December 19, 2025 • 23 mins
Hi Pod, it's James Guttman. As the holidays approach, I talk about what respect really looks like when you’re raising a nonverbal child with autism. My son doesn’t care about Christmas traditions, gift-opening, or big holiday moments, so instead of forcing him into them, I’ve learned to build the season around who he actually is.
In this episode, I share how trust became the foundation of our relationship, from a moment after my heart surgery that changed how I parent forever to the everyday choices that make holidays calmer and more meaningful for him. I explain why I follow my son’s lead instead of correcting him, why consistency matters more than control, and how keeping my word has shaped his behavior in public and at home.
I also talk candidly about single fatherhood, rejecting the “helpless dad” stereotype, protecting peace after major life changes, and what it means to invite someone into a life that already works. This episode is about autism appreciation, setting boundaries with kindness, and choosing respect over performance, especially during the holidays.
If you’re a parent of a child with autism, a single parent, or someone looking to make the holidays gentler and more authentic, this conversation is for you.
It's Here! Get the book – “Hi World, I’m Dad: How Fathers Can Journey to Autism Awareness, Acceptance, and Appreciation” on audio, digital, or print.
Follow Us On TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
Also, be sure to read the blog that started it all - Hi Blog! I'm Dad.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
James Guttman (00:51):
Hi Pod, it's James Gutman.
Welcome back to another editionof the show.
It's Friday.
It's the best day of the week.
It is December the 19th.
It is one of the best Fridays ofthe year.
We are on the road to, well, NewYear's, the road to Christmas,
the road to fresh beginnings,new starts, and 2026.
I appreciate you guys taking thetime to check it out, to join
me.
Whether you found me onHiPodOndad.com or any of the
(01:14):
streaming services, I appreciateit.
Audible, Apple Podcasts, I don'tknow, iHeartRadio.
We can make them up.
Maybe you found me on uh onWoofer.
I don't know.
It's I'm everywhere.
You name it.
We've had this podcast.
Thank you so much.
The same thing with the book.
If you guys want to pick it up,Hi World I'm Dad, my book.
I don't promote it a lot.
It's on Amazon, it's on Spotify,it's on everything.
(01:36):
So grab it.
Thank you.
I appreciate the support.
Got that out of the way.
But yeah, man, it's been a yearof learning.
It's been a year of awakenings.
It's been a year of lifelessons.
I think I've talked about this.
You guys may have even noticedthis week.
If you go to highblogomdad.comwhere everything I've written
(01:57):
about autism awareness,appreciation, all this stuff is
all on there since 2017.
I was thinking about it today.
I've written twice a week forabout eight years.
We're closing in, and eacharticle is about a thousand
words.
So we're closing in on themillion-word mark soon of what
I've written for this situation.
(02:18):
I love it.
I love being able to do it.
I love getting to go back andwatching, you know, Lucas and
Olivia grow up.
So it's been fantastic.
But if you went tohighblogomdad.com this week, you
saw that I wrote about myselfand kind of a different spin on
things on Wednesday.
I haven't done this in a while,where I wrote about kind of
being a single dad in mysituation.
(02:38):
I have a 17-year-old daughter, Ihave a 14-year-old nonverbal
son.
My house runs great.
You know, I'm not one of thesedads where, you know, where do
we keep the peanut butter?
I'm not, I'm not a sitcom dadfrom Nick Jr., you know what I'm
saying?
Which used to make me reallyannoyed.
The way dads are depicted on TV,this is a side rant, on TV and
movies and commercials, itdrives me crazy.
(03:00):
Even as a kid, there were twodifferent commercials that I'm
going to complain about rightnow, real quick.
Uh, the first one was RingAround the Collar commercial,
right?
Um, I don't know if it was aboutRing Around the Collar, it was
about stains in the laundry.
And it was a guy, and he's outwith his family, he's out with
his wife, and the wife spillssomething like on her shirt or
(03:22):
on her pants or something.
And she goes, Oh no.
And they go to the husband, andI swear to God, the husband
goes, Saw y'all wash them, likethat.
Not exactly, saw y'all washthem.
And she like rolls her eyes,like, what a goober.
And even as a kid, I rememberbeing like, What the hell?
Like, why do they depict thisguy like that?
That's the dad.
(03:43):
The other one, and this one,this one hits me at my core.
Um, it might not affect you asmuch.
It's a commercial.
Check this out.
Because there's so much missingcontext here, and all the
context is terrible.
It's a dad, I assume he's a dad,and he's sitting on a couch or
on a chair, and he's watchingtelevision.
And he's like, Oh, he's gotgrayer hair, you know, kind of
(04:03):
like me.
And these two little girls walkinto the room, and one of them
goes, Dad, it's time.
And the two of them present tohim just for men hair dye, as if
they are presenting the holygrail.
And the other one goes, We thinkyou'd make a really good catch
for someone.
And I'm like, This is before Ieven had the gray hairs that I
(04:26):
have, which by the way, I likemy gray hairs, but it's before I
even had them.
And I remember, what the there'sno context.
You don't know if his wife isdead or what the hell.
But the the idea of thecommercial is nobody's gonna
want you with your nasty grayhair.
So at the end of the day,gray-haired dads not always
depicted the best in media andthings like that.
(04:47):
So I think sometimes people havethis idea that dads need to be
saved.
We need to be helped.
We don't know how to doanything.
Now, granted, I'm not the bestwhen it comes to colors, and
I'll go, which sounds insane tosay out loud, but you know, I go
to my daughter and I'll be like,Do these match?
And she'd be like, that's gray.
That doesn't match.
I'd be like, isn't this blue?
She'd be like, oh my God, daddy.
The amount of times I've heard,oh my god, daddy, like, I don't
(05:10):
know.
To me, maybe there is somethingwrong.
Who knows?
But that's about the extent ofit.
I keep my house clean, I keep mykids fed, I have Lucas on a
schedule like clockwork, boom,boom, boom, boom.
So I wrote on Wednesday abouthow I'm looking in my life as a
single dad for the person who'sgonna come in and be a part of
our group.
Um, and this was not a call toaction where I'm like, I'm
(05:32):
searching all over.
I might have found it, might nothave found it.
I don't talk too in-depth aboutthose things.
I do know that I've had in mytime relationships and people
that I've I've been around andI've learned, man.
I'm I'm in my late 40s.
I've learned what I don't want,what I don't want to have in my
life.
And I've talked about it, andyou guys kind of know it too,
which is what's funny, becauseI've talked openly about having
(05:53):
my heart surgery and wantingpeace and serenity now, you
know?
That's my whole goal.
Um, and I feel like a lot oftimes the readers know this more
than these people who come intomy life and are supposed to know
it.
People will pretend too.
Oh, I'm very chill.
You know, okay.
All right, that lasts for whattime is it?
So I wrote a little bit aboutdoing this because I never
(06:14):
really address it.
I never really talk about it.
For years, people would write tome when I was still married and
I was writing the blog.
And if you guys noticed, Ididn't mention my wife a lot.
And I had a rule.
If she's there for somethingthat we did, she would be in the
story.
But I would never, I would neverpurposely not include her, but
she had to actually be a part ofthe story.
I wouldn't make it up.
But between that and I don'tknow, I mentioned, you know, a
(06:37):
past girlfriend who had been apart of of some of the blog
posts in the past who is nowcornfielded away.
I wanted to at least give anupdate, give you guys an idea,
because this is something thatI've I've gotten emails from
people and people have asked meabout it because there are other
single parents in the situationthat I'm in.
And the way that I raise my sonis unique.
(06:59):
And it's to the point where whenI first started dating, I
thought, you know, well, Ishould find people who have, you
know, children like Lucas.
And I find that in some ways,sometimes, that's almost a
harder fit to make becausepeople like that already have
their own views on how theyraise their kid.
And I had said before, I'munique.
So I'm not going to come in andchange your entire life.
(07:21):
You're not going to change myentire life with it.
In many ways, it's easier tofind somebody who doesn't that
can follow my lead andunderstand what we're doing, or
in the very least, not insist onthings, not insist that I raise
my daughter a certain way, notinsist that I raise my son a
certain way.
I do my thing.
We have a good rhythm.
We're happy.
I'm looking for someone in mylife to share this world with
(07:46):
me, not somebody to complete itor to be, you know, my kids,
they have a mom.
They, you know, I don't need amom.
Like we're just, we're good togo.
And that I thought, especiallytowards the end of the year, I
just had the heart surgeryanniversary.
And you guys know too, I get alittle, you know, all up in his
feelings.
So I'm on to come on there andkind of address it.
Um, and I appreciate it.
(08:06):
And the the feedback is alwaysgreat from everybody.
It makes me really happy.
It makes me happy that I startedthis blog.
You guys know before I did thisblog, I used to, you know, write
about pro wrestling, and thefans are rabid and nuts.
Nuts for wrestling fans.
I mean, you want to have anexample of it.
(08:27):
I've said this example a milliontimes.
Try writing an article andsaying that Jake the Snake
Roberts fought Rick the ModelMartell at WrestleMania 6
instead of seven, and peoplewill literally write to you and
tell you how stupid you are.
I wrote a thousand words and Igot the wrong WrestleMania
number in there, which I knewthe right one.
I just put the wrong numberdown.
You know, I knew right away youwere the dumbest person.
(08:49):
I'm like, oh my God, why did Iwrite this?
They're not like that anymore.
They're not like that with thisblog.
Once in a while, I'll get atroll, I'll get somebody, but no
man, people for the most partare, you know, nice and kind.
It's cool.
This past week, too, I got achance to kind of drift back
into the wrestling world.
You guys know I have a friendover at New York News Day, and
every time a wrestling storycomes, he contacts me.
(09:10):
Can we quote you?
I'm like, you know it's been 10years, right?
But I love it.
I love getting to do it.
So I talked a little bit McFoleythis week.
Um, that made me happy.
And the feedback from that wasgreat.
So you guys are uh just really afantastic, fantastic group of
people reading the blog, and Iappreciate it.
And that's why I wanted to dothis one special today, because
uh there's something, you know,again, it's unique, right?
(09:31):
Like, so I raise my son in aunique way, I look at it at a
unique, you know, point of view.
Christmas is coming up.
And I gotta be honest, Lucasdoesn't care about Christmas.
My son is nonverbal with severeautism.
So he doesn't care about Elf ona Shelf, and he doesn't care
(09:51):
about Santa Claus, and hedoesn't care about opening
gifts, and he doesn't care aboutum, you know, decorating the
tree.
But he does all those things forus.
He stands by and he helps and hesmiles and he poses and I love
him for it.
So when the holidays come, theleast I can do is make it
(10:12):
something for him that is goingto put his best foot forward.
I don't have to put food on atable at eye level for him and
expect him to resist thetemptation to shove his face
into it all day.
Granted, big boy, Lucas, don'tdo that.
You shouldn't do that.
I got it.
But for one day, maybe hedoesn't get you know corrected
(10:32):
over and over again.
Maybe we take the food, we putit on a higher shelf.
If he wants to go lay in hisroom while people are over, go
lay in your room, Lucas.
You're allowed, thank you somuch for being a part of this,
as opposed to, oh, sit down, bigboy, big boy sits at the table.
No, man, it's his holiday too.
And I want to give him that.
I want to give him the samerespect that he gives us.
(10:56):
And that at the end of the day,that's autism appreciation, and
that's the back and forth thatI've had with my son this whole
time.
I've told the story a milliontimes about the first day that I
started like this journeytowards appreciating who my son
was.
And it was right after thesurgery.
I was sitting on the couch,incapacitated pretty much,
(11:18):
watching him pull a toy phone inand out from underneath the
chair while watching it in themirror.
And for the first time ever, Ididn't correct him.
I didn't pick up the phone andshow him how we properly play
with a phone.
I did what he was doing, and Ilet him watch me and he hugged
me after seeing me do thisbecause for the first time
somebody was playing a toy withhis rules, as opposed to
(11:43):
correcting him.
For the first time, somebody wasentering his world instead of
pulling him into ours, and heappreciated it.
And I've built this relationshipwith my son through that,
through that idea of I'm askingthings of him, let me do things
for him, right?
(12:03):
We all want things to be the waythey are.
We have, you know, all thesenotions about how they should
be.
Then you have a boy like minewho kind of throws everything on
its ear.
Lucas doesn't open presents,doesn't like to do it.
So you could wrap a present, butthen like even if you give it to
him, go open the present.
He'll maybe like, he'll look atme, he'll like pull on it a
little bit.
He doesn't really care.
(12:23):
Even if he opens it up, andhere's the thing, too, that gets
people if he opens it up, evenif it's something he really
wants, he doesn't really react.
He no sells it.
It's a wrestling term, like TheUndertaker, just kind of like no
expression, doesn't care.
Uh once in a while you get himsomething he really wants.
Like this year, it's anothertablet.
I get this kid kind of similarthings every year just because I
(12:44):
know that he's gonna love it.
So he might react to that alittle bit.
It has to be out of the box.
He won't look at the box and belike, oh, there's a tablet in
here.
He won't care.
And I understand that.
But we've had people show up atour house and insist that he
opens the present in front ofthem and then react in a weird
way that he's not like jumpingfor joy.
And it's like, hey, Karen, Itold you he's not gonna care.
(13:07):
But that's the respect, andthat's what we let him do.
Choose what he wants to do, bewho he wants to be.
Lucas is uh different with methan he is anywhere else.
And I've earned this, and I willstand by this and I will tell
you how proud I am of this.
Lucas, I've heard in othersituations with other people,
(13:32):
will throw himself at food.
I wrote an article years ago.
One of the earliest kind ofviral things that we wrote here
on the blog was an articlecalled I'm sorry my kid drank
your coffee.
I loved it.
It was one of my favorite onesbecause it was real, and it was
about Lucas' propensity forstealing people's food in
public, grabbing someone's drinkoff a table and drinking it.
(13:53):
And I'm like, oh my God, oh mygod, he has hepatitis now.
It was always that worry oflike, and then you apologize,
you're paying for coffees, andlike he shouldn't drink coffee
anyway, now he's up all night.
That happened, and it doesn'thappen with me anymore, but it
still happens elsewhere.
And I get these stories andthese secondhand accounts about
him acting in a way that almostsounds like Back to the Future.
(14:16):
It's like he gets in theDeLorean, he went back in time
and stole a donut off of atable.
Who does that?
He doesn't do that.
And I remember the first timewhere I felt like, oh, I've made
good choices with this kid.
And it was a few years ago, itwas at Easter.
Me, him, Olivia, we went to thisbig buffet on Long Island, uh,
(14:39):
Millridge Inn.
Wasn't that great?
Wasn't the Millridge Inn?
I don't want to get thempublicity.
I didn't like it.
It was terrible.
Don't go to the Millridge Inn.
It was a different place.
But we had gone and it was thisbig hall of tables, and
everyone's kind of wedged in.
It was like being at a weddingreception, but they were like,
How many tables could we get inhere for this buffet?
And when we walked to the table,we were literally walking
(15:01):
through chairs where my son wasat most two feet away from
someone's plate.
All he had to do was reach hisarm out, and he could just grab
French toast or whatever offpeople's plates.
And he didn't do it at all.
The whole walk through, hedidn't try to take one piece of
food.
I got up to go to the buffet andI told Olivia, I said, Can you
(15:24):
sit with him and just watch him,make sure he's okay?
And I walked away, and I'm like,okay, there is going to be a
catastrophe.
And there wasn't.
He was an angel, and he was anangel because he's learned with
me to act a certain way.
Certain things are expected.
And most of all, and here'swhat's most important he's gonna
(15:44):
get everything he wants with meall in due time.
When I tell him wait, the thingthat I tell him to wait for is
always coming.
If he wants like a piece ofpizza, he goes, he comes over,
he uses a device pizza, I'mlike, all right, buddy, just can
you wait?
Wait, I put the hand up, wait.
He might go, uh he does thatkind of like a little whine, a
little side swipe, but he leavesand he comes back and he gets
(16:06):
pizza.
And that's always been thepayoff.
He knows my dad might tell me tohold on a second, but he's gonna
get it for me.
I don't forget, I don't ignore.
If he can't have it, I tell himno, and I try to explain why,
even if I don't think heunderstands every word.
And that I think is probably themost important part of it all.
(16:28):
Explain everything.
Even if you think your kidunderstands nothing, explain
everything.
Every word.
Just talk, talk out loud, talkout loud all day.
And I promise you, at least withmy son, there are things that he
just gets.
He knows certain words, and I'mlike, oh, he gets it.
Like I could turn around to himas he's getting dressed, and
(16:49):
I'll be like, all right, butwe're gonna get your socks on,
your shoes after we're done, andhe'll leave and go get his socks
and shoes.
And I'm I'm thinking to myself,I didn't even realize that he
was picking that up.
It all goes back.
There was one specific day whereit happened.
I was in his room and I wasgetting him like ready for the
day.
And I'm talking to myself.
He was young, and I'm talking tomyself kind of under my breath
(17:12):
because it's early, I'm tired, Ihave a lot going on.
I'm like, all right, buddy,let's get this on, get your
pants on.
Oh my God.
All right, we're gonna, allright, give you some breakfast.
And we're just we'll go, we'llgo wash your hands, and then
we'll do breakfast.
It'll be all right.
And as soon as I'm done talking,he runs out of the room.
And I'm like, oh my God.
Now I gotta go get him, I gottago find this kid.
(17:33):
I'm just kind of like justannoyed.
And I walk out into the hallway,and he's standing in front of
the sink in the bathroom withthe water running, looking at me
over his shoulder, like, let'sgo.
And I was like, You got that?
Like you understood that?
I didn't enunciate becausethere's a lot, man.
When you have a nonverbal kid,you do a lot of pantomime.
You know, there's a lot of, hey,buddy, we're gonna go out, and
(17:55):
then after we're gonna go washyour hands.
And you guys can't see me rightnow, but I'm doing the whole,
you know, like I'm doing theYMCA right now.
Like it's it's all like handmotions or whatever.
This wasn't that.
This was simply like, all right,but I'm gonna wash your hands.
Like I barely said it out loud.
And since I've done it so oftenand he's listened so much, he
got it.
(18:16):
My kid knows to listen to mebecause he knows that I'm giving
him information that he needs,and he might not get every word
of it, but there is importantthings in there.
And then on top of it, too, andit's the line that I've used
over and over again.
I talked to him when I didn'tthink he understood.
I read to him when I didn'tthink he cared, and I showed him
love when I didn't think he knewwhat that meant.
(18:38):
And that's what's important.
That's what you have to do witha boy like mine.
It makes the holidays easier, itmakes life easier.
I don't know, and if there's onething that I I really hope
people take away from my blog,it's that it's really not as
hard as I thought it was gonnabe.
Don't get me wrong, I'm gonnapreface everything I say because
(19:01):
it's important.
I don't know your kid.
Maybe it's harder with your kid,right?
I don't know.
I'm not sitting here, I'm notlike, oh my god's great.
I'm just telling you what I didthat worked.
And I will tell you this.
And I know people hear thepodcast now and they read the
blog and they hear about myrelationship with him, and they
think, oh, he's always beengreat with it wasn't.
(19:22):
When Lucas was a baby, I thoughthe was never gonna know
anything.
It's awful to say, and it hurtsto say, and it's hard to say.
But I genuinely didn't think hewas ever going to know anything.
I didn't think he'd know myname.
I didn't think he'd be able tolook up, I didn't think he'd be
able to do anything.
And every step of the way, Itreated him like he was my age.
(19:46):
We would just talk and I wouldjust like talk at him in the
car.
We'd laugh.
If he laughed, I would laughwith him, I would play games the
way he wanted to play them.
I would try to follow his leadon certain things, I would give
him respect.
If he had a meltdown, I wouldsit with him.
He He knew and he knows that I'mon his side.
Always, just like his sisterknows.
He has a neurotypical sister,and I I give the two of them the
(20:09):
exact same respect.
It doesn't matter if heacknowledges it, it doesn't
matter if he gets it.
I just kept doing it.
And now, today at 14, does heunderstand everything?
No.
I just wrote a blog about that,I think on Monday, actually.
He doesn't understand everythingI say.
He doesn't get everything I say,but that's fine.
Because the things that he doesunderstand are important.
(20:30):
And the one thing that he neededto understand that he does is
trust.
He trusts me.
He knows that Dad has his back.
And that if Dad tells him no tocookies, it's because there's a
reason.
He's going to have more cookieslater.
He's going to have it at adifferent time.
If dad says to wait, what he'swaiting for is going to come.
And that's it.
And that's what makes us happy.
(20:51):
And that's what life is like.
And that's why I know this year,Christmas and the holidays and
everything.
It's always going to go well.
I am the luckiest.
I'm the luckiest man on earth,man.
I got a second chance to comeback and live my life in 2012
after my surgery.
And I was able to rewrite it inthe best possible way.
(21:13):
I was able to, you know, alterthe trajectory of my life.
I was able to not only welcomepeople in, but then also get
life lessons from that.
And when things weren't right,see it and understand it.
Every negative thing that's everhappened to me has been good
because it's taught me somethingabout myself.
In the very least, and I thinkI've said this before too.
(21:35):
Even if there's a situation thatI'm like 100% right about where
I'm like, I didn't do anythingwrong.
I still did something wrongbecause I ended up in this
situation.
How did I get there?
And that becomes a thing tothink about.
Like, what did I do?
What steps can I take to notfind myself there again?
And you do it.
And I do it.
And I thank you.
I thank you guys for allowing meto kind of talk out loud here on
(21:57):
the podcast.
I thank you guys for allowing meto write my thoughts and share
my family with you.
I thank you for, I don't know,everything.
Just making this the life I'vealways wanted to live.
I appreciate it and I appreciateall of you.
And I'm trying to think, 19.
So Merry Christmas if youcelebrate Christmas.
If you celebrate anything else,merry everything, happy
(22:18):
everything.
Just have a happy end of theyear.
I say it all.
When we're coming up on actualChristmas, I say Merry
Christmas, but holidays, I don'tknow.
Celebrate everything.
This is the time of year that nomatter who you are, where you
are, what you celebrate, youknow to be reflective and you
know to look back on all you'vedone.
So hopefully you're lookingback.
You enjoy the year.
And if not, next year will bebetter.
(22:38):
And that does it for me.
Do me a favor, follow me onsocial media, hi James Gutman,
H-I-James Gutman.
I am everywhere.
TikTok, Instagram, uh Woofer, aswe said earlier.
You name it, we got it.
Thank you.
Until next time, this is JamesGutman saying, Be well.
Bye bye.
I'm dead.
Hi Pod, it's James Gutman.
Welcome back to another editionof the show.
It's Friday.
It's the best day of the week.
It is December the 19th.
It is one of the best Fridays ofthe year.
We are on the road to, well, NewYear's, the road to Christmas,
the road to fresh beginnings,new starts, and 2026.
I appreciate you guys taking thetime to check it out, to join
me.
Whether you found me onHiPodOndad.com or any of the
(01:14):
streaming services, I appreciateit.
Audible, Apple Podcasts, I don'tknow, iHeartRadio.
We can make them up.
Maybe you found me on uh onWoofer.
I don't know.
It's I'm everywhere.
You name it.
We've had this podcast.
Thank you so much.
The same thing with the book.
If you guys want to pick it up,Hi World I'm Dad, my book.
I don't promote it a lot.
It's on Amazon, it's on Spotify,it's on everything.
(01:36):
So grab it.
Thank you.
I appreciate the support.
Got that out of the way.
But yeah, man, it's been a yearof learning.
It's been a year of awakenings.
It's been a year of lifelessons.
I think I've talked about this.
You guys may have even noticedthis week.
If you go to highblogomdad.comwhere everything I've written
(01:57):
about autism awareness,appreciation, all this stuff is
all on there since 2017.
I was thinking about it today.
I've written twice a week forabout eight years.
We're closing in, and eacharticle is about a thousand
words.
So we're closing in on themillion-word mark soon of what
I've written for this situation.
(02:18):
I love it.
I love being able to do it.
I love getting to go back andwatching, you know, Lucas and
Olivia grow up.
So it's been fantastic.
But if you went tohighblogomdad.com this week, you
saw that I wrote about myselfand kind of a different spin on
things on Wednesday.
I haven't done this in a while,where I wrote about kind of
being a single dad in mysituation.
(02:38):
I have a 17-year-old daughter, Ihave a 14-year-old nonverbal
son.
My house runs great.
You know, I'm not one of thesedads where, you know, where do
we keep the peanut butter?
I'm not, I'm not a sitcom dadfrom Nick Jr., you know what I'm
saying?
Which used to make me reallyannoyed.
The way dads are depicted on TV,this is a side rant, on TV and
movies and commercials, itdrives me crazy.
(03:00):
Even as a kid, there were twodifferent commercials that I'm
going to complain about rightnow, real quick.
Uh, the first one was RingAround the Collar commercial,
right?
Um, I don't know if it was aboutRing Around the Collar, it was
about stains in the laundry.
And it was a guy, and he's outwith his family, he's out with
his wife, and the wife spillssomething like on her shirt or
(03:22):
on her pants or something.
And she goes, Oh no.
And they go to the husband, andI swear to God, the husband
goes, Saw y'all wash them, likethat.
Not exactly, saw y'all washthem.
And she like rolls her eyes,like, what a goober.
And even as a kid, I rememberbeing like, What the hell?
Like, why do they depict thisguy like that?
That's the dad.
(03:43):
The other one, and this one,this one hits me at my core.
Um, it might not affect you asmuch.
It's a commercial.
Check this out.
Because there's so much missingcontext here, and all the
context is terrible.
It's a dad, I assume he's a dad,and he's sitting on a couch or
on a chair, and he's watchingtelevision.
And he's like, Oh, he's gotgrayer hair, you know, kind of
(04:03):
like me.
And these two little girls walkinto the room, and one of them
goes, Dad, it's time.
And the two of them present tohim just for men hair dye, as if
they are presenting the holygrail.
And the other one goes, We thinkyou'd make a really good catch
for someone.
And I'm like, This is before Ieven had the gray hairs that I
(04:26):
have, which by the way, I likemy gray hairs, but it's before I
even had them.
And I remember, what the there'sno context.
You don't know if his wife isdead or what the hell.
But the the idea of thecommercial is nobody's gonna
want you with your nasty grayhair.
So at the end of the day,gray-haired dads not always
depicted the best in media andthings like that.
(04:47):
So I think sometimes people havethis idea that dads need to be
saved.
We need to be helped.
We don't know how to doanything.
Now, granted, I'm not the bestwhen it comes to colors, and
I'll go, which sounds insane tosay out loud, but you know, I go
to my daughter and I'll be like,Do these match?
And she'd be like, that's gray.
That doesn't match.
I'd be like, isn't this blue?
She'd be like, oh my God, daddy.
The amount of times I've heard,oh my god, daddy, like, I don't
(05:10):
know.
To me, maybe there is somethingwrong.
Who knows?
But that's about the extent ofit.
I keep my house clean, I keep mykids fed, I have Lucas on a
schedule like clockwork, boom,boom, boom, boom.
So I wrote on Wednesday abouthow I'm looking in my life as a
single dad for the person who'sgonna come in and be a part of
our group.
Um, and this was not a call toaction where I'm like, I'm
(05:32):
searching all over.
I might have found it, might nothave found it.
I don't talk too in-depth aboutthose things.
I do know that I've had in mytime relationships and people
that I've I've been around andI've learned, man.
I'm I'm in my late 40s.
I've learned what I don't want,what I don't want to have in my
life.
And I've talked about it, andyou guys kind of know it too,
which is what's funny, becauseI've talked openly about having
(05:53):
my heart surgery and wantingpeace and serenity now, you
know?
That's my whole goal.
Um, and I feel like a lot oftimes the readers know this more
than these people who come intomy life and are supposed to know
it.
People will pretend too.
Oh, I'm very chill.
You know, okay.
All right, that lasts for whattime is it?
So I wrote a little bit aboutdoing this because I never
(06:14):
really address it.
I never really talk about it.
For years, people would write tome when I was still married and
I was writing the blog.
And if you guys noticed, Ididn't mention my wife a lot.
And I had a rule.
If she's there for somethingthat we did, she would be in the
story.
But I would never, I would neverpurposely not include her, but
she had to actually be a part ofthe story.
I wouldn't make it up.
But between that and I don'tknow, I mentioned, you know, a
(06:37):
past girlfriend who had been apart of of some of the blog
posts in the past who is nowcornfielded away.
I wanted to at least give anupdate, give you guys an idea,
because this is something thatI've I've gotten emails from
people and people have asked meabout it because there are other
single parents in the situationthat I'm in.
And the way that I raise my sonis unique.
(06:59):
And it's to the point where whenI first started dating, I
thought, you know, well, Ishould find people who have, you
know, children like Lucas.
And I find that in some ways,sometimes, that's almost a
harder fit to make becausepeople like that already have
their own views on how theyraise their kid.
And I had said before, I'munique.
So I'm not going to come in andchange your entire life.
(07:21):
You're not going to change myentire life with it.
In many ways, it's easier tofind somebody who doesn't that
can follow my lead andunderstand what we're doing, or
in the very least, not insist onthings, not insist that I raise
my daughter a certain way, notinsist that I raise my son a
certain way.
I do my thing.
We have a good rhythm.
We're happy.
I'm looking for someone in mylife to share this world with
(07:46):
me, not somebody to complete itor to be, you know, my kids,
they have a mom.
They, you know, I don't need amom.
Like we're just, we're good togo.
And that I thought, especiallytowards the end of the year, I
just had the heart surgeryanniversary.
And you guys know too, I get alittle, you know, all up in his
feelings.
So I'm on to come on there andkind of address it.
Um, and I appreciate it.
(08:06):
And the the feedback is alwaysgreat from everybody.
It makes me really happy.
It makes me happy that I startedthis blog.
You guys know before I did thisblog, I used to, you know, write
about pro wrestling, and thefans are rabid and nuts.
Nuts for wrestling fans.
I mean, you want to have anexample of it.
(08:27):
I've said this example a milliontimes.
Try writing an article andsaying that Jake the Snake
Roberts fought Rick the ModelMartell at WrestleMania 6
instead of seven, and peoplewill literally write to you and
tell you how stupid you are.
I wrote a thousand words and Igot the wrong WrestleMania
number in there, which I knewthe right one.
I just put the wrong numberdown.
You know, I knew right away youwere the dumbest person.
(08:49):
I'm like, oh my God, why did Iwrite this?
They're not like that anymore.
They're not like that with thisblog.
Once in a while, I'll get atroll, I'll get somebody, but no
man, people for the most partare, you know, nice and kind.
It's cool.
This past week, too, I got achance to kind of drift back
into the wrestling world.
You guys know I have a friendover at New York News Day, and
every time a wrestling storycomes, he contacts me.
(09:10):
Can we quote you?
I'm like, you know it's been 10years, right?
But I love it.
I love getting to do it.
So I talked a little bit McFoleythis week.
Um, that made me happy.
And the feedback from that wasgreat.
So you guys are uh just really afantastic, fantastic group of
people reading the blog, and Iappreciate it.
And that's why I wanted to dothis one special today, because
uh there's something, you know,again, it's unique, right?
(09:31):
Like, so I raise my son in aunique way, I look at it at a
unique, you know, point of view.
Christmas is coming up.
And I gotta be honest, Lucasdoesn't care about Christmas.
My son is nonverbal with severeautism.
So he doesn't care about Elf ona Shelf, and he doesn't care
(09:51):
about Santa Claus, and hedoesn't care about opening
gifts, and he doesn't care aboutum, you know, decorating the
tree.
But he does all those things forus.
He stands by and he helps and hesmiles and he poses and I love
him for it.
So when the holidays come, theleast I can do is make it
(10:12):
something for him that is goingto put his best foot forward.
I don't have to put food on atable at eye level for him and
expect him to resist thetemptation to shove his face
into it all day.
Granted, big boy, Lucas, don'tdo that.
You shouldn't do that.
I got it.
But for one day, maybe hedoesn't get you know corrected
(10:32):
over and over again.
Maybe we take the food, we putit on a higher shelf.
If he wants to go lay in hisroom while people are over, go
lay in your room, Lucas.
You're allowed, thank you somuch for being a part of this,
as opposed to, oh, sit down, bigboy, big boy sits at the table.
No, man, it's his holiday too.
And I want to give him that.
I want to give him the samerespect that he gives us.
(10:56):
And that at the end of the day,that's autism appreciation, and
that's the back and forth thatI've had with my son this whole
time.
I've told the story a milliontimes about the first day that I
started like this journeytowards appreciating who my son
was.
And it was right after thesurgery.
I was sitting on the couch,incapacitated pretty much,
(11:18):
watching him pull a toy phone inand out from underneath the
chair while watching it in themirror.
And for the first time ever, Ididn't correct him.
I didn't pick up the phone andshow him how we properly play
with a phone.
I did what he was doing, and Ilet him watch me and he hugged
me after seeing me do thisbecause for the first time
somebody was playing a toy withhis rules, as opposed to
(11:43):
correcting him.
For the first time, somebody wasentering his world instead of
pulling him into ours, and heappreciated it.
And I've built this relationshipwith my son through that,
through that idea of I'm askingthings of him, let me do things
for him, right?
(12:03):
We all want things to be the waythey are.
We have, you know, all thesenotions about how they should
be.
Then you have a boy like minewho kind of throws everything on
its ear.
Lucas doesn't open presents,doesn't like to do it.
So you could wrap a present, butthen like even if you give it to
him, go open the present.
He'll maybe like, he'll look atme, he'll like pull on it a
little bit.
He doesn't really care.
(12:23):
Even if he opens it up, andhere's the thing, too, that gets
people if he opens it up, evenif it's something he really
wants, he doesn't really react.
He no sells it.
It's a wrestling term, like TheUndertaker, just kind of like no
expression, doesn't care.
Uh once in a while you get himsomething he really wants.
Like this year, it's anothertablet.
I get this kid kind of similarthings every year just because I
(12:44):
know that he's gonna love it.
So he might react to that alittle bit.
It has to be out of the box.
He won't look at the box and belike, oh, there's a tablet in
here.
He won't care.
And I understand that.
But we've had people show up atour house and insist that he
opens the present in front ofthem and then react in a weird
way that he's not like jumpingfor joy.
And it's like, hey, Karen, Itold you he's not gonna care.
(13:07):
But that's the respect, andthat's what we let him do.
Choose what he wants to do, bewho he wants to be.
Lucas is uh different with methan he is anywhere else.
And I've earned this, and I willstand by this and I will tell
you how proud I am of this.
Lucas, I've heard in othersituations with other people,
(13:32):
will throw himself at food.
I wrote an article years ago.
One of the earliest kind ofviral things that we wrote here
on the blog was an articlecalled I'm sorry my kid drank
your coffee.
I loved it.
It was one of my favorite onesbecause it was real, and it was
about Lucas' propensity forstealing people's food in
public, grabbing someone's drinkoff a table and drinking it.
(13:53):
And I'm like, oh my God, oh mygod, he has hepatitis now.
It was always that worry oflike, and then you apologize,
you're paying for coffees, andlike he shouldn't drink coffee
anyway, now he's up all night.
That happened, and it doesn'thappen with me anymore, but it
still happens elsewhere.
And I get these stories andthese secondhand accounts about
him acting in a way that almostsounds like Back to the Future.
(14:16):
It's like he gets in theDeLorean, he went back in time
and stole a donut off of atable.
Who does that?
He doesn't do that.
And I remember the first timewhere I felt like, oh, I've made
good choices with this kid.
And it was a few years ago, itwas at Easter.
Me, him, Olivia, we went to thisbig buffet on Long Island, uh,
(14:39):
Millridge Inn.
Wasn't that great?
Wasn't the Millridge Inn?
I don't want to get thempublicity.
I didn't like it.
It was terrible.
Don't go to the Millridge Inn.
It was a different place.
But we had gone and it was thisbig hall of tables, and
everyone's kind of wedged in.
It was like being at a weddingreception, but they were like,
How many tables could we get inhere for this buffet?
And when we walked to the table,we were literally walking
(15:01):
through chairs where my son wasat most two feet away from
someone's plate.
All he had to do was reach hisarm out, and he could just grab
French toast or whatever offpeople's plates.
And he didn't do it at all.
The whole walk through, hedidn't try to take one piece of
food.
I got up to go to the buffet andI told Olivia, I said, Can you
(15:24):
sit with him and just watch him,make sure he's okay?
And I walked away, and I'm like,okay, there is going to be a
catastrophe.
And there wasn't.
He was an angel, and he was anangel because he's learned with
me to act a certain way.
Certain things are expected.
And most of all, and here'swhat's most important he's gonna
(15:44):
get everything he wants with meall in due time.
When I tell him wait, the thingthat I tell him to wait for is
always coming.
If he wants like a piece ofpizza, he goes, he comes over,
he uses a device pizza, I'mlike, all right, buddy, just can
you wait?
Wait, I put the hand up, wait.
He might go, uh he does thatkind of like a little whine, a
little side swipe, but he leavesand he comes back and he gets
(16:06):
pizza.
And that's always been thepayoff.
He knows my dad might tell me tohold on a second, but he's gonna
get it for me.
I don't forget, I don't ignore.
If he can't have it, I tell himno, and I try to explain why,
even if I don't think heunderstands every word.
And that I think is probably themost important part of it all.
(16:28):
Explain everything.
Even if you think your kidunderstands nothing, explain
everything.
Every word.
Just talk, talk out loud, talkout loud all day.
And I promise you, at least withmy son, there are things that he
just gets.
He knows certain words, and I'mlike, oh, he gets it.
Like I could turn around to himas he's getting dressed, and
(16:49):
I'll be like, all right, butwe're gonna get your socks on,
your shoes after we're done, andhe'll leave and go get his socks
and shoes.
And I'm I'm thinking to myself,I didn't even realize that he
was picking that up.
It all goes back.
There was one specific day whereit happened.
I was in his room and I wasgetting him like ready for the
day.
And I'm talking to myself.
He was young, and I'm talking tomyself kind of under my breath
(17:12):
because it's early, I'm tired, Ihave a lot going on.
I'm like, all right, buddy,let's get this on, get your
pants on.
Oh my God.
All right, we're gonna, allright, give you some breakfast.
And we're just we'll go, we'llgo wash your hands, and then
we'll do breakfast.
It'll be all right.
And as soon as I'm done talking,he runs out of the room.
And I'm like, oh my God.
Now I gotta go get him, I gottago find this kid.
(17:33):
I'm just kind of like justannoyed.
And I walk out into the hallway,and he's standing in front of
the sink in the bathroom withthe water running, looking at me
over his shoulder, like, let'sgo.
And I was like, You got that?
Like you understood that?
I didn't enunciate becausethere's a lot, man.
When you have a nonverbal kid,you do a lot of pantomime.
You know, there's a lot of, hey,buddy, we're gonna go out, and
(17:55):
then after we're gonna go washyour hands.
And you guys can't see me rightnow, but I'm doing the whole,
you know, like I'm doing theYMCA right now.
Like it's it's all like handmotions or whatever.
This wasn't that.
This was simply like, all right,but I'm gonna wash your hands.
Like I barely said it out loud.
And since I've done it so oftenand he's listened so much, he
got it.
(18:16):
My kid knows to listen to mebecause he knows that I'm giving
him information that he needs,and he might not get every word
of it, but there is importantthings in there.
And then on top of it, too, andit's the line that I've used
over and over again.
I talked to him when I didn'tthink he understood.
I read to him when I didn'tthink he cared, and I showed him
love when I didn't think he knewwhat that meant.
(18:38):
And that's what's important.
That's what you have to do witha boy like mine.
It makes the holidays easier, itmakes life easier.
I don't know, and if there's onething that I I really hope
people take away from my blog,it's that it's really not as
hard as I thought it was gonnabe.
Don't get me wrong, I'm gonnapreface everything I say because
(19:01):
it's important.
I don't know your kid.
Maybe it's harder with your kid,right?
I don't know.
I'm not sitting here, I'm notlike, oh my god's great.
I'm just telling you what I didthat worked.
And I will tell you this.
And I know people hear thepodcast now and they read the
blog and they hear about myrelationship with him, and they
think, oh, he's always beengreat with it wasn't.
(19:22):
When Lucas was a baby, I thoughthe was never gonna know
anything.
It's awful to say, and it hurtsto say, and it's hard to say.
But I genuinely didn't think hewas ever going to know anything.
I didn't think he'd know myname.
I didn't think he'd be able tolook up, I didn't think he'd be
able to do anything.
And every step of the way, Itreated him like he was my age.
(19:46):
We would just talk and I wouldjust like talk at him in the
car.
We'd laugh.
If he laughed, I would laughwith him, I would play games the
way he wanted to play them.
I would try to follow his leadon certain things, I would give
him respect.
If he had a meltdown, I wouldsit with him.
He He knew and he knows that I'mon his side.
Always, just like his sisterknows.
He has a neurotypical sister,and I I give the two of them the
(20:09):
exact same respect.
It doesn't matter if heacknowledges it, it doesn't
matter if he gets it.
I just kept doing it.
And now, today at 14, does heunderstand everything?
No.
I just wrote a blog about that,I think on Monday, actually.
He doesn't understand everythingI say.
He doesn't get everything I say,but that's fine.
Because the things that he doesunderstand are important.
(20:30):
And the one thing that he neededto understand that he does is
trust.
He trusts me.
He knows that Dad has his back.
And that if Dad tells him no tocookies, it's because there's a
reason.
He's going to have more cookieslater.
He's going to have it at adifferent time.
If dad says to wait, what he'swaiting for is going to come.
And that's it.
And that's what makes us happy.
(20:51):
And that's what life is like.
And that's why I know this year,Christmas and the holidays and
everything.
It's always going to go well.
I am the luckiest.
I'm the luckiest man on earth,man.
I got a second chance to comeback and live my life in 2012
after my surgery.
And I was able to rewrite it inthe best possible way.
(21:13):
I was able to, you know, alterthe trajectory of my life.
I was able to not only welcomepeople in, but then also get
life lessons from that.
And when things weren't right,see it and understand it.
Every negative thing that's everhappened to me has been good
because it's taught me somethingabout myself.
In the very least, and I thinkI've said this before too.
(21:35):
Even if there's a situation thatI'm like 100% right about where
I'm like, I didn't do anythingwrong.
I still did something wrongbecause I ended up in this
situation.
How did I get there?
And that becomes a thing tothink about.
Like, what did I do?
What steps can I take to notfind myself there again?
And you do it.
And I do it.
And I thank you.
I thank you guys for allowing meto kind of talk out loud here on
(21:57):
the podcast.
I thank you guys for allowing meto write my thoughts and share
my family with you.
I thank you for, I don't know,everything.
Just making this the life I'vealways wanted to live.
I appreciate it and I appreciateall of you.
And I'm trying to think, 19.
So Merry Christmas if youcelebrate Christmas.
If you celebrate anything else,merry everything, happy
(22:18):
everything.
Just have a happy end of theyear.
I say it all.
When we're coming up on actualChristmas, I say Merry
Christmas, but holidays, I don'tknow.
Celebrate everything.
This is the time of year that nomatter who you are, where you
are, what you celebrate, youknow to be reflective and you
know to look back on all you'vedone.
So hopefully you're lookingback.
You enjoy the year.
And if not, next year will bebetter.
(22:38):
And that does it for me.
Do me a favor, follow me onsocial media, hi James Gutman,
H-I-James Gutman.
I am everywhere.
TikTok, Instagram, uh Woofer, aswe said earlier.
You name it, we got it.
Thank you.
Until next time, this is JamesGutman saying, Be well.
Bye bye.
I'm dead.
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