Doing The Dad Thing

Full Disclosure: I’ve only been a Dad for like 4 years. There are people with waaaay more experience that new and soon-to-be Dads should be asking for advice from. I personally just follow The Rock on Insta and try my best to imitate him, minus about 100 pounds of muscle (which I’m working on btw). But if I were going to give out any advice, mine would be relatively simple.

Just be there.

Life is busy. And life is really freaking tough. Don’t believe the Insta hype, even The Rock will have days where all isn’t as rosy as his last post. And even if it looks like I’m nailing the whole Dad thing, I’m getting my butt kicked elsewhere. I’m fighting the big author fight, trying to make financial ends meet, and even lost my job earlier in the year.

The only reason I get to be all over the gram is because I make the time to capture those moments. And its hard work, no doubt. Not every dad is going to find the time for Saturday morning football, Swimming lessons on Sundays, Nursery runs on weekday mornings, and your daughters first days of school. If you can manage just one of those things, you’re halfway there in their eyes. All that matters is that your pick your moments and never let them pass you by.

Some people call it sacrifice. The things they have to give up when their kids arrive, but they’ve got it all wrong. Sometimes when I tell my people I can’t make it to their meetup, they think its because I’m being held hostage by responsibility. That family is a chain restricting me from doing the things I want. But its the other way round. With all due respect, f**k those people (if any friends of mine are reading this, I love you really and promise I am very sorry that I couldn’t attend your birthday/coming out/wedding/funeral?) F**k em. I’ve spent years with them, and there will plenty more years to come (unless it was the funeral).

My family is new and exciting. And my family will always be new and exciting (until those kids are 18. After that - good luck strangers, see you at Xmas). Every day is a first. Every day is a rollercoaster. Every day is a new challenge, a memory that you’re going to come back to in thirty years time and bond over time and time again. Like that time I pretended to work from home when really we were just baking white chocolate chip cookies. Or that time when both my kids were acting like total d**ks and I took away all their s**t, sent them to bed early and put headphones on so I couldn’t hear the echoes of their misery. But these are the good times. Even when they’re bad, or seem like they don’t matter.

So make it for bath time when you can, so they can snatch your phone out of your hand and dunk it into the bubbles.

Make it when you can to parties, so you can apologize to the birthday girl for your kid snatching her cake out of her hands and crumbling it over his face.

And make it to dentist appointments at midnight, after an hours drive, when your kid falls over and chips his tooth before bed.

You don’t have to plan 7 days in Disneyland to do the whole ‘Dad thing’. A trip to the grandparents. A weigh in. An hour at soft play. A walk to the shops. They’re all great chances to strengthen the bond between you and them. And all you have to do is be there.

Because if you’re not, those moments (no matter how tiny they might seem) aren’t going to come again.