So Lily might have a, oh, my friend didn't say this to me, and I'm upset because she talked to somebody else. Max doesn't tend to bring that issue. He's 15. There are a whole lot different issues at 15. So it's been kind of— I know you are a baby person and you love the baby phase, and you talk about us graduating each level as our kids get older and graduating with them. I have been fascinated to see, okay, Max has a question about this, which Lilia, Ella are hopefully way too young to ask about. I am fascinated that the new conversation we get to have and the new level our relationship gets to as father and son by the things that he's asking because he's experiencing something different. I try and be there for him, be available, listen, be the one going, "Dad, I got to talk to you." "Okay, relax yourself. It's going to be all right." But be it to the point where he's comfortable going, "Dad, I got to talk to you about something. Can you come to my room?" As opposed to him going, the first couple of times we had conversations like that, he'd be like, "I'm really nervous to talk to you about something." And he would pace around his room and I'd stand there and wait for him to get to the point where he could tell me. And then he would tell me and I'd be like, okay. And I'd have the conversation and be like, oh my God, Dad. The first time that happened, he hugged me and he cried. And he was like, I was so scared to talk to you about this. I've been thinking about it for 2 weeks and I can't believe that was so easy. And you made it so easy for me. I'm like, that's kind of my job. Like, when I said you could talk to me about anything, I meant it. Sometimes stifling our reaction as parents is the challenge to whatever it is he's asking. But I'm trying to reinforce that reputation of, I can talk about everything and it will be okay.

I'm, I'm moved. I'm moved. I'm at a loss for words. I'm regrouping. I picked such a good dad for our kids. I'm, I'm really proud of you right now, and I'm really proud of me for picking you.

Well, thank you. And for the record, I'm the one who came up to you in Temple and tapped you on the shoulder and talked to you. You weren't coming to me. So, but I'll still give you credit, at least 50% of the credit, for finding my business card in your purse and having the courage to email me 4 months later so that we could go on a date, right?

But I when we did start dating.

Yes, you had to say yes.

I had to want to marry you and have children with you.

Yes.

And I knew that you were going to be a good dad, and I was so right.

You were right.

What?

I'm happy you're right. See, you gotta— you recorded it. You got it on tape of me saying I'm happy you were right.

So our children, we have 3 kids, 15, 13, and 9 at the time we're recording this. They're so, they're so, they're so different. I can't even express to you how different our 3 children are. I would never, personally, my opinion, I would never think to parent them the same because they are so different. And Ella will say, or Max will say things like, How come they can get an 85 and you don't get mad? And I'm like, Max, you've never brought home an 85.

It's his fault. It's a victim of his own success.

Well, and then he says things to his friends. Okay, so the kid has like a 99 average. Okay, so he says to his friend in the car— I mean, his mother is listening to this conversation— he's like, well, if I tried more, I could probably get 100. Like, I think he's trying, but I don't think he's trying to the level that he could try, but I think he does try very hard. Um, so yes, so from Max, I expect super high grades because he is so smart. And that doesn't mean that our daughters aren't as smart. Our daughters are very smart, but it comes really easy for Max, so I don't let him get off easy.

Yeah, that's just funny that your reaction to that was probably, well, what the hell? Give me the 100. Get me the extra point. Let's go. Work your ass. And I'm like, OK, well, good for you that you could pull off a 99 without breaking a sweat.

No, actually, actually, I was like, come on, are you serious right now? And I do not ever expect 100. Like, that is totally unrealistic expectations. No, I did not say, where is my extra point? I am so proud of him.

My dad would have done that and thought he was funny. My dad would have been like, you got a 98, what happened to the other 2 points? And you would have thought he was partially joking when he said it.

My dad said that to me as a kid, probably joking, and I took it to heart so badly that I would never say it.

I had that thought— conversation with myself yesterday about parenting, going, there are so many things that like deeply impacted me that my dad or my mom said growing up that they don't even remember, or they totally weren't even talking about what I thought I internalized they were talking about. I'm like, I'm trying to watch myself every day going, is there a way that what I just said could land them on a therapist's couch in 20 years and that they have been traumatized by this? I try not to do that too much, but I'll not— I won't know for a long time.

Um, my mother told me no matter what I do, they'll end up on a therapist's couch complaining about me.

No, I agree with that part, but I'm just trying to say, because I know what things did, or I— what I allowed things to do to me, I now think, was that something that is going to come back to bite me 20 years from now? I don't know. I hope not.

Like, I know, I know we do our best conscious of it. Conscious parenting. I love it. Um, and I love that you realize how different they are and that you parent them so differently. And I love hearing your insight about how you think about them and how you parent them. It's very helpful for me.

Awesome.

So I listed all of your businesses. I probably didn't, but I listed most of your businesses. Um, I've talked about your 3 children. You've got a, um, demanding wife.

Uh, you said it, not me. You're lower maintenance than you think you are.

I do— I didn't call myself high maintenance because I do not think that I'm high maintenance, but I did yesterday. Did I call myself high maintenance?

In the kitchen, you gave me a hug and you were like, "I'm so sorry, I'm so high maintenance." I was feeling anxious when I said that. Yeah, I know. I remember.

You, you tend to calm me down when I'm feeling anxious.

That is my job.

So, so you're— we got to talk about balance because I feel like we could all learn from you. Seth is like the king of balance. He's the king of getting things done. He's the king of balance. I learn from him every day. Tell us how you balance it all.

OK, so I'm going to discount your question because Barbara Corcoran from Shark Tank told me once that balance is bullshit. Sorry, I— you'll have to censor that out. I don't know. And that boundaries rule. And the inspiration she gave to me was she says she has a work cell phone and a personal cell phone. And the second she leaves her office, She physically shuts off her work cell phone. Like, you can't get her until the next day. And she said, I'm in real estate and business and all this stuff now with Shark Tank. She's like, no one's going to die, right? I'm not a surgeon. They can wait till tomorrow. And only a certain number of people have her personal cell phone. I have not pulled that off. I have one phone for both. However, that made me think that if it's balanced, you're never going to be perfectly in balance. There's always going to be one area of your life, day to day, minute to minute, that's taking more focus. So I think it's being, being present in whatever area you're focused on right now. So if you're at work and you're thinking, oh, I feel guilty, I should be home with the kids, well, there's your no balance. Like, when you're at work, you need to be at work 100%. And when you tell me this— the biggest thing I'm working on in this area is when I get home at 5, 6, or 7 or whatever time it is, it's just be home. Try not to bring too much work home. And I've cut back and I know it's not enough and I can see your face, but it's a lot more than it used to be. Like, you'll be like, you're home and you're not done. I'm like, right, I got one more thing I got to do. But now it's down to one more thing I got to do. It isn't 4 or 5 more things I got to do. So I guess my secrets to that are focus 100% on what you're doing when you're doing it. And then try and let it out of your head when you're done.

That is really good. Wow, I need to interview you every day. Um, that's really good advice. I'm gonna take that advice. And I think that mothers are the, um, I'm starting to think of the word I'm looking for, but when we're—

Interrupt?

Yeah.

You're too busy multitasking and you're too overwhelmed and you've got too many lists in your head and it makes it hard for you to be present 100% without thinking about something else when you're doing one thing. Like, I watch your mind spin at home. I watch you make lists and go, oh wait, I got to do this and I got to do that and I got to do this. I'm like, you're 6 things off the first thing you were actually doing when you started because you let 17 other things pop into your head. And you would feel more balanced if you practiced focusing more, and meditation really helps for this, getting to the point where keeping one thought in my head and only focusing on that. It's against your normal DNA genetic nature with diffused awareness, but any practice you can do in that area would dramatically reduce your stress level and help you.

That's super helpful. You know me very well. You live with me. You see my list. You see how I act every day. One of the ways that has helped me with this is I will be focusing on getting work done when I've remembered I didn't do something that was due for the PTA that day. Okay, so that's just one example.

Yeah.

So the way that I cope with that is I write it down because I'm going to forget, the thought's going to be gone. I'm going to write it down.

You've got a scarcity complex around your thought. You think you will forget it. You think it won't come back.

I do.

If it's important enough, your subconscious will bring it back. And the problem is you're stopping to go write it down. And that's not the only thing you think of, because when you write it down, you probably remember 3 other things. And now the amount of time it's going to take you to get back to the level of productivity you had on the first thing before you allowed yourself to get interrupted, you just wasted more time. And your feeling of overwhelm comes from your perception of time. You only get overwhelmed when you think there's not enough time to get it all done. If you think I got plenty of time, you don't feel overwhelmed.

Yeah. I told you, you're the king of this. So those are really good tips. Every single mother who hears this is going to take this away from this interview because we all are doing the same things and we're spinning. And what Seth has taught me is that multitasking is not good for us. It makes us crazy. And when we focus on one thing at a time, we're more productive and we feel so much less overwhelmed.

Yeah, there have been— I've read entire books on that. There's entire medical clinical studies of experiments on people's brain activity and stuff. Multitasking is actually bad for you and technically makes you dumber because you do 6 things less well than you would do the one thing if you just did one.

I'm making myself stupid.

No. Okay. I didn't say that. I said it is making you do things at a lower level than you could do them if you did one at a time. It's like the equivalent. If you're trying to do 2 or 3 things at once, I think what I remember is it's like the equivalent of being slightly buzzed from marijuana or slightly drunk.

Yeah. I mean, from doing it on a daily basis, I would agree with that. Yeah. So if you could go back in time, if you could go back in time as a father, what would you change?

Holy crap. A lot. Holy cow. That's a good question. I mean, I would change everything from when you were pregnant.

Uh, no, stop it.

How far back? I mean, I would change how I was in the delivery room and knowing like how scared I was and knowing that it was about you and that you were going to be okay. I, I would probably change everything I've ever done that I viewed as a mistake, like I would take things less seriously. I would have more fun. I would go, oh my God, it's 8-year-old soccer, let it go. Like, it's not that big a deal. Um, right.

But don't you think that everything that you've done the last 15 years has made you the awesome father that you are today?

Oh, absolutely.

It was a journey.

I agree 100%. But you asked if I could go back, what would I change? And I could make the awesome journey even more awesome and Think about it. Any parent, you could go back and remove every mistake, every time you raised your voice and you regretted it later, anything you said that you wish you could take back. We do it. We would all do it.

Go, go back to the delivery room. I want to know what you would change. No, I'm really curious that you brought that up.

Okay. Well, Ella and Lily, I think I didn't have the same experience because we had had a baby, right? It was my first baby. First baby. I knew nothing. I was terrified. And given your complications and the emergency C-section and all that stuff, like, I don't know if I've ever been more scared than that in my entire life. Like, I would love to go back and go, she's going to be okay. I mean, best and worst moment of my life is probably waiting in that hall, sitting on the floor, like, wondering what the heck was happening to you. And if you were going to be okay. If I could go back and tell myself, guess what, she and Max are both healthy and fine, man, I could have been more supportive to you as opposed to running myself to the bathroom because I had so much adrenaline. We had been up for 25 hours and I was so nervous. Like, I would have been a much better birth partner than had I not had all of my own stuff in my way.

Is that the same thing with me being pregnant?

No, because the— no, because I wasn't scared then because the baby was in you. He wasn't out yet and you weren't having problems getting him out. So I'm— I think I did. I did an even better job being a birth partner, being a birth partner for Ella and Lily because we had done it once. And I was like, well, it's going to go better than that one. So I feel better about it. And I had gotten used to juggling. So it was okay. We got to get Max over— Max and Ella to Grammy's house and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And make sure— bring them home and get them to school and get them fed and get back to the hospital for you and Lily. So I think it got easier every time. And I think the— had I known what you were about to go through with Max, I thought I did a good job, like, supporting you in your pregnancy, but I'm sure I could have done a better one. But you don't know in advance.

Yeah, well, there's a lot we would both change, right?

Right. But it all worked out, right? I mean, that's the good news.

Yes, yes. Um, What do you think your worst parenting moment was?

Unfortunately, I could probably come up with a few. Um, I would probably pick two. I would probably pick, um, fighting with Max at the top of the stairs trying to physically drag him to soccer when he didn't want to go play goalie when he was like 8. And I'm like, I'm the coach, let's go. And he was refusing, and I was like trying to physically pull him down the stairs, and you were yelling at me going, you're gonna drop him down the stairs and you got to stop. So that was not a proud moment for me. I was 8 years old. I should have left and just gone to practice without him and just been, oh well, and maybe you brought him later. If I had to pick another one, I'm sure it's been sometime in the last 5 or 10— fighting with Lily at sometime in the last 5 years when she got emotional and I got reactive and tried to drag her somewhere. Or away from you. Both of the— yeah, both of those examples were to the point where I lost all emotional resourcefulness and, and tried to resort not to physical violence but to physically forcing my kid, those two, to do something. I'm not very proud of.

Oh my god, we'll always remember you trying to drag Max to soccer and me going, "Stop, he's gonna fall down the stairs!" Yes, thankfully he did not fall down the stairs.

I stopped, he went, everything went fine. And I think it was that— it might have been a game. I don't think I would have cared as much about practice.

Well, I love his new enthusiasm for football and that he's running to practice instead of us forcing him to go to practice.

Yes, it's a very, very nice, huge difference to see.

So refreshing. Um, what is your best parenting moments?

Those, thankfully, I have a lot more of. Um, I would say I'm gonna give you a couple, probably one with each kid. First one probably would have been the first time in the last couple, couple years when— with— it's during COVID when Max was like, Dad, I gotta talk to you, and was like so nervous and been working on it, up to it for weeks. And I think I handled it absolutely flawlessly as a parent. And he said this, he's like, oh my God, that was better than I ever imagined. And he cried. He's like, I can't believe that you were so easy to talk to about that. That's so amazing. So I'll take that one for Max. For Ella, it's probably got to be— hmm, I mean, she's so much easier.

Pause for Ella, because I want to tell tell everybody something about Max.

Okay.

Um, in the car driving to the many places that I drive him, he told me something. Um, I'm not gonna even— even if it comes to me, I'm not going to reveal it because I'm sure it was personal. But, um, he said— I responded and he said, you didn't react. Why was that so easy? Like, he expects me to be reactive.

Yes.

And when we're reactive they don't want to talk to us. Like Seth really consciously stays calm for our children. When we react to them, it turns them off from wanting to tell us anything. So I'm really working on staying calmer, especially for him.

That's awesome that you did that. And I said to him, I'm growing up as a parent, which is one of my favorite lines that you have in regards to parenting. And I'm very proud of you. And you did not tell me that that happened. So that's awesome that you pulled that off. Well, I mean, I know sometimes what a challenge it can be.

Yeah, I mean, it was, I, it was something that I was like, oh, okay. And he was like, oh, I didn't get a big emotional response from you. Like, big emotions makes him so uncomfortable. So I have to know that as a parent and give him, try to give him what he needs. Now I have had friends say to me, just be yourself, like, just be you, you're wonderful, like, stop criticizing yourself, just be you. And that's an excellent point. But I also know that I can be a better mother if I'm less reactive.

And I'm gonna chime in with one thing you just said there. I agree with the stop criticizing yourself. I'm gonna say We don't want to, in my opinion, as parents, we don't want to just be ourselves. I want to be the best version of myself. Yeah, right, because there's a crappy version of myself that could make this thing go really wrong and make it worse. Yeah, there's a really higher version of myself that could make it go even better than he thinks it's gonna go.

Yeah.

Okay, so parenting moment, happy parenting moment for Lily. I'm going out of order. Um, those are probably the ones where she is upset, I handle it in what I view as a high-level, high-consciousness way. Um, it usually tends to be around something where I underst— I can actually relate to her because it's usually because she's the youngest child in the birth order that she's up— she doesn't know that's why she's upset, but it's why something is happening that's upsetting her. And in those times, I can relate to her better than everybody else because I'm the youngest. So like there was one a couple of months ago and I was like, she just got the thing. Can she do it before she has to share with another sibling? Because I went through that with my older brother. I drove him crazy. And I'm like, Lily, I understand where you're coming from. I went through this with my brother because I'm the youngest, blah, blah, blah. And she like gave me this big hug and cried and was like, see, Daddy, you get me because you're the youngest and you understand. And it made the situation so much better. So those are the times I'm like, oh, I actually have a built-in advantage when it comes to Lily, because in regards to the intense emotions, I do not, because I didn't grow up with it. But being a youngest, I have down. I know what that— I know what it's like to be the bratty youngest child who wants something, and I know what it's like to be the one who doesn't want to share yet, and I know what it's like to have an older sibling where— who has something you want. So in that area, I'm like, yes, I got this one. Um, magic. Yes, a lot. And it's all the time. Um, I will say it's usually involving working with her on something. So whether it's lines or a dance or guitar, when we do something that she wants help with together and I'm able— and she's not sure she can do it, she's not sure, she needs help— and I'm able to teach her a different way to look at it where she goes like, oh, I can do that, that was easy, what, I didn't know that. And like, that feels awesome to watch her, the light bulb go off and go, her go, oh, I can do this.

Our dog is driving me crazy. I'm going to let him in the bedroom. This is real life, people. He's at my door crying and distracting me.

Oh, I didn't even hear a thing.

You— oh, I'm so glad that you can't hear him.

I had no idea. So while we wait for Erika, a moment for our sponsors. Go check out whinypalooza.com. Go check out the Whiny Palooza app in the App Store. Go check out Whiny Palooza on YouTube, Apple, iTunes, Google Play, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Amazon, or Audible.

Oh my God, I love when you do that. Um, so he has been sitting at our door whining for me that entire time, and I just let him in, and this is This is our life. This is our life. There is someone always at my door for me when I shut my door. Lily's like, are you in there? What are you doing?

Notice if your door is open, they don't do it. It's only as soon as you— they do it more when you close it because they're like, what's going on? And now that he's in there, he'll want to leave and go because you're like, oh, this is boring. Nothing's happening.

Is being a dad what you thought it would be like?

No, it's way more.

So much better, right?

Yes, much better.

Um, yeah, Seth had no idea.

And much better.

You had no idea. He— when I met him, he was completely clueless about the amazing father that he was going to be. And I, in my heart of hearts, knew what I was signing up for.

And I knew for your belief I, I knew how amazing you would be.

I had no doubt. Um, okay, let me look and see if there's any more questions that they have. This is really good. Our, our daughters had really good questions. I think I'm going to, um, end with a couple. So any helpful advice that you want to give to the fathers out there and the mothers out there that I haven't asked you.

How many more hours do you have?

Well, no, see if you have one. See if you have one bullet point that you can give to people.

Relax, it's gonna be okay. Oh, what you think is the end of the world now, or your teenager says they hate you, or whatever it is, like, it will be okay. If you can just know that now, you'll handle it better. I tell myself that all the time.

You tell me that, like yesterday you were like, oh honey, you worry so much. Yeah, there's a pregnant mom that I follow and she, you know, she worries, she worries. I worried when I was pregnant. And she said, what I have realized, she's like, I was like, when I get to the second trimester, I'm gonna worry less. When I get to the third trimester, I'm gonna worry less. When she's here, when he's here, I'm gonna worry less. And she said, I have just— I have figured out that in motherhood you just worry.

You worry more, not less.

Okay, so going forward, last question, honey. Going forward, um, what, what are your aspirations in fatherhood? Goals you have for yourself?

Keep doing an awesome job, have them say, "I have the best dad," and mean it. Have them say— to have them look back and go, "Man, I wouldn't really change a thing about my childhood." I mean, they're going to change some things in their head, but I had it really good. I mean, obviously get them all through high school, college, married, grandkids, all that good stuff, law-abiding productive citizens. And I think Max said it really well the other day. He said, "Dad, some of my friends don't know what a good deal, what a good hand they've been dealt in life by virtue of who their parents are, where they are, all that stuff." He said, "I know what a good hand I've been dealt, and I'm going to play it as best I can." And he used the gambling analogy, which obviously helps me. But I said, "Oh my God, that's beautiful. I love that you—" I asked him more questions and said, "Specifically, what do you mean?" and got a long, awesome list of what he recognized as having life, having dealt him a good hand. And I'm like, that's awesome that you're aware of that at 15.

Yep. He, he's, he's a mature 15-year-old. I have been told. Um, well, I am so happy that he said that to you. I think that all 3 of our kids, if they were here with me, would tell you what an awesome father you are. I can't wait to celebrate you for Father's Day. You deserve so much celebrating. I'm so thankful for you. Thank you for being their dad. Thank you for, for teaching us all so much today. And I just love you so much. I'm so thankful for you.

I learn more from you every day than you could possibly know, and I love you too.

This is Rebecca Green reminding everyone to spend every day laughing, learning, and loving.

Thank you for tuning in to the Winey Palooza podcast. If you like what you heard, please be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. While you are there, leave a review. I love to hear your feedback. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.

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