January 29, 2025 • 24 mins
In this week’s episode of TUF, we explore the delicate balance of being a “safe space” for your children while maintaining boundaries and guiding them toward growth. Inspired by personal parenting moments—like late-night visits from scared little ones—we dive into the importance of providing emotional safety without over-validating irrational fears.
As a millennial dad, I share my thoughts on why it’s essential to support our kids through their emotions, acknowledge their fears, and still help them develop resilience and independence. From navigating the challenges of tough love to avoiding common pitfalls of “gentle parenting,” this episode tackles the nuanced role of being a parent kids can turn to in their toughest moments.
Key topics include:
- Exploring the concept of being a safe space for children
- Personal reflections on handling kids’ nighttime fears
- The balance between validating fears and promoting strength
- Navigating discipline within a nurturing framework
- The importance of not dismissing children's concerns
- Implications of children seeking help outside the home
- Handling personal slip-ups and the power of apologies
- Building a trusting parent-child relationship
Whether you’re a new parent or a seasoned one, this episode is a candid, unfiltered look at modern parenting’s ups and downs. Tune in and join the conversation!
👉 Don’t forget to subscribe, share your thoughts, and let me know what topics you want to hear next!
Send a message about the episode!
https://linktr.ee/unhingedfather
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, everyone welcome in.
Hope you're all having afantastic day so far, having a
great week, hope 2025 is stilloff to a good start for you, and
that you're making sometraction on whatever goals you
put into place.
I'm not a huge fan of NewYear's resolutions, but if you
made them, I hope that you'resticking with them.
Being a better parent, gettingin shape, stopping so much,
whatever it is that you've got,hope that you're on track with.
(00:21):
With that, I personally am notwith a lot of the things that I
wanted to do like.
One of them was actuallyplanning out the episodes and
not just free balling it everyweek the day before I'm gonna
release the fucking episode, butat least I'm staying true to
releasing one per week and I'mgonna.
I'm gonna stick with that, butgot a good episode or at least a
(00:43):
good concept plan for you today.
I'm going to try and make sureI don't go completely off the
fucking tracks with this one.
That being said, before we getgoing, I ask for it at the end
of each episode with whateverthe automatic thing that I say
in the beginning, at the end butif you're listening, if you're
a regular listener, you enjoythe show and you've got
(01:03):
something that you'd like me totalk about, please hit that
little.
Send me a message about thisepisode.
Let me know what you thinkabout the episode.
Let me know if there's anythingthat you want me to touch upon
in other episodes.
Whatever it is, you can alsoshoot me an email.
All the links are provided onthe website or on the Instagram
page, but I'm definitely lookingfor what you guys want to
(01:29):
listen to, since I am seeingthat there are a couple of
regular listeners out there, andI really appreciate you guys
and want to make sure thatwhatever I'm talking about is
relevant and pertinent and notjust whatever the fuck is going
on my life at this point in time.
That being said, let's go aheadand jump into what I wanted to
talk about today, and it's kindof funny, it's.
This has been something thatI've thought about for quite
some time being a parent andjust having my own parents
growing up and some of thethings that I went through when
(01:49):
I was a kid not to say that myparents were terrible, but we
all have different things thatwe go through when we're growing
up.
My son, my elder son he's fiveand a half.
Sometimes he'll get scared atnight and he'll come crawl into
my room with us or crawl intobed, and I remember that I used
to do that when I was young too.
I would get scared in my roomby myself and either go lay on
(02:11):
the floor next to my parents'bed or go tell them that I was
scared.
Whatever it was, I would go tothem because I was scared, and
it's definitely super annoyingas a parent to be woken up and
sometimes a little scary.
My son the other night he cameup to me, grabbed me by the neck
to climb into bed and woke mefrom my sleep.
(02:34):
I already tend to wake up in avery defensive way.
I've jumped out of bed beforethinking that there was an
intruder in the house.
There was no one there, I wasjust dreaming and I went
straight into the wall, my headwent through the drywall and I
had to patch it up before wesold that house.
It was a thing my wife's beenscared ever since that.
(02:54):
I'm just going to absolutelydemolish one of our kids when
they wake me up in the middle ofthe night because I'm a
psychopath.
That being said, he came in andhe grabbed me by the neck.
I woke up a little defensive,but I realized it was him with
his little hands, pulled himinto bed, gave him a hug, picked
him up, walked him down to hisroom, rubbed his head, told him
it was time to go back to sleepit was about one in the morning
(03:16):
laid down next to the bed nextto him for a little bit and
waited for him to fall backasleep.
And then I went back to bed,fell asleep and that was that.
But it got me thinking aboutthis concept of safe spaces, but
not the way that you thinkabout it.
In today's society, you alwayshear people talk about like, oh,
I need a safe space.
Or in college, someone has adiffering opinion and they're
(03:37):
like oh, I need my safe space.
These people are attacking mewith their different ideas and
their logic and reason,attacking me with their
different ideas and their logicand reason.
It's not that type of safespace that I'm talking about.
It's being a parent and being asafe space for your kids, being
a place where they go whenthey're scared or where they're
in a place where they'redysregulated and they don't know
(03:58):
what to do, and so they come toyou, they rely on you and
you're that place that they cango to for safety, for comfort,
for whatever it is that theyneed in that moment.
And I've got that with my kidsright now, thankfully.
I could obviously fuck this upin the future.
I don't want to fuck this up inthe future, but it's just
something to be mindful of.
(04:20):
This concept of being our kid'ssafe space is something that I
really like, and I wanted tojust kind of go into a couple of
different things with thattoday.
As I think about it and Irealize that I have differing
feelings when it comes to thisconcept of the safe space
because, as we talked about inlast week's episode and previous
episodes is that I do thinkthat we should be pushing our
(04:42):
kids to strive towards greatness, that we should be helping our
kids grow up, that we shouldhave tough love, that we should
let them know when they're doingsomething wrong, and that we
can't just sit there and affirmeverything that they say or let
them do whatever the fuck theywant.
We can't let them sit there andbe these little tyrants.
(05:03):
Kids don't know what they want,they have irrational fears,
they have all these other thingsthat go along with them.
But at the same time, you canbe that I can be the dad who has
tough love.
I can be the dad who's pushingmy kids towards greatness,
towards being a good person,towards constantly improving,
(05:24):
but also be the person that theycome to when they don't feel
safe.
I don't have to be a dick topush them forward.
I don't have to be a fuckingcocksucker who's always just
sitting there ragging on my kids.
Or, if they come to me andthey're afraid of something, be
like oh you're stupid, there'snothing to be afraid of.
And invalidating their fear,because even though there may
not be a fear, that or whateverthey're afraid of, that that may
(05:44):
not be real, right, they'reafraid of the boogeyman.
Obviously you're not going tobe like, oh, the boogeyman's
real and dad's going to kick theshit out of it.
You don't want to validate thefear that they've got, but you
also don't want to invalidatethe feelings that they've got,
because I remember when I was akid and I was scared, shitless,
like it didn't matter whatanyone told me, my mind wasn't
ready to believe that that wastrue, and I can still be fearful
(06:05):
of it.
It's just like today.
I mean, I'm afraid of heights,I'm afraid of flying.
I don't like doing that shit Isflying relatively safe, 100%,
doesn't matter.
What the fuck you say to meDoesn't matter.
If you tell me that turbulenceis completely normal, I don't
fucking care.
I don't care at all.
I'm still afraid of it.
And why would I expect my kidsto be any different with fears
(06:26):
that are just as quote unquoteirrational?
So yeah, I just don't want itto get conflated that what I'm
talking about today, in terms ofbeing a safe space for your
kids, being a place where theycome to you when they're afraid,
with letting them do whateverthey want, or validating things
that are completely irrational,or telling them like, oh, this
is true or I don't know, justnot being apparent about it,
(06:49):
just letting them run rampant,letting their imagination run
rampant and letting them havethese fears and let them
continue growing.
You can be somewhere in themiddle to where you can try to
squish the fears but, at thesame time, just hold them and
let them know, hey, it's okay.
And that's what I try to doquite a bit.
(07:10):
Not in a lot of other areas ofmy life.
I really struggle with empathyand being gentle in so many
other aspects of my life, butwhen it comes to my kids, for
some reason I don't know if it'sbecause I'm able to look back
and see the little kid that Iwas, a little scared kid that I
was and the fact that I had togrow up a little bit quicker
when it came to those fears.
I was constantly scared ofthings.
(07:31):
People made fun of me.
Parents made fun of me forcertain things.
Parents tried to scare me andit almost forced me to kind of
grow this tough exterior inorder to not feel those things,
to not be afraid to fall in linein what society or what my
family or what others thoughtthat I should be With me and
(07:52):
with my kids.
I personally think that creatinga safe space and being the
person that they come to and notbeing the one that they have to
worry about we already have aton of shit we need to worry
about in this life.
There's plenty of people outthere that are going this life.
There's plenty of people outthere.
They're going to fucking scareus.
Plenty of people out there thatare going to try and tear us
down.
Plenty of people that are goingto try and poke holes in us and
(08:12):
what we do.
The world is full of slings andarrows and I know this, I know
it's true, and I don't need tobe an additional sling and arrow
for my kid.
I don't need to be anadditional obstacle for them or
an additional hardship to them,because they're going to already
have a tough enough time goingthrough life as it is.
So why would I add additionalpressure, additional stress and
(08:34):
be an additional obstacle forthem in these things, as opposed
to being the loving parentthat's there to help them guide
through these things?
But then, at the same time, theycan come to me with their fears
, with their concerns, with allthese things, because if they're
not bringing them to me,they're going to take them
somewhere.
They're either going tointernalize them and have issues
(08:55):
that pop up later in lives.
They're going to take it totheir friends, who are going to
guide them in the wrongdirection.
Shit in a scary world.
They may take it to an adult,another adult who you don't know
, who you don't trust, who canguide them in a completely,
absolutely terrible direction,just away from you, away from
family, away from love.
And that's a huge concern ofmine is that if I'm not the
(09:19):
space that my kids bring theirconcerns, bring their fears, who
are they going to?
Where are they going to?
Are they going to the internet?
Are they going to another adultthey go into?
I don't know.
I'm not sure where they wouldbe going and luckily, right now,
like my kids are young and, asI've said, I am a safe space for
my kids right now they come tome, they come to me with those
(09:41):
when they're afraid.
They cry for dad or mom,sometimes too.
Obviously you know, me and mywife are a team, but I'm just
speaking about me directly.
Right now they come to us, theygive us a hug, they bury
themselves deep in my chest andmaybe it's the part of me that
thinks that I'm a superhero andwants to be the big, strong
protector that just relishes inthe fact that when they don't
(10:05):
feel safe, they come to me and Ican wrap my arms around them or
give them a hug or give them akiss, and that just helps so
much to make them feel relieved,to feel like they're safe again
and to feel like they can turnaround and face whatever the
issues are.
And don't get me wrong, therehave been times where I've
violated this trust or thisquote unquote safe space that
(10:26):
I've tried to create for them.
There have been times where myeldest gets you know he's at
that age, he's five, five and ahalf.
This is where they startpushing buttons and try to be
annoying and they got the weirdvoices and they say weird shit
that they're picking up fromschool.
And there have been times whereI've yelled at him, I've gotten
gruff, I've raised my voicequite a bit, told him he's doing
(10:49):
something bad and I can see thepoints in where he's actually
afraid of me and luckily Ihaven't done it too much where
he's like legit afraid of me.
There have been maybe one ortwo times where I've raised my
voice a little too loud and beena little too intimidating,
which it doesn't help that I'malready larger than most adult
males and have been told that Ihave a presence that can be
(11:11):
intimidating sometimes Not mywords other people.
That doesn't necessarily help,especially with young children.
I don't realize that myintensity is already like it at
this level and so if I just geta little bit more angry or a
little bit more animated, it'slike I've taken the fucking
intensity from a, from like asix, five, six up to like an 11.
(11:34):
Just took that dial, turned itto 11.
But I'm lucky because I've grownup and have learned that I do
have a short fuse and I can getangry, and I've had to become
more and more aware of the factthat that has a bigger impact on
my kids than it does otherpeople or I'm sure I have a big
impact on other people as well,but I just don't give a shit as
(11:56):
much with other people or withmy kids.
I really care because I never,ever want my kids to be afraid
of me.
I don't want them to withdrawfrom me with their fears, with
their hopes, with anything.
I want my kids to be able tocome to me for anything that
they need Now.
That doesn't mean that we'renot able to still have
discipline and still haveboundaries and still help guide
(12:21):
them along the way.
I think a lot of times with manymillennial parents or gentle
quote unquote gentle parents orwhatever the fuck you want to
call it nowadays I don't reallygive a shit about the titles,
but anyone who's a mindfulparent I feel like sometimes
it's very easy to go down thepath of just letting them do
what they want, validating thefears or like saying like oh
(12:44):
yeah, that's really scary.
Or you're afraid of theboogeyman?
Oh yeah, I'd be afraid of theboogeyman too.
Instead of being like, hey, theboogeyman's not real, but I
know that you're afraid rightnow, and it's okay to be afraid,
you validate that emotion asbeing something that's okay,
that's rational, withoutverifying that whatever they're
afraid of is real or that it'ssomething that they should be
(13:07):
afraid of, and that happens in alot of areas.
I feel like today I don't haveany data to back that up,
besides the fact that I justkind of see how people raise and
treat their kids and a lot ofthe things that I see from Insta
psychologists, insta moms,insta dads on validate, verify
whatever your kids are feelingor whatever they're going with.
(13:29):
That's what it is.
Kids know what's going on.
Your job is to be a safe space,but also to be a guiding hand
with the kids and take them downthis path and help them find
the right way.
And you may not know the rightway.
When I say the right way, thereis no objective right and wrong
in a lot of the things thatwe're going to come across.
(13:50):
It's more so just how you wereraised, the type of person you
are and the way that you feellike is the best to guide them
through this world andultimately, my hope with all of
this is not just for them tocome to me in the middle of the
night.
Or, you know my son.
He's a procrastinator.
He's just like his father.
He's a huge procrastinator.
(14:10):
He's even better at me in someinstances, and bedtime is one of
those times where he is amaster procrastinator.
He will find any reason not togo to bed whatsoever and he's a
person of habit and routines andso if you do something one time
, he latches onto it and hewants to do that routine again.
(14:31):
But I was kind of thinking aboutthere was a night where he was
hungry and he wanted a snack andit was bedtime but it wasn't
too late to where he couldn'tstay up a little bit longer.
And so instead of being likenope, you go to bed hungry, you
didn't eat enough for yourdinner or you should have eaten
more dinner if you didn't wantto be hungry, we let him stay up
(14:52):
with us.
We let him stay up.
I was cleaning the dishes.
His mom was, you know, doingsomething else in the in the
kitchen and we got him somepeanut butter pretzels or
something like that Peanutbutters and apples.
It doesn't really matter whatit was, and he got to sit down
and sit there with us and andhave his snack and drink some
milk and then, you know, brushhis teeth and all that stuff.
But it was just such a differentinteraction because he felt
(15:17):
safe enough, he felt comfortableenough to come to us with the
fact that he was hungry and itwasn't anything that he had done
wrong, he was just still hungryand he was getting to that age
it was like right at thattransition period where he was
kind of starting to stay up alittle bit later and also
starting to eat more food.
I think it was when he was likefour years old.
So we were starting to thinklike, hey, he might need these
(15:39):
nighttime snacks to help himstay satiated until he's waking
up in the morning.
Anyways, it was just nice tofeel like he felt comfortable
enough to come to me as his dad,to come to his mom, to come to
the people that are like thedisciplinarians, the adults, to
ask us for this and to not feelfear in asking for something
(16:02):
this simple, because I know thateven me as a kid, or people
growing up or kids out theretoday who live in not
necessarily the best situations.
They may be fearful ofretaliation or getting yelled at
or getting smacked from theirparents if they're like I'm
hungry and it's right at bedtime, or something like that, and so
(16:22):
it just felt good that he feltsafe enough to bring that to me.
And ultimately, my goal withboth of my kids or however many
kids that I have hopefully we'llhave at least one more my goal
is for them to be able to cometo me even when they might be
scared or they don't feelcomfortable.
I want them to come to me whenit matters.
(16:44):
I want to show them when it'sthese little things like getting
a snack, or they're scared atnight and they come into my room
and kind of wake me up orwhatever, or they ask me for
something that they know they'reprobably not going to get, like
when he asked me for candy orchocolate or something like that
.
I don't want to be the dad thatjust fucking blows his lid and
(17:05):
loses my shit, because that'sgoing to show them that if they
come to me with something hardor if they do something that's
wrong or not the right time orwhatever it is, they're afraid,
but it's dad sleeping.
I don't want him to lose it.
I don't want to start showingthem that stuff on these little
(17:26):
things, because that means thatwhen they're older they're
already going to be in this rutor this routine of thinking that
I can't bring these things tomy dad because he's going to
lose his shit.
He's going to of thinking thatI can't bring these things to my
dad because he's going to losehis shit.
He's going to get angry and Idon't want him to get angry at
me.
I don't want to face thoserepercussions Not necessarily
that I don't have repercussionsfor any wrongdoings they do
(17:47):
right now, but it doesn't havethis emotional burden that comes
along with it.
If dad lost his shit, dad'sdisappointed in me.
Dad fucking yelled at me.
It doesn't have all that stuffwith it.
I want them to be able to cometo me when they're older, say
they go out, they drink alcohol,their friends drink alcohol and
their friend wants to drive.
Their friend who was supposedto drive him home got drunk.
(18:09):
I want them to call me.
I want them to call me and belike dad.
I need them to call me.
I want them to call me and belike dad.
I need you to come and pick meup.
I had alcohol, I drank and ourfriend drank and I don't have a
safe way to get home.
I want them to come to me withthese hard things.
I never want them to feel likethey're not going to be loved
anymore, that I'm going to be sodisappointed or so angry.
(18:31):
I don't want to have this harshemotional reaction to when they
do things like that, becausethen they're not going to come
to me with them, especially whenit matters.
I want my kids, as adults oryoung adults or teenagers, to
trust in me and to be able toface the consequences that may
come, knowing that they're goingto have consequences, knowing
(18:52):
that there's going to besomething bad not necessarily
something bad, but like there isgoing to be a consequence to
their action.
But the consequence is notgoing to be that dad loves me
less.
The consequence is not going tobe that dad loses his shit and
yells at me and screams at meand doesn't let this go and
holds it over my head forfucking ever.
I don't want that for them, Idon't want that for me and, in
all honesty, if I do do shitlike that, like I say all the
(19:16):
time, we're constantly modelingfor our kids how we should
behave, how we should act, andwhat we're showing them is that
if we have this huge blow upreaction to something small,
especially when they're younger,it shows them that dad can't
handle these things.
I don't have the emotionalmaturity to handle the things
(19:38):
that they're bringing to thetable, that I can't handle when
they do something wrong, or thatif they are scared or they have
fears and they have questionsthat I'm not emotionally stable
enough to be the support thatthey need, I'm not the safe
space that they need in theirlives, and so it's my job as a
dad to be that to.
(19:59):
It's okay.
If we slip up, you're gonna getmad, you're going to yell,
you're going to break that trustonce in a while, it's more so
acknowledging it.
If you do do it, apologize.
There's nothing wrong withapologizing to your kids.
Apologize, repair and then tryto be that space for them.
I want that for my kids.
(20:20):
I'm a dad who loves.
I like tough love.
I'm someone who can be veryhard, very harsh.
I have disciplinariantendencies for sure, but at the
end of the day, I never want mykids to be fearful of me.
I want them to have respect forme and I want them to listen to
(20:41):
me, and I'm sure that some ofthat is going to be fear.
I'm sure a lot of people arelike, oh, they need to fear you
to respect you.
They can be your friend later.
I'm not even saying they needto be my friend.
I want my kids to know that Ihave unconditional love for them
, that I'm a safe space for themto go to and that, regardless
of whatever happens, that I willalways love them and I will
always give them the supportthey need, and that they can
(21:03):
come to me with their fears.
They can come to me with theirhopes, their dreams, their
questions, anything they have.
Dad can handle it, because dadis a stable, safe force in my
life and I don't need to goother places to look for it.
Because guess what?
I don't want my kids going toother places.
I don't know what those otherplaces are going to push on them
and I know that what I've gotmaybe not the best, but it's
(21:27):
pretty damn good.
It's led me down my life in adecent direction so far and I
want to make sure that I'mpassing that along to my kids.
So that's what I wanted to talkabout today.
I'm not sure if it was acoherent path that we went down.
I didn't have any notes todaywhatsoever, so hopefully that
that was a good episode.
(21:48):
Hopefully you guys enjoy justsome of the thoughts that are
going through my head and, likeI said, if you have anything you
want me to talk about, if youhave any comments on this
episode, click the little, sendme a message about the episode
button in the description ofthis podcast.
You could also go to theInstagram page.
Click the links.
Send me an email and if youwould like to be a guest on the
(22:11):
Unhinged Father show, or Tuff asI like to call it, just shoot
me a message.
Let me know I'm happy to havedads, moms, professional
psychologists, whatever the fuckyou are.
If you have something that youthink would contribute to other
listeners of this show, let meknow Love to have you on.
(22:32):
But that's going to do it forthis week.
I hope everyone has a good restof the day.
All right, everyone welcome in.
Hope you're all having afantastic day so far, having a
great week, hope 2025 is stilloff to a good start for you, and
that you're making sometraction on whatever goals you
put into place.
I'm not a huge fan of NewYear's resolutions, but if you
made them, I hope that you'resticking with them.
Being a better parent, gettingin shape, stopping so much,
whatever it is that you've got,hope that you're on track with.
(00:21):
With that, I personally am notwith a lot of the things that I
wanted to do like.
One of them was actuallyplanning out the episodes and
not just free balling it everyweek the day before I'm gonna
release the fucking episode, butat least I'm staying true to
releasing one per week and I'mgonna.
I'm gonna stick with that, butgot a good episode or at least a
(00:43):
good concept plan for you today.
I'm going to try and make sureI don't go completely off the
fucking tracks with this one.
That being said, before we getgoing, I ask for it at the end
of each episode with whateverthe automatic thing that I say
in the beginning, at the end butif you're listening, if you're
a regular listener, you enjoythe show and you've got
(01:03):
something that you'd like me totalk about, please hit that
little.
Send me a message about thisepisode.
Let me know what you thinkabout the episode.
Let me know if there's anythingthat you want me to touch upon
in other episodes.
Whatever it is, you can alsoshoot me an email.
All the links are provided onthe website or on the Instagram
page, but I'm definitely lookingfor what you guys want to
(01:29):
listen to, since I am seeingthat there are a couple of
regular listeners out there, andI really appreciate you guys
and want to make sure thatwhatever I'm talking about is
relevant and pertinent and notjust whatever the fuck is going
on my life at this point in time.
That being said, let's go aheadand jump into what I wanted to
talk about today, and it's kindof funny, it's.
This has been something thatI've thought about for quite
some time being a parent andjust having my own parents
growing up and some of thethings that I went through when
(01:49):
I was a kid not to say that myparents were terrible, but we
all have different things thatwe go through when we're growing
up.
My son, my elder son he's fiveand a half.
Sometimes he'll get scared atnight and he'll come crawl into
my room with us or crawl intobed, and I remember that I used
to do that when I was young too.
I would get scared in my roomby myself and either go lay on
(02:11):
the floor next to my parents'bed or go tell them that I was
scared.
Whatever it was, I would go tothem because I was scared, and
it's definitely super annoyingas a parent to be woken up and
sometimes a little scary.
My son the other night he cameup to me, grabbed me by the neck
to climb into bed and woke mefrom my sleep.
(02:34):
I already tend to wake up in avery defensive way.
I've jumped out of bed beforethinking that there was an
intruder in the house.
There was no one there, I wasjust dreaming and I went
straight into the wall, my headwent through the drywall and I
had to patch it up before wesold that house.
It was a thing my wife's beenscared ever since that.
(02:54):
I'm just going to absolutelydemolish one of our kids when
they wake me up in the middle ofthe night because I'm a
psychopath.
That being said, he came in andhe grabbed me by the neck.
I woke up a little defensive,but I realized it was him with
his little hands, pulled himinto bed, gave him a hug, picked
him up, walked him down to hisroom, rubbed his head, told him
it was time to go back to sleepit was about one in the morning
(03:16):
laid down next to the bed nextto him for a little bit and
waited for him to fall backasleep.
And then I went back to bed,fell asleep and that was that.
But it got me thinking aboutthis concept of safe spaces, but
not the way that you thinkabout it.
In today's society, you alwayshear people talk about like, oh,
I need a safe space.
Or in college, someone has adiffering opinion and they're
(03:37):
like oh, I need my safe space.
These people are attacking mewith their different ideas and
their logic and reason,attacking me with their
different ideas and their logicand reason.
It's not that type of safespace that I'm talking about.
It's being a parent and being asafe space for your kids, being
a place where they go whenthey're scared or where they're
in a place where they'redysregulated and they don't know
(03:58):
what to do, and so they come toyou, they rely on you and
you're that place that they cango to for safety, for comfort,
for whatever it is that theyneed in that moment.
And I've got that with my kidsright now, thankfully.
I could obviously fuck this upin the future.
I don't want to fuck this up inthe future, but it's just
something to be mindful of.
(04:20):
This concept of being our kid'ssafe space is something that I
really like, and I wanted tojust kind of go into a couple of
different things with thattoday.
As I think about it and Irealize that I have differing
feelings when it comes to thisconcept of the safe space
because, as we talked about inlast week's episode and previous
episodes is that I do thinkthat we should be pushing our
(04:42):
kids to strive towards greatness, that we should be helping our
kids grow up, that we shouldhave tough love, that we should
let them know when they're doingsomething wrong, and that we
can't just sit there and affirmeverything that they say or let
them do whatever the fuck theywant.
We can't let them sit there andbe these little tyrants.
(05:03):
Kids don't know what they want,they have irrational fears,
they have all these other thingsthat go along with them.
But at the same time, you canbe that I can be the dad who has
tough love.
I can be the dad who's pushingmy kids towards greatness,
towards being a good person,towards constantly improving,
(05:24):
but also be the person that theycome to when they don't feel
safe.
I don't have to be a dick topush them forward.
I don't have to be a fuckingcocksucker who's always just
sitting there ragging on my kids.
Or, if they come to me andthey're afraid of something, be
like oh you're stupid, there'snothing to be afraid of.
And invalidating their fear,because even though there may
not be a fear, that or whateverthey're afraid of, that that may
(05:44):
not be real, right, they'reafraid of the boogeyman.
Obviously you're not going tobe like, oh, the boogeyman's
real and dad's going to kick theshit out of it.
You don't want to validate thefear that they've got, but you
also don't want to invalidatethe feelings that they've got,
because I remember when I was akid and I was scared, shitless,
like it didn't matter whatanyone told me, my mind wasn't
ready to believe that that wastrue, and I can still be fearful
(06:05):
of it.
It's just like today.
I mean, I'm afraid of heights,I'm afraid of flying.
I don't like doing that shit Isflying relatively safe, 100%,
doesn't matter.
What the fuck you say to meDoesn't matter.
If you tell me that turbulenceis completely normal, I don't
fucking care.
I don't care at all.
I'm still afraid of it.
And why would I expect my kidsto be any different with fears
(06:26):
that are just as quote unquoteirrational?
So yeah, I just don't want itto get conflated that what I'm
talking about today, in terms ofbeing a safe space for your
kids, being a place where theycome to you when they're afraid,
with letting them do whateverthey want, or validating things
that are completely irrational,or telling them like, oh, this
is true or I don't know, justnot being apparent about it,
(06:49):
just letting them run rampant,letting their imagination run
rampant and letting them havethese fears and let them
continue growing.
You can be somewhere in themiddle to where you can try to
squish the fears but, at thesame time, just hold them and
let them know, hey, it's okay.
And that's what I try to doquite a bit.
(07:10):
Not in a lot of other areas ofmy life.
I really struggle with empathyand being gentle in so many
other aspects of my life, butwhen it comes to my kids, for
some reason I don't know if it'sbecause I'm able to look back
and see the little kid that Iwas, a little scared kid that I
was and the fact that I had togrow up a little bit quicker
when it came to those fears.
I was constantly scared ofthings.
(07:31):
People made fun of me.
Parents made fun of me forcertain things.
Parents tried to scare me andit almost forced me to kind of
grow this tough exterior inorder to not feel those things,
to not be afraid to fall in linein what society or what my
family or what others thoughtthat I should be With me and
(07:52):
with my kids.
I personally think that creatinga safe space and being the
person that they come to and notbeing the one that they have to
worry about we already have aton of shit we need to worry
about in this life.
There's plenty of people outthere that are going this life.
There's plenty of people outthere.
They're going to fucking scareus.
Plenty of people out there thatare going to try and tear us
down.
Plenty of people that are goingto try and poke holes in us and
(08:12):
what we do.
The world is full of slings andarrows and I know this, I know
it's true, and I don't need tobe an additional sling and arrow
for my kid.
I don't need to be anadditional obstacle for them or
an additional hardship to them,because they're going to already
have a tough enough time goingthrough life as it is.
So why would I add additionalpressure, additional stress and
(08:34):
be an additional obstacle forthem in these things, as opposed
to being the loving parentthat's there to help them guide
through these things?
But then, at the same time, theycan come to me with their fears
, with their concerns, with allthese things, because if they're
not bringing them to me,they're going to take them
somewhere.
They're either going tointernalize them and have issues
(08:55):
that pop up later in lives.
They're going to take it totheir friends, who are going to
guide them in the wrongdirection.
Shit in a scary world.
They may take it to an adult,another adult who you don't know
, who you don't trust, who canguide them in a completely,
absolutely terrible direction,just away from you, away from
family, away from love.
And that's a huge concern ofmine is that if I'm not the
(09:19):
space that my kids bring theirconcerns, bring their fears, who
are they going to?
Where are they going to?
Are they going to the internet?
Are they going to another adultthey go into?
I don't know.
I'm not sure where they wouldbe going and luckily, right now,
like my kids are young and, asI've said, I am a safe space for
my kids right now they come tome, they come to me with those
(09:41):
when they're afraid.
They cry for dad or mom,sometimes too.
Obviously you know, me and mywife are a team, but I'm just
speaking about me directly.
Right now they come to us, theygive us a hug, they bury
themselves deep in my chest andmaybe it's the part of me that
thinks that I'm a superhero andwants to be the big, strong
protector that just relishes inthe fact that when they don't
(10:05):
feel safe, they come to me and Ican wrap my arms around them or
give them a hug or give them akiss, and that just helps so
much to make them feel relieved,to feel like they're safe again
and to feel like they can turnaround and face whatever the
issues are.
And don't get me wrong, therehave been times where I've
violated this trust or thisquote unquote safe space that
(10:26):
I've tried to create for them.
There have been times where myeldest gets you know he's at
that age, he's five, five and ahalf.
This is where they startpushing buttons and try to be
annoying and they got the weirdvoices and they say weird shit
that they're picking up fromschool.
And there have been times whereI've yelled at him, I've gotten
gruff, I've raised my voicequite a bit, told him he's doing
(10:49):
something bad and I can see thepoints in where he's actually
afraid of me and luckily Ihaven't done it too much where
he's like legit afraid of me.
There have been maybe one ortwo times where I've raised my
voice a little too loud and beena little too intimidating,
which it doesn't help that I'malready larger than most adult
males and have been told that Ihave a presence that can be
(11:11):
intimidating sometimes Not mywords other people.
That doesn't necessarily help,especially with young children.
I don't realize that myintensity is already like it at
this level and so if I just geta little bit more angry or a
little bit more animated, it'slike I've taken the fucking
intensity from a, from like asix, five, six up to like an 11.
(11:34):
Just took that dial, turned itto 11.
But I'm lucky because I've grownup and have learned that I do
have a short fuse and I can getangry, and I've had to become
more and more aware of the factthat that has a bigger impact on
my kids than it does otherpeople or I'm sure I have a big
impact on other people as well,but I just don't give a shit as
(11:56):
much with other people or withmy kids.
I really care because I never,ever want my kids to be afraid
of me.
I don't want them to withdrawfrom me with their fears, with
their hopes, with anything.
I want my kids to be able tocome to me for anything that
they need Now.
That doesn't mean that we'renot able to still have
discipline and still haveboundaries and still help guide
(12:21):
them along the way.
I think a lot of times with manymillennial parents or gentle
quote unquote gentle parents orwhatever the fuck you want to
call it nowadays I don't reallygive a shit about the titles,
but anyone who's a mindfulparent I feel like sometimes
it's very easy to go down thepath of just letting them do
what they want, validating thefears or like saying like oh
(12:44):
yeah, that's really scary.
Or you're afraid of theboogeyman?
Oh yeah, I'd be afraid of theboogeyman too.
Instead of being like, hey, theboogeyman's not real, but I
know that you're afraid rightnow, and it's okay to be afraid,
you validate that emotion asbeing something that's okay,
that's rational, withoutverifying that whatever they're
afraid of is real or that it'ssomething that they should be
(13:07):
afraid of, and that happens in alot of areas.
I feel like today I don't haveany data to back that up,
besides the fact that I justkind of see how people raise and
treat their kids and a lot ofthe things that I see from Insta
psychologists, insta moms,insta dads on validate, verify
whatever your kids are feelingor whatever they're going with.
(13:29):
That's what it is.
Kids know what's going on.
Your job is to be a safe space,but also to be a guiding hand
with the kids and take them downthis path and help them find
the right way.
And you may not know the rightway.
When I say the right way, thereis no objective right and wrong
in a lot of the things thatwe're going to come across.
(13:50):
It's more so just how you wereraised, the type of person you
are and the way that you feellike is the best to guide them
through this world andultimately, my hope with all of
this is not just for them tocome to me in the middle of the
night.
Or, you know my son.
He's a procrastinator.
He's just like his father.
He's a huge procrastinator.
(14:10):
He's even better at me in someinstances, and bedtime is one of
those times where he is amaster procrastinator.
He will find any reason not togo to bed whatsoever and he's a
person of habit and routines andso if you do something one time
, he latches onto it and hewants to do that routine again.
(14:31):
But I was kind of thinking aboutthere was a night where he was
hungry and he wanted a snack andit was bedtime but it wasn't
too late to where he couldn'tstay up a little bit longer.
And so instead of being likenope, you go to bed hungry, you
didn't eat enough for yourdinner or you should have eaten
more dinner if you didn't wantto be hungry, we let him stay up
(14:52):
with us.
We let him stay up.
I was cleaning the dishes.
His mom was, you know, doingsomething else in the in the
kitchen and we got him somepeanut butter pretzels or
something like that Peanutbutters and apples.
It doesn't really matter whatit was, and he got to sit down
and sit there with us and andhave his snack and drink some
milk and then, you know, brushhis teeth and all that stuff.
But it was just such a differentinteraction because he felt
(15:17):
safe enough, he felt comfortableenough to come to us with the
fact that he was hungry and itwasn't anything that he had done
wrong, he was just still hungryand he was getting to that age
it was like right at thattransition period where he was
kind of starting to stay up alittle bit later and also
starting to eat more food.
I think it was when he was likefour years old.
So we were starting to thinklike, hey, he might need these
(15:39):
nighttime snacks to help himstay satiated until he's waking
up in the morning.
Anyways, it was just nice tofeel like he felt comfortable
enough to come to me as his dad,to come to his mom, to come to
the people that are like thedisciplinarians, the adults, to
ask us for this and to not feelfear in asking for something
(16:02):
this simple, because I know thateven me as a kid, or people
growing up or kids out theretoday who live in not
necessarily the best situations.
They may be fearful ofretaliation or getting yelled at
or getting smacked from theirparents if they're like I'm
hungry and it's right at bedtime, or something like that, and so
(16:22):
it just felt good that he feltsafe enough to bring that to me.
And ultimately, my goal withboth of my kids or however many
kids that I have hopefully we'llhave at least one more my goal
is for them to be able to cometo me even when they might be
scared or they don't feelcomfortable.
I want them to come to me whenit matters.
(16:44):
I want to show them when it'sthese little things like getting
a snack, or they're scared atnight and they come into my room
and kind of wake me up orwhatever, or they ask me for
something that they know they'reprobably not going to get, like
when he asked me for candy orchocolate or something like that
.
I don't want to be the dad thatjust fucking blows his lid and
(17:05):
loses my shit, because that'sgoing to show them that if they
come to me with something hardor if they do something that's
wrong or not the right time orwhatever it is, they're afraid,
but it's dad sleeping.
I don't want him to lose it.
I don't want to start showingthem that stuff on these little
(17:26):
things, because that means thatwhen they're older they're
already going to be in this rutor this routine of thinking that
I can't bring these things tomy dad because he's going to
lose his shit.
He's going to of thinking thatI can't bring these things to my
dad because he's going to losehis shit.
He's going to get angry and Idon't want him to get angry at
me.
I don't want to face thoserepercussions Not necessarily
that I don't have repercussionsfor any wrongdoings they do
(17:47):
right now, but it doesn't havethis emotional burden that comes
along with it.
If dad lost his shit, dad'sdisappointed in me.
Dad fucking yelled at me.
It doesn't have all that stuffwith it.
I want them to be able to cometo me when they're older, say
they go out, they drink alcohol,their friends drink alcohol and
their friend wants to drive.
Their friend who was supposedto drive him home got drunk.
(18:09):
I want them to call me.
I want them to call me and belike dad.
I need them to call me.
I want them to call me and belike dad.
I need you to come and pick meup.
I had alcohol, I drank and ourfriend drank and I don't have a
safe way to get home.
I want them to come to me withthese hard things.
I never want them to feel likethey're not going to be loved
anymore, that I'm going to be sodisappointed or so angry.
(18:31):
I don't want to have this harshemotional reaction to when they
do things like that, becausethen they're not going to come
to me with them, especially whenit matters.
I want my kids, as adults oryoung adults or teenagers, to
trust in me and to be able toface the consequences that may
come, knowing that they're goingto have consequences, knowing
(18:52):
that there's going to besomething bad not necessarily
something bad, but like there isgoing to be a consequence to
their action.
But the consequence is notgoing to be that dad loves me
less.
The consequence is not going tobe that dad loses his shit and
yells at me and screams at meand doesn't let this go and
holds it over my head forfucking ever.
I don't want that for them, Idon't want that for me and, in
all honesty, if I do do shitlike that, like I say all the
(19:16):
time, we're constantly modelingfor our kids how we should
behave, how we should act, andwhat we're showing them is that
if we have this huge blow upreaction to something small,
especially when they're younger,it shows them that dad can't
handle these things.
I don't have the emotionalmaturity to handle the things
(19:38):
that they're bringing to thetable, that I can't handle when
they do something wrong, or thatif they are scared or they have
fears and they have questionsthat I'm not emotionally stable
enough to be the support thatthey need, I'm not the safe
space that they need in theirlives, and so it's my job as a
dad to be that to.
(19:59):
It's okay.
If we slip up, you're gonna getmad, you're going to yell,
you're going to break that trustonce in a while, it's more so
acknowledging it.
If you do do it, apologize.
There's nothing wrong withapologizing to your kids.
Apologize, repair and then tryto be that space for them.
I want that for my kids.
(20:20):
I'm a dad who loves.
I like tough love.
I'm someone who can be veryhard, very harsh.
I have disciplinariantendencies for sure, but at the
end of the day, I never want mykids to be fearful of me.
I want them to have respect forme and I want them to listen to
(20:41):
me, and I'm sure that some ofthat is going to be fear.
I'm sure a lot of people arelike, oh, they need to fear you
to respect you.
They can be your friend later.
I'm not even saying they needto be my friend.
I want my kids to know that Ihave unconditional love for them
, that I'm a safe space for themto go to and that, regardless
of whatever happens, that I willalways love them and I will
always give them the supportthey need, and that they can
(21:03):
come to me with their fears.
They can come to me with theirhopes, their dreams, their
questions, anything they have.
Dad can handle it, because dadis a stable, safe force in my
life and I don't need to goother places to look for it.
Because guess what?
I don't want my kids going toother places.
I don't know what those otherplaces are going to push on them
and I know that what I've gotmaybe not the best, but it's
(21:27):
pretty damn good.
It's led me down my life in adecent direction so far and I
want to make sure that I'mpassing that along to my kids.
So that's what I wanted to talkabout today.
I'm not sure if it was acoherent path that we went down.
I didn't have any notes todaywhatsoever, so hopefully that
that was a good episode.
(21:48):
Hopefully you guys enjoy justsome of the thoughts that are
going through my head and, likeI said, if you have anything you
want me to talk about, if youhave any comments on this
episode, click the little, sendme a message about the episode
button in the description ofthis podcast.
You could also go to theInstagram page.
Click the links.
Send me an email and if youwould like to be a guest on the
(22:11):
Unhinged Father show, or Tuff asI like to call it, just shoot
me a message.
Let me know I'm happy to havedads, moms, professional
psychologists, whatever the fuckyou are.
If you have something that youthink would contribute to other
listeners of this show, let meknow Love to have you on.
(22:32):
But that's going to do it forthis week.
I hope everyone has a good restof the day.
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.