March 18, 2025 • 59 mins
Eric Ballentine, Executive Director of Streets Ministries in Memphis, shares his journey through fatherhood, marriage, and ministry as someone who "jumped off the porch" at age 12 before finding his faith at 25. His powerful story reveals how his past experiences shaped his approach to raising children in a blended family and the lessons he learned about authentic manhood along the way.
• Born and raised in South Memphis, youngest of seven siblings with an extended family that includes 21 grandchildren and 23 great-grandchildren
• Developed a blended family when he married at 25, with his wife bringing a biological daughter and Eric having a son from a previous relationship
• Had to unlearn toxic masculinity and what he thought was "authentic manhood" after accepting Christ
• Found himself becoming "super dad" to many youth in ministry while potentially missing quality time with his own children
• Realized he was projecting his own childhood trauma onto his blended family dynamic, watching closely how his wife treated his biological son
• Experienced reconciliation with his oldest son after a period of estrangement, learning that sometimes being right doesn't matter if you lose the relationship
• Offers practical advice for navigating blended families including not forcing relationships and preventing children from speaking negatively about their other parent
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Hello everyone and welcome to the Unlearned Podcast
.
I'm your host, ruth AbigailSmith, and you have stumbled
upon a podcast that is here tohelp you gain the courage to
change your mind, and today wehave the privilege of speaking
with genuinely one of myfavorite people.
I don't call everybody this,but this man truly is my big
(00:31):
brother and I'm so grateful forhim.
If you are listening fromMemphis, you probably know who
he is.
You certainly know where heworks.
He is the executive director ofStreets Ministries and he has
been doing ministry in Memphisfor quite some time, born and
raised.
He's going to tell you all thathimself and talk a little bit
(00:53):
about who he is, but this man'sname is Eric Ballantyne.
Mr Ballantyne, welcome to theUnlearned Podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Ruth Abigail, how are you today?
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I'm great man it's good to be with you Likewise.
Yeah, this is exciting.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
This is truly my sister.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
I mean truly, we siblings for real.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
For real.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
I mean we behave like siblings, Absolutely.
So just be warned, Beforewarned.
We didn't prepare too much forthis Right.
We didn't want to, so this isgoing to be a great conversation
.
I'm particularly excited aboutthis conversation because, Eric,
you're an executive director ofa long-lasting that's not the
(01:40):
word I'm looking for a veryprominent nonprofit in the city,
and so you speak all the time.
I mean, you speak aboutministry and you speak about
young people and you do thatright.
So if you're in Memphis andlocal, you've probably heard him
(02:01):
or you've heard something hesaid.
He's done music, so his voiceis not unknown to the city.
But what I'm excited abouttoday is we're going to dig into
some stuff he doesn't normallytalk about.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
We're going to dig we're going to dig, and I'm
excited because we get to talkto Eric the man, not Eric the
director, right, and I like that.
And so I want us to just startwith.
I'd love just for you tointroduce yourself to the people
(02:34):
, tell them what it is that'sinteresting about you, where you
grew up, a little bit of yourstory, how in the world you got
to this place, and then we'lljust dig a little bit.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
All right, Thanks again.
Story how in the world you gotto this place, and then we'll
just dig a little bit.
All right, Thanks again.
So honored to be here on theUnlearned podcast tonight and
just to share a little bit ofwho I am and hopefully we can
glean from each other tonight.
I'm from Memphis, a nativeMemphian born and raised here.
As of a week or so ago, I'vebeen here 46 years.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Come on 46.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
So that's my entire life right and I love Memphis.
Born and raised in the southpart of Memphis, affectionately
known as South.
Memphis South Memphis sure, andyoungest of seven, youngest of
seven.
My mom, beautiful mom, now is76.
And her baby boy is 46.
(03:28):
It's weird, so weird, but she'sbeautiful as ever, healthy,
doing fine, and all of mysiblings are still here in town.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
And just give you the roots of that.
My mama has seven children, 21grandchildren and 23
great-grands.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
And they're all here.
No, they're everywhere ohthey're everywhere, okay, okay,
all over the world.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Wow Ireland somewhere .
But no yeah, but, yeah, thegrands and the great-grands a
nice portion of them are here,Wow, but they're like scattered
all over the United States, butall of my siblings are here in
the city.
So, yeah, been married to mylovely wife, barbara now for 20
years.
Yes, 20 years of marriage goingon 40, right, and 20 years of
(04:17):
being happily married and wehave three children.
So, yeah, okay, yeah, cool man,that's me in a nutshell.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
I love it, I love it, I love it, I yeah, okay, yeah,
cool man.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
That's me in a nutshell.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it.
So all right.
So you're married, have threechildren.
How old were you when you gotmarried?
Well, you said 20 years.
I was 20.
I should do math.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, I was 25 when.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
I got married, 25 when you got married, 25 when
you got married, and so so I'mgoing on 21.
So, of course, Right, okay, yeah, 21 years, okay.
So yeah, because this is kindof leading us into where we want
to go right, it's just kind oflearning a little bit about who
you are, who you have been as ahusband, as a father, as a man
(05:06):
out here in these Memphisstreets doing your life, right.
So tell us, just tell us, alittle bit of that experience,
right, kind of start where youwant to start with that.
Tell us a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Okay, I guess more about my upbringing, about your
upbringing.
Or marriage more so.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah about your upbringing, about my upbringing,
about your upbringing Aboutmarriage.
More so, yeah about yourupbringing.
So share with us a little bitabout who Eric was as a young
man, husband, father.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Okay, got you.
Okay.
Well, for me I mentioned at theage of 25 is when I got married
, and for some people they'relike that's young, that's's
young, that's so young.
But I felt old at 25 because Iliterally jumped off the porch
pretty early, when I was about12-ish or 13,.
(06:02):
I started doing big boy thingsand got involved in a lot of the
streets, gangs, drugs, stufflike that.
So by the time I was 16, youknow, I thought I was grown.
You know what I'm saying.
So at 25, I was OG to me, youknow, and to some others, you
know, like man, you know, he'dbeen there, done that already,
(06:23):
and so I was ready to settledown by that time.
Her and I had been dating forat that time, right at three
years, and she entered into therelationship with a biological
daughter Okay, at that time wasfour years old, okay, and I had
a biological son, okay, who wasthree months.
(06:46):
Oh, wow, yeah, wow, when we,you know, like real talk, when
we met and I was living fast,yeah, and then we had a son
together, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Wow, right Okay.
Yeah, all right, so let's talkabout that.
So both of you had childrengoing into the marriage.
Going into the marriage or therelationship?
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Well, coming into the relationship, Coming into the
relationship.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Okay, so you both had children coming into the
relationship and then you had achild together.
So talk about a little bit thatexperience navigating, blending
a family.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I had no idea.
She had no idea.
Yeah, we just you know we werein love, right, yeah, and all we
know is you know we love eachother.
And I really didn't knowanything about being a father,
being a parent.
I grew up pretty much in asingle-parent home.
(07:47):
Youngest of seven, my momthought it would be better for
me to live with my grandparents,so I was technically raised
primarily by my grandmother.
My grandfather died in a caraccident when I was six, so I
stayed with my grandmother.
So I was slick the only childfor a second there.
(08:09):
I could put my Kool-Aid in therefrigerator and nobody drink it
right, Sure, sure.
But I was the only kid for aminute, and then my grandmother
was just very kind, loving, soshe adopted another family.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
There was another family in the community and this
lady was very ill, like stagefour cancer, and her children
had been in the system.
Some and her and my grandma hadbecome friends and she was like
, hey, I'm dying, become friends.
And she was like, hey, you knowI'm dying and but I want my
(08:47):
kids to stay together.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
You know, will you promise me that you'll keep my
family?
My grandma said yes, so shetook her four kids into our
house and they became mysiblings.
Wow, so my family was blendedall around, you know, and?
And the lady was white and thekid's father was
African-American.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
So yeah, wait a minute, all right so all right,
so there's a lot going on.
Right, yeah, right.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
So how old were you when they moved in?
Speaker 2 (09:23):
I'm not mistaken, I had to be around 10.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
I would say around 9 or 10.
Okay, and they were much olderthan me, you know well.
Yeah, back then it seemed likethey were grown, they were like
16.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Oh, they were really.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, 16, 15, 16.
Okay, One was maybe 20.
Oh, 16.
One was maybe 20.
Oh, wow.
And they were very well known inthe community.
One of them, particularly theone that I wanted to be just
like Chris, was like man.
(10:01):
He was that winsome guy waslike man, he was that winsome
guy.
What's funny is in the hoodyou're super light-skinned, with
good hair.
You're a nickname, white boy.
So Chris was white boy andeverybody loved Chris.
Everybody loved white boy.
White boy, chris, that's hisname.
Everybody knew him as that andhe was just one of those guys
who was charismatic, loving,funny.
(10:24):
But he was feared.
He was like man.
He just had this anger and thisrage from his experiences as a
child and even trying to processthe death of his mom and the
fact that his dad was not in hislife and that he had to go
through this system.
You know all of the porterleaves, the tall trees, secs,
(10:48):
dogwoods, any system you canthink of, fostering, whatever.
He went through a lot of thatand he had a lot of rage and
bitterness, but he was the onethat I loved the most and I kind
of wanted to be like him.
So when I jumped off that porch, I jumped off the porch with
intentions of becoming him.
You know, just being honest.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Yeah, no, that's good .
So your experience is reallyyou've got a blended experience
from a lot of different angles.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
And all right.
So I want to talk a little bitmore about jumping off the porch
, because I think that that is awell, that's key to your story,
right, right.
And I love how you kind of saidin the beginning 25 for you was
like- Retired Right, you wereretired right yeah.
(11:51):
So tell me if I'm wrong.
Like your perspective on lifemay have been a little bit more,
would you call it more maturethan most 25-year-olds because
of your experience, or is thataccurate?
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah, I think that's accurate.
Okay, again, by 25, I had donemore than most and I thought
what's weird is, at 25, for me,all of the things I had been
involved in and had experienced,I thought I was this guy, I
(12:32):
thought this was my identity,what I saw in my brother Right,
I wanted to be that and Ithought that was authentic
manhood, I guess I can say, andit was not until I accepted
Christ at 25 and startedsurrounding myself around some
men who were imitating Christthat I really found out that,
(12:52):
hey, I have no idea what I'mdoing here and I had to kind of
relearn, unlearn what I thoughtwas authentic manhood and then
learn what true manhood would.
At the same time, while I'mtrying to figure out this
parenting thing and being ahusband right, wow, right,
(13:14):
because all I had was myexperiences, what I've seen, and
my dad I lost him in 2014.
Great man, we had a greatrelationship, but early on and
I'm an open book, so the way Iwas conceived was out of wedlock
, you know, my dad was marriedand stepped out.
Yeah, and here I am right.
(13:35):
Yeah, and as a kid, you don'tknow that.
As a kid, all you know is, hey,that's dad, that's mom Right.
Why can't I go to that house,right, right, that's dad, that's
mom Right.
Why can't I go to that house,right, right.
So some of those childhoodexperiences, you know, when I
started to mature and go throughmy adolescence or whatever,
some of those things werebrought to my attention, right,
(13:59):
like, oh, this happened, oh,that's why I couldn't go here,
oh, that's why that lady lookedat me like that, and so all that
bitterness that I told you mybrother, had I had my adopted
brother, had I began to havethat bitterness toward my
biological father, yeah, eventoward my grandmother who raised
(14:20):
me, why you didn't tell me, youknow just so many other things
that just created somewhat of amonster.
I guess I can say, yeah,because what you would do is
you'd take it out on anybody.
You can right your frustration,so yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
So you well, here's the thing, right, you were
challenged to emulate somethingthat you hadn't been practicing.
Pretty quickly, right, right,and you had to work through all
(14:59):
of this stuff to get to thispoint to you know, to, to, to
function as a man, right, andthe, the way that you had
learned, like you said, manhoodwas different than how you had
been introduced to it in yourold age of 25.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Um and so how, how did that that unlearning manhood
process look?
What?
What were some examples of whatthat looked like?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Oh, man, one thing was learning how to control your
emotions, learning conflictresolution, you know, because
you used to handle this stuffthis way Right, this way Right.
But when you started to reallylearn about true, authentic man,
biblical man, who's a, you know, real man?
(15:51):
Fight on the knees.
You know, we don't take it toour, you know, to the fist, but
for me I had to kind of get overthe anger stuff, work some
stuff out with myself.
But, mind you, I'm trying to doall of this.
So all of my old ways of gettingmoney, my old ways of handling
my disputes, yep, all ways ofeverything, how I navigated
(16:15):
right, matriculated through theera of my life in that I'm still
trying to figure out how to bea parent, and that was the piece
for me.
So I probably made a ton ofmistakes.
I did the best I could, but Istarted to model myself.
But the transition for me waswatching again, men of God that
(16:40):
I looked up to.
I watched how they handledtheir wives, how they treated
them with class and respect, howthey nurtured their kids, their
relationship.
I kind of watched how theydisciplined their children.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Because I didn't want to again my childhood
experiences to totally influencehow I handled my children.
If that makes sense, correct,there were some great elements
of it, I think.
One thing I can say I hope I'mnot getting ahead here but one
thing with my dad.
Again, he was not there in thehouse with me, but I think about
(17:19):
it.
I saw him two days a week.
He bought all my school stuff.
He was very loving to me.
I just couldn't go to his houseand I got something to say
about that later on when you'retalking about bleeding the
families.
But I couldn't go to his housebecause his wife didn't accept
me.
She knew about me but shedidn't accept me.
(17:41):
And so he told me in his latteryears we were talking.
One day he said son, he saidman, I made a lot of mistakes.
He said, but one thing I didn'tdo, I didn't deny you, and I
had to agree with him with that,because I mean all throughout
my childhood I had a dad.
I knew I had a dad.
I didn't know the dad'ssupposed to be in the house, I
(18:02):
just knew, hey, he'd take careof me, he'd come over here.
He even disciplined me andthat's something that I learned
from him about discipline.
People have different views onspanking your kid.
Or do you put him in the cornertime out, or whatever.
I got spankings, but I didn'tget beatings.
I got spankings.
My dad was a truck driver, sohe's in and out of town or
(18:27):
whatever and I'm just a boy, I'mtrying to set the big wheel on
fire.
I'm just crazy.
So my grandmother would tell mydad and I'm like, oh Lord, he
coming.
So when he would pull up in thetruck, I'm like, oh, okay, but
he would come in spend qualitytime with my grandmother.
Then he would call me in, hewould discuss the situation with
(18:50):
me in front of my grandmother,calmly, never raise his voice,
and I was super intimidatedbecause it was my dad, but I
wasn't afraid he's going to killme right now.
I knew I was in trouble, buteven before he would spank me,
he would sit down and explain tome why Wow, you can't do this,
(19:13):
and that's something that I'llnever forget.
So I was like, okay, in thisparenting thing, I know my kid's
going to do some crazy stuff,yeah, and there may be some
times where I may have todiscipline them like that, but I
want to do it like he did.
You know what I mean, so thatwas a good takeaway.
So that's one man that Iwatched and learned some things
from, and then my pastor andother people that I had an
(19:38):
opportunity to do.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
That's beautiful.
That's a beautiful picture offatherhood.
You said something you knowthat you could never go to him
(19:59):
Right, Right, Right to him.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Right, right.
So so this and and so there wasa, so I guess the a difference
right of fatherhood being thefatherhood you experienced, of,
like you said, two days a weekversus seven days a week.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right In the home Right.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Right there with you Are there some immediate
differences that you saw as afather, that you realized was a
different experience you had asa kid.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Right, I guess, comically.
First I'd say, get on yournerves.
I see why.
I see why you let me come toyou.
No, I'm just joking.
But no, my kids had, all threeof them had.
That I longed for was being ableto touch your father.
(20:52):
You know what I'm saying.
Yeah, I remember sitting thereas a kid, like what's my daddy
number?
You know, call him.
And nobody would ever call him.
And you know, later on you'relike man.
I was traumatized by thatbecause I wanted to talk to my
daddy, I want to wrestle with mydaddy, or whatever, right,
because I couldn't do that withmy grandfather anymore.
He was gone and so I had no manthat I could physically touch
(21:15):
to get that appropriateaffection from right.
And so my children had thatevery night, every, you know,
whenever I worked all the time.
So when I get home, man, theyjumping on your neck, your back,
wrestling, tickling.
It's just, and again that goesto with Barbara and I when we
(21:39):
decided to become one again.
She's bringing her biologicaldaughter into picture and I have
a biological son who does notlive in the house, right?
yeah so that's a blended familythat we now have, and nobody has
taught us how to manage thatthing.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
So um can I ask you this sure, sure what, how was
like?
How, what kind of conversationsdid you and Barbara have?
Or didn't have that?
Maybe you look back and be like, hey, we should have talked
about this Right, that's it.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, when it comes to handlingparenting each other's children
(22:21):
, Right.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
I think, man, we should have had the
conversations.
We did the best we could.
Yeah, we both were lovingpeople.
I was not a tyrant in the houseor never been a violent guy,
abusive guy verbally, or none ofthat.
No cursing around my kids, noneof that stuff.
(22:42):
So I wasn't that type of guy,none of that, you know.
No cursing around my kids, noneof that stuff.
So I wasn't that type of guy.
But I was probably morelegalistic than anything, like
when I first accepted Christ,man, you know, I was like not to
do nothing, you know, and Iwish I had been a bit more open
(23:03):
to allowing them to make somemistakes.
Wow, yeah, I hope I'm notgetting ahead, but that's what I
feel Like.
I feel like I was trying sohard to protect them from
becoming me that I may havestopped them from becoming them,
if that makes sense, if thatmakes sense.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
We're going to let that sit for just a second.
That's good.
Yeah, you said you didn't wantthem to become you, right?
So you may, in the process,have stopped them from becoming
them, right, right, wow.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
You know, but doing it out of love and trying to
protect them.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Like I felt like it was my responsibility, to which
it is, you know, but I was sooverbearing with protecting them
, yeah, and I should have letthem learn a little bit more by
experience.
Now you know I'm mature Now.
My kids are grown and gone.
Barbara and I empty nesters,have been empty nesters now for
(24:07):
about one or four years and Ilook back and they're grown.
I'm like man, I wish I had it.
This different, that differentyou know what were.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
so you say, not becoming like you.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
So what were you afraid of that?
I think the biggest thing offtop, just coming from where I
come from, I didn't want thestreets to get them.
Yeah, you know, I didn't wantour daughter to be treated the
way I may have treated youngladies in my ignorance, right,
(24:42):
or how I've seen young ladies betreated, right.
So I felt like I got to protecther.
Yeah, no, you can't go here.
You can't go there, you can'tdo this.
You know, you can't listen tothis, you can't do that.
And again, that was justlegalistic for real.
But I tried the approach ofexplaining it too, but still, at
the end of the day, it was zerounderstanding, like no, this is
(25:05):
it Like, this, is it what I saygoes?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Yeah, and I think I would have been if I could go
back.
This is hindsight, it's 2020,but if I could go back, I would
be more open to listening to whythey want to do this or give
them a bigger voice.
So how has that impacted yourrelationships with them as
(25:30):
adults?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Right, wow.
I think one thing my childrenalways knew was that I love them
and they knew that they couldcome to me and talk about it.
That was a good thing.
Me working in youth ministrywas sweet, but at the same time
it was deceptive, because mebeing the youth leader, youth
(25:51):
pastor, I'm always doing thecrazy, creative stuff with the
youth.
So I was like super dad to somany other kids, like everybody
want to be around, miss, a Rightman, let's go.
So my house was the spot Wow.
So we got all the youth want tocome hang at my house.
Parents trust us, know they'rewith us, they're safe.
We're doing the lock-ins, we'redoing the camps.
(26:13):
We're doing the lock-ins, we'redoing the camps, we're doing
whatever campfires, we're justdoing everything together.
And my kids loved it becausethey got the super cool dad who
all the kids want to be around,who make everybody smile.
But I worked so much to providefor them and I'm volunteering,
doing all of this stuff here atthe church and I think I lost
(26:38):
out on you know, like the lovelanguages the quality time.
I think I missed out on.
They may not say this, but Ithink that I missed out on some
real quality time with thembecause it was always so crowded
.
You know, either we're atchurch, some youth function and
then me, being a Christianrapper at that time, traveling,
doing that.
(26:58):
I tried to always include myfamily but I was like they got
me but everybody got me.
So I would rethink how I didthat and probably fall back a
little bit and spend some moreintentional time with them
Instead of dragging them allaround.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You saying a lot and I this is really because I think
a lot, of, a lot of men.
So you went from because Ithink this is so important and I
think the connection here is soimportant.
You went from doing your thingin the streets to being a
husband and a father, to addingon to that youth pastor, right,
(27:43):
right, and not just a youthpastor, but a really really good
one, right.
I hope I'm saying that I hope,yeah, just knowing who you are.
But, like you said, super dadto all the kids right.
Yeah, but even in that it'slike if somebody looked at your
kind of we'll call it manhoodresume.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
It's like man he is killing right there may have
lacked the attention with youryou know the children that
you're stewarding because of thekind of energy put in.
(28:26):
Being exactly who it is thatyou felt God called you to be
Right, so that tension is real.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
Again.
My wife and my kids probablywould say something different,
but it's my inner convictions, Iknow, and I'm like man.
I think I missed it in someareas where I could have been a
bit more intentional withgetting to know each of them
(28:53):
individually.
It was more like this is whatwe do.
Yeah, we.
You know what I'm saying.
Yes, this is what we do, yeah,but maybe she didn't, that
wasn't her love language, or her, or that wasn't his love
language.
You know, like this kid and Iwould advise any parent out
there, especially if you have ablended family get to know your
(29:16):
children's love languages.
Like one kid, it may be qualitytime, yeah.
The other kid, it may bephysical touch, and I use it in
my real life, like my son thatwas in the house.
He had dad 24-7 around theclock.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And so I mean we roustled and the the crazy stuff
, but he didn't touch me as much.
But my oldest son, when hewould come over on weekends, he
couldn't keep his hands off me.
Wow, I don't care what he said,dad, you know, hit me on the
shoulder.
He always just, and I didn'trecognize that at first and as I
(29:55):
started maturing and growing Iwas like dang, that was me
wanting that as a kid with mydad.
Wow, he needed that.
Right, you know what I'm saying.
And he didn't have me all thetime.
Yeah, so when he did, he goingto take advantage of it.
He going to take advantage.
Just test me to death, you knowwhat I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
So can you, can you kind of talk a little bit about?
Um, the difference in parenting?
Speaker 2 (30:20):
yeah a child in the home and one who lives away from
home that's a tricky onebecause, uh, a lot of variables,
like it depends on therelationship between you, uh,
and the other parent, becausewhen you're co-parenting,
sometimes that can be smooth andsometimes it can be challenging
Absolutely.
For me, thankfully, it waspretty smooth.
(30:43):
That's good, and I'll tell youwhy I think it was smooth.
First of all, the grace of God.
Second of all, I didn't playwith her emotions and I talked
to a lot of young brothers aboutthat who are in situations
where they might have a childthat they had from a previous
relationship and now you're withsomebody else and you're
(31:04):
wondering why it's so difficult.
You know windows and tires andfoolishness.
You know, many times we kind ofwant our cake and eat it too,
right, and you play withpeople's emotions like that.
So when we decided that wewouldn't be together, we decided
we weren't going to be togetherand I said I'm not going to be
(31:27):
cruel to her.
She has my son in her stomachand so I want to make sure she's
straight.
So she wants some grapes?
Yeah, three in the morning I'mtaking grapes.
I'm like you know, I'm going tolive with my boy.
Okay, I didn't know better, Ididn't know, but we had this
understanding.
Hey, we're not together, nomore.
But guess what?
We got a son, wow.
(31:49):
So we got to figure this thing,yeah, and we didn't bet 100.
We ran into our challenges whenyou talked about the portion of
the child in-house compared toyour child that's not in the
house.
Even when it comes tocorrecting them as a parent,
guilt can kick in and you allowthe child outside of the house
(32:11):
to get away with murder.
Yeah, almost compared.
And you're super hard on theones who are right there and
it's not fair.
So I may have been a bit extrain the house at times and more
lenient with my oldest, becauseI felt like he couldn't touch me
when he wanted to, and so whenwe do have those opportunities
(32:33):
for touches, the touches can'tbe me fussing.
You get what I'm saying?
I do Right, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
So how do you?
That's really hard to navigate.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Very hard to navigate .
Speaker 1 (32:46):
I mean, it's really, really hard.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
I don't think there's an answer to it.
I'm pretty sure somebody outthere yeah somebody wrote a book
.
Yeah, but I don't know exactlyhow we navigated through that.
I was learning as I go.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
So this may be and I want to get back to that
relationship in just a second,but I just want to kind of pivot
this way.
If there's something here atthis time you were a believer,
you were in the church, right.
Was there tension between youknow your relationships in the
(33:25):
church and your relationshipwith the relationships you had
with kids and family and kind ofyou know your parenting living
situation?
I mean, maybe there wasn't yourparenting living situation, was
it?
I mean maybe there wasn't.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
But I'm curious when you say the tension between so
did you experience.
You talked about guilt right,and you know was any of that
(34:01):
guilt catalyzed by church at allor by other Christians, I would
say no, yeah, I would say no,yeah, I would say no.
I can say this, and the goodthing is this is word to the
wise for anybody who decided todo a podcast, and you may talk
to your wife first.
I talked to my wife in theparking lot.
I said look, okay, I'm about tohave a real conversation, right
, you cool.
But my wife I think if anybodywould get on me, it would be her
(34:28):
about putting everything first.
And I didn't think I was.
I didn't think I was like man,I'm doing the work of the Lord.
You know what I'm saying.
But I didn't realize that I'mworking all day, and now I'm at
the church.
And if I'm not at the church,I'm at home working on church
stuff, doing PowerPoints andputting together curriculums for
(34:50):
Bible study and all of this,and I'm excited about it.
And I'm thinking she's lookingat me like, oh my God, he's
doing the work of the Lord.
But she's looking at me like,hey, spend some time with me and
your kids, yeah, yeah, you know, I thought including my kids in
that was exciting for them andthey would get with it because
(35:13):
I'm dead, but they need it.
So I think that the tensionwould come from there, in-house,
not from out-house.
You're the hero.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Outside the house, right, yeah, and people don't—it
takes a very mature person torecognize and say, hey, man,
take care of home, we got this,take a break, take a sabbatical
and go spend time with your kids.
But me, coming from where Icome from, man, I just had this
(35:47):
zeal to live right, to serve Godand I'm thinking, if I'm doing
this, I'm happy, so everybodyshould be happy, right, you know
?
So it took me about I'll say ittook me about my God 10 to 12
years of ministry before Irealized I need to slow down.
(36:09):
It took that long for me to sayman, my kids are really growing
up and I'm still dragging themalong to do everything that I
want to do and I need to investa little bit more into who they
are.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
So with your oldest son, yes, talk a little bit
about that relationship.
I know that has been it's, um,it's been a journey.
Yeah, oh yeah what, what, whathas that journey look like?
And, um, what are some thingsthat you have had to unlearn as
(36:47):
a parent, particularly with youroldest son oh man, uh, eric, oh
man, eric Jr, my boy, that's myboy, eric is now 24.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
And again, didn't know what I was doing in the
beginning and I started to learnwhen I got 25, I'm telling you,
somewhere in that window, 25 to27, I was really on some more
stuff.
Like man, I'm trying to learnall I can so I can invest in my
family and all that.
But again, I'm learning aboutworking now and you know I had
(37:23):
neglected my education, so somany things stacked against me
but I was so crazy in believingthat, if God be for me, who
could be against me?
Right?
So I'm just zealous and going.
But as I learned and grew withEric, I knew one thing he is
(37:43):
going to be at my house.
Now that's good and bad.
Let me tell you why.
Okay, it's good because I needto do that as a parent, I need
to be in my son's life.
But it was bad because I foundout years later why I was doing
it, the motive behind it.
It was my own adverse childhoodexperiences, right as a kid.
(38:04):
My dad's wife said no, he isnot coming to this house.
So I had in my mind nobodywould never treat my son like
that.
So here I am, my crazy self.
I have my son at the housebecause I want him with me, but
at the same time, in my mind I'mtrying to show my wife that my
(38:29):
boy coming here.
So I'm walking around with amagnifying glass watching her to
see how she's going to treat myboy.
So I'm walking around with amagnifying glass watching her to
see how she's going to treat myboy, wow.
So I say this humorously but ifshe were to give our biological
son a green lollipop and givemy son a red, my oldest son a
red one, I'm like why are yougiving him the red?
(38:50):
Try to tell him to stop.
We're just conjuring upfoolishness.
Wow, but I didn't know why.
But it was my own adversechildhood experiences and I
didn't want him to go throughwhat I went through.
And it was not even the case.
She loved him, just like therest of our kids, and she had to
(39:15):
check me on that years later.
Like you know, what are youdoing?
Yeah, you know, and I'm feelinglike I had to protect him, but
there's a flip side to that coin.
She had the same thing with ourdaughter.
She felt like she had to protecther because of her experiences
as a child and her pastrelationship.
(39:38):
Yeah, so they had this bondthat you know.
In reality, I know now that we,as parents, should have been on
one accord right first, but shehad this bond with our daughter
, but I had the same thing.
Yeah, my son, yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:58):
Right, that's right.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
And so we had to have to come to Jesus meeting to hey
, this is not your daughter,this is not my son, these are
our children, yeah, so we got toget on one on one course.
So it took some hurdles and youknow, along the way, but God
did his thing.
I'll say, for us, in ourmarriage, year number 12 or 13
(40:28):
was like the roughest ever.
We hit a bump and it wasbecause of the blended family.
Wow, we hit a bump that wethought we couldn't overcome and
it took a lot.
It took some counseling, ittook some tears, it took some
(40:50):
real conversations,self-realization and all of the
above for that to be totallyrestored to where we say, hey,
nah, we're going to keep, we'restrong together.
Right, you know what I'm saying.
So now fast forward.
My oldest and I, we hit a bumpin the road.
Today is actually the one-yearanniversary of his brother's
murder.
His brother was killed.
Wow, everybody knew about theyoung doll situation.
(41:13):
Right around that time hisbrother was killed, and it had
nothing to do with that, but hewas killed around that time.
And so this is the one-yearanniversary today of his
brother's death.
But my son went through a realtough period prior to that and I
(41:35):
think about it.
I did the same thing.
As much as I admired andrespected my father, I had some
things that I felt like hedidn't quite get right according
to my standards and I cut himoff for some years.
No reason, he's trying to reachout to me, I just cut him off
(41:55):
and I was gone in the streetsdoing my thing.
So my son had his stint and hedid the same thing and it took
the Lord because I was so upset,and it took the Lord to show me
like hey, you did the samething.
So he had this moment where hekind of bagged off for a while.
Then he lost his brother in theprocess.
But through that God restoredour relationship.
So he and I are back.
(42:17):
You know, like we never leftright and but you said something
a few minutes ago about somethings that I wish I could go
back and do different and learn.
I learned with my oldest son.
We had a conversation duringthat process of reconciling our
(42:40):
relationship and I thought Ijust knew why he did what he did
and I was thinking in my headI'm like he and his feelings,
you know.
But he shared with me.
He said, wasn't the fact thatyou how did he word it?
He said it was not the factthat you didn't agree with me.
(43:08):
He said I didn't expect you toagree with the choice that he
was about to make.
He said but I did expect you tocome get me.
And when he said that to me,it's like it cut me Because I
was like man, I was so bent onbeing right, but the situation
was still wrong.
(43:29):
Make sense.
So for me, if I could go back,I would say man, it's not about
who right and who wrong, becauseif you win the battle but you
(43:49):
lose the war, I was 45 at thattime.
At 45, I had to apologize to myson for not being there for him
the way he needed me, not theway you know.
I thought I knew what he needed.
Again, that comes from youbeing the adult thinking you
know everything.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
So I would have listened more, eric.
You're saying so much and I'mtrying to.
(44:35):
Honestly, I'm sitting here,just I am just sitting here
listening at this story and justyour journey, and I know a lot
of people have experiencedprobably parts of what you're
talking about for sure, fromjust blended family coming into
a marriage, coming into arelationship with kids, having
to parent kids in the home, outof the home.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
You know tension around you, know your marriage
relationship after being therefor a while and that still being
there, like you know, parentingan adult child, particularly
one who does have a little bitof a chip on his shoulder.
But in all of that you, andalmost every story you've told
(45:22):
you, have traced it back.
You've traced you.
You know what I'm saying.
You have seen you, you'veidentified you in the scenario.
I want to know what work haveyou done to get to the place
where you're willing to seeyourself in life, some of the
(45:44):
things that you've seen in yourchildren?
Speaker 2 (45:48):
I tell you what a lot of listening to other people
who have been here before, Someof my mentors in their 60s maybe
and they're like man, you know,I went through this and talking
to them about it.
Also, more than anything, it'sjust man using the word of God
(46:12):
as a mirror, you know, and notreally looking in it to see
other people, but to see myself,and just a continuous
improvement, looking for ways tocontinue to get better.
And you know, hey, I'm going tohave grandkids one day, right?
Yeah, yeah, you know.
So I want to be able to give mychildren advice, to say hey
(46:33):
here's some places where I mayhave messed up.
So I think there's no magic wandto it or particular strategy I
use or anything.
It's just man, I'm just tryingto improve day by day, get
better listening, and you know,when you see your children go
(46:54):
through things in life and youcan't just look at them and say
I told them you should have yougot.
To look at you, say what couldI have done different early on
to prevent this from happening?
Right, they make their ownchoices and decisions.
They do stuff.
But I think a lot of times whenwe look at ourselves we'll see
(47:14):
the root cause of it is againhow we handle them.
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
And how your hurts have impacted your actions
Absolutely.
And and I think that's so, youknow, we you know, being an
adult child, havingconversations with my parents as
an adult is very different, andwe talk all the time like we'll
we'll share me and my siblingswill share experiences we had
(47:44):
growing up that we didn't say asas kids, but and then we'll say
it and they'll be like, oh mygosh, I had no idea.
And then sometimes begin tobeat themselves up because it's
like I should have known, Ishould have done something.
I hate that.
That was the case, that was notwhat we thought, or not what we
(48:05):
expected, or whatever.
You know what I'm saying andit's like no, no, no, no, no,
it's.
There wasn't anything you coulddo.
There's nothing you could havedone.
Some things like you were saying.
It's good for kids to gothrough, right, but what I think
(48:26):
has been interesting and isseeing is watching my parents
see them in us and like andhaving that, oh, like.
This is why this bothers me somuch.
Oh, this is what, and that isnot an easy thing to come to as
(48:47):
a parent, as an older age.
You know what I mean.
You're still learning you todayand I think it takes a level of
humility to be willing to dothat and be willing to continue
to grow and learn and shift andchange and unlearn, even
(49:11):
yourself, even the parts ofyourself that other people
probably prop up and reallyrespect and admire, like you
were saying about Superdad,right?
You know what I'm saying?
Hey, that's a badge of honor.
The minivan, yeah, Right, forreal, all these kids.
Like hey, that's a badge ofhonor.
Speaker 2 (49:27):
The minivan.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Yeah, right, like for real, all these kids at my
house, right, they love comingover here, but your kids, you
know and you were able to see,like, okay, maybe I needed to
modify my actions a little bitfor that, even though other
people gave me the badge, gaveme the medal, for things like
(49:47):
that.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
I was talking to my brother on the way here and I
told him about the podcast andasked him I said, man, what are
some things that you wish youhad did different?
He said probably that militanttype style of leadership I had
(50:11):
in the home.
He said it was kind of like forme everything had to be planned
out and had to go exactly likethis.
He's a military guy and he saidI probably would be a bit more
understanding and listen a bitmore and give them room to
experience life and makemistakes.
Yeah, instead of.
And I told her and that's whenI said, man, we just got this
(50:34):
thing in us.
We feel like we have to protectthem.
You know, and and and I thinkpoverty breathes that sometimes,
like coming from where we camefrom, from nothing, and seeing
the things that we've seen, youjust feel like you have to and I
(50:54):
just felt like I may havemuzzled them a bit as kids and
by me not being exposed to a tonof things.
It limited what I could exposethem to you get what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (51:08):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (51:09):
So yeah.
Speaker 1 (51:10):
Yeah, so I think it's interesting having this
conversation about parenting andblending families, because you
know a lot of people.
I don't know the exactstatistics on it, but a lot of
people are getting married older, which means that a lot of
(51:32):
people are probably enteringinto some version of a blended
family.
And that's a lot more commontoday than it probably was 20,
30, 40 years ago.
Right, you know 20, 30, 40years ago, in that you know what
and you've said a lot.
But like, what are some thingsin when you are dating people
(51:58):
that have children?
You know, and are, or in, youknow, exploring a relationship
with people that have children?
What's some of the things thatyou can say?
Hey, it's important to havethese types of conversations.
What should you consider whenit comes to a life as a blended
family?
Speaker 2 (52:17):
I think the first piece of advice I would give
whether it be the man or thewoman don't force it.
Don't force it Because thinkabout a child who is away from
one of their parents.
So, no matter how bad it was orwhat happened when that child
(52:42):
is still young, and even as theygrow up in 10 years, sometime
in adulthood, they still havethis vision of the picket fence
and the poodle and mom and dadbeing together, Right, and
there's that inkling of hopethere saying they're going to
get back together.
Yeah, it's temporary, righthere, yeah, and so that child
(53:02):
and this is not from me, this isfrom Gary Chapman child's, and
this is not from me, this isfrom Gary Chapman.
I was listening to a podcastwith him and another gentleman
he wrote a book with and hetalked about how that child's
love language could be physicaltouch.
But they don't want your touchand you're trying to force it
(53:25):
because you think you've readall these books and all this
stuff and oh, so I'm going tokeep hugging them.
They don't want to hug from youright now.
Let that kind of be organic andcome natural.
You just might need to do afist bump.
Yeah, until that childinitiates, that's good.
That hug right and I was likethat's wisdom, yeah, that's
wisdom, that's wisdom.
(53:47):
That hug right.
And I was like that's wisdom,yeah, that's wisdom, that's
wisdom instead of forcing it.
And me personally, I'll saythis my daughter, who's not my
biological daughter, she had abiological dad in her life and I
mean took care of her.
He took care of her.
He and I didn't see eye to eye,but he took care of his
(54:11):
daughter.
And so one thing this isanother piece of advice I'll
give One thing I think I gotright.
I can say I got this right.
I would not allow her and that'sa strong word, allow but I
wouldn't allow her to talknegatively about her biological
father.
That's good, yeah.
And parents have to watch that,because children know how to be
(54:32):
manipulative as well to gettheir way.
The Bible said foolishness isbound up in the heart of a child
.
So they know how to bemanipulative to get their way.
So she would be gone with herfather.
But if she come home, he madeher upset.
I wouldn't entertain that.
I cut that off immediately.
(54:55):
No, we're not doing that Now.
I can't control what happenedwith her by a lot of your fault.
I can't control anything thathe may have said or anything or
didn't say, but I can controlwhat I do.
I'm not going to do thatbecause I want you to respect
your father.
Yeah, you're just upset rightnow because you didn't get what
(55:16):
you wanted and some parents fallsome of the bonus dads or bonus
moms, or even the biologicalthey again, it's all about
experiences.
They can be bitter at the otherindividual so they will allow
(55:36):
the child to talk bad about thatother individual because you
don't like them either and nowyou don't want your child.
So you're trying to livethrough your child, your
experiences, and that's a toxicsituation.
So I think that you shouldstill teach them to honor their
other parent.
Yeah, and don't try to make,don't like, don't make your kids
(55:57):
call you dad.
That should be natural.
Yeah, I want to earn it.
You know what I'm saying?
Just love them where they are,get to know them, let them
process it.
Don't try to force somethingthat don't fit.
That's one thing I would say,and have that clear
communication.
(56:18):
I would give the same advice Igive to younger couples who are
married.
It's funny.
I say that now.
I'm like I've been married 20years, but I bet somebody
married 50 years.
Like you're a rookie.
But what I say to my rookies.
I say, man, what do you say?
The, I guess, key ingredientsare for a marriage to be
(56:40):
successful?
I tell them three things, mankeep God first, have clear
communication and keep folks atyour business, especially your
family.
Speaker 1 (56:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (56:51):
Like you know and I think you do the same thing with
your kids.
Speaker 1 (56:55):
Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 2 (56:57):
You know what I'm saying, god.
First listen to them more thanyou talk, because we think we
know everything because we areadults, but we don't know how
they're processing theirexperience better than them.
I don't care how grown you are,I mean the books you've read.
So, clear communication withthem and keep focused.
(57:21):
You know what I'm saying.
Like, spend time listening andtalking to them, and when they
share something with you, that'sbetween y'all.
You know.
So that would be my advice.
Speaker 1 (57:37):
Eric, this has been incredibly rich.
Speaker 2 (57:41):
You brought me out, you brought me out.
I don't do podcasts.
Speaker 1 (57:47):
Y'all.
This has been a treat.
He really doesn't.
He's being for real.
He doesn't do stuff like me.
He does not typically do stufflike this and especially Cher,
and I appreciate yourvulnerability and your
transparency Absolutely and Ireally think this is going to
help a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (58:02):
I hope so.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Like I really do, because it's such a tricky thing
.
And it's a tricky thing.
Relationships are tricky anyway, but bringing in children and
then by them other adults istricky, and to navigate that
(58:24):
well and then to have thehumility to be willing to
continue to learn is such aquality I think a lot of people,
I hope a lot of people canreally gain from.
So thank you for sharing.
Speaker 2 (58:39):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (58:40):
Absolutely.
This was so good.
All right, thank you once againfor listening to the Unlearned
Podcast.
We would love to hear yourcomments and your feedback about
the episode.
Feel free to follow us onFacebook and Instagram and to
(59:02):
let us know what you think.
We're looking forward to thenext time when we are able to
unlearn together to move forwardtowards freedom.
See you then.
Hello everyone and welcome to the Unlearned Podcast
.
I'm your host, ruth AbigailSmith, and you have stumbled
upon a podcast that is here tohelp you gain the courage to
change your mind, and today wehave the privilege of speaking
with genuinely one of myfavorite people.
I don't call everybody this,but this man truly is my big
(00:31):
brother and I'm so grateful forhim.
If you are listening fromMemphis, you probably know who
he is.
You certainly know where heworks.
He is the executive director ofStreets Ministries and he has
been doing ministry in Memphisfor quite some time, born and
raised.
He's going to tell you all thathimself and talk a little bit
(00:53):
about who he is, but this man'sname is Eric Ballantyne.
Mr Ballantyne, welcome to theUnlearned Podcast.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Ruth Abigail, how are you today?
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I'm great man it's good to be with you Likewise.
Yeah, this is exciting.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
This is truly my sister.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
I mean truly, we siblings for real.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
For real.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
I mean we behave like siblings, Absolutely.
So just be warned, Beforewarned.
We didn't prepare too much forthis Right.
We didn't want to, so this isgoing to be a great conversation
.
I'm particularly excited aboutthis conversation because, Eric,
you're an executive director ofa long-lasting that's not the
(01:40):
word I'm looking for a veryprominent nonprofit in the city,
and so you speak all the time.
I mean, you speak aboutministry and you speak about
young people and you do thatright.
So if you're in Memphis andlocal, you've probably heard him
(02:01):
or you've heard something hesaid.
He's done music, so his voiceis not unknown to the city.
But what I'm excited abouttoday is we're going to dig into
some stuff he doesn't normallytalk about.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
Right.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
We're going to dig we're going to dig, and I'm
excited because we get to talkto Eric the man, not Eric the
director, right, and I like that.
And so I want us to just startwith.
I'd love just for you tointroduce yourself to the people
(02:34):
, tell them what it is that'sinteresting about you, where you
grew up, a little bit of yourstory, how in the world you got
to this place, and then we'lljust dig a little bit.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
All right, Thanks again.
Story how in the world you gotto this place, and then we'll
just dig a little bit.
All right, Thanks again.
So honored to be here on theUnlearned podcast tonight and
just to share a little bit ofwho I am and hopefully we can
glean from each other tonight.
I'm from Memphis, a nativeMemphian born and raised here.
As of a week or so ago, I'vebeen here 46 years.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Come on 46.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
So that's my entire life right and I love Memphis.
Born and raised in the southpart of Memphis, affectionately
known as South.
Memphis South Memphis sure, andyoungest of seven, youngest of
seven.
My mom, beautiful mom, now is76.
And her baby boy is 46.
(03:28):
It's weird, so weird, but she'sbeautiful as ever, healthy,
doing fine, and all of mysiblings are still here in town.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (03:39):
And just give you the roots of that.
My mama has seven children, 21grandchildren and 23
great-grands.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
And they're all here.
No, they're everywhere ohthey're everywhere, okay, okay,
all over the world.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
Wow Ireland somewhere .
But no yeah, but, yeah, thegrands and the great-grands a
nice portion of them are here,Wow, but they're like scattered
all over the United States, butall of my siblings are here in
the city.
So, yeah, been married to mylovely wife, barbara now for 20
years.
Yes, 20 years of marriage goingon 40, right, and 20 years of
(04:17):
being happily married and wehave three children.
So, yeah, okay, yeah, cool man,that's me in a nutshell.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
I love it, I love it, I love it, I yeah, okay, yeah,
cool man.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
That's me in a nutshell.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it.
So all right.
So you're married, have threechildren.
How old were you when you gotmarried?
Well, you said 20 years.
I was 20.
I should do math.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
Yeah, I was 25 when.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
I got married, 25 when you got married, 25 when
you got married, and so so I'mgoing on 21.
So, of course, Right, okay, yeah, 21 years, okay.
So yeah, because this is kindof leading us into where we want
to go right, it's just kind oflearning a little bit about who
you are, who you have been as ahusband, as a father, as a man
(05:06):
out here in these Memphisstreets doing your life, right.
So tell us, just tell us, alittle bit of that experience,
right, kind of start where youwant to start with that.
Tell us a little bit.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Okay, I guess more about my upbringing, about your
upbringing.
Or marriage more so.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah about your upbringing, about my upbringing,
about your upbringing Aboutmarriage.
More so, yeah about yourupbringing.
So share with us a little bitabout who Eric was as a young
man, husband, father.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Okay, got you.
Okay.
Well, for me I mentioned at theage of 25 is when I got married
, and for some people they'relike that's young, that's's
young, that's so young.
But I felt old at 25 because Iliterally jumped off the porch
pretty early, when I was about12-ish or 13,.
(06:02):
I started doing big boy thingsand got involved in a lot of the
streets, gangs, drugs, stufflike that.
So by the time I was 16, youknow, I thought I was grown.
You know what I'm saying.
So at 25, I was OG to me, youknow, and to some others, you
know, like man, you know, he'dbeen there, done that already,
(06:23):
and so I was ready to settledown by that time.
Her and I had been dating forat that time, right at three
years, and she entered into therelationship with a biological
daughter Okay, at that time wasfour years old, okay, and I had
a biological son, okay, who wasthree months.
(06:46):
Oh, wow, yeah, wow, when we,you know, like real talk, when
we met and I was living fast,yeah, and then we had a son
together, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Wow, right Okay.
Yeah, all right, so let's talkabout that.
So both of you had childrengoing into the marriage.
Going into the marriage or therelationship?
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Well, coming into the relationship, Coming into the
relationship.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Okay, so you both had children coming into the
relationship and then you had achild together.
So talk about a little bit thatexperience navigating, blending
a family.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
I had no idea.
She had no idea.
Yeah, we just you know we werein love, right, yeah, and all we
know is you know we love eachother.
And I really didn't knowanything about being a father,
being a parent.
I grew up pretty much in asingle-parent home.
(07:47):
Youngest of seven, my momthought it would be better for
me to live with my grandparents,so I was technically raised
primarily by my grandmother.
My grandfather died in a caraccident when I was six, so I
stayed with my grandmother.
So I was slick the only childfor a second there.
(08:09):
I could put my Kool-Aid in therefrigerator and nobody drink it
right, Sure, sure.
But I was the only kid for aminute, and then my grandmother
was just very kind, loving, soshe adopted another family.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
There was another family in the community and this
lady was very ill, like stagefour cancer, and her children
had been in the system.
Some and her and my grandma hadbecome friends and she was like
, hey, I'm dying, become friends.
And she was like, hey, you knowI'm dying and but I want my
(08:47):
kids to stay together.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
You know, will you promise me that you'll keep my
family?
My grandma said yes, so shetook her four kids into our
house and they became mysiblings.
Wow, so my family was blendedall around, you know, and?
And the lady was white and thekid's father was
African-American.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
So yeah, wait a minute, all right so all right,
so there's a lot going on.
Right, yeah, right.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
So how old were you when they moved in?
Speaker 2 (09:23):
I'm not mistaken, I had to be around 10.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
I would say around 9 or 10.
Okay, and they were much olderthan me, you know well.
Yeah, back then it seemed likethey were grown, they were like
16.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
Oh, they were really.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, 16, 15, 16.
Okay, One was maybe 20.
Oh, 16.
One was maybe 20.
Oh, wow.
And they were very well known inthe community.
One of them, particularly theone that I wanted to be just
like Chris, was like man.
(10:01):
He was that winsome guy waslike man, he was that winsome
guy.
What's funny is in the hoodyou're super light-skinned, with
good hair.
You're a nickname, white boy.
So Chris was white boy andeverybody loved Chris.
Everybody loved white boy.
White boy, chris, that's hisname.
Everybody knew him as that andhe was just one of those guys
who was charismatic, loving,funny.
(10:24):
But he was feared.
He was like man.
He just had this anger and thisrage from his experiences as a
child and even trying to processthe death of his mom and the
fact that his dad was not in hislife and that he had to go
through this system.
You know all of the porterleaves, the tall trees, secs,
(10:48):
dogwoods, any system you canthink of, fostering, whatever.
He went through a lot of thatand he had a lot of rage and
bitterness, but he was the onethat I loved the most and I kind
of wanted to be like him.
So when I jumped off that porch, I jumped off the porch with
intentions of becoming him.
You know, just being honest.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Yeah, no, that's good .
So your experience is reallyyou've got a blended experience
from a lot of different angles.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
And all right.
So I want to talk a little bitmore about jumping off the porch
, because I think that that is awell, that's key to your story,
right, right.
And I love how you kind of saidin the beginning 25 for you was
like- Retired Right, you wereretired right yeah.
(11:51):
So tell me if I'm wrong.
Like your perspective on lifemay have been a little bit more,
would you call it more maturethan most 25-year-olds because
of your experience, or is thataccurate?
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah, I think that's accurate.
Okay, again, by 25, I had donemore than most and I thought
what's weird is, at 25, for me,all of the things I had been
involved in and had experienced,I thought I was this guy, I
(12:32):
thought this was my identity,what I saw in my brother Right,
I wanted to be that and Ithought that was authentic
manhood, I guess I can say, andit was not until I accepted
Christ at 25 and startedsurrounding myself around some
men who were imitating Christthat I really found out that,
(12:52):
hey, I have no idea what I'mdoing here and I had to kind of
relearn, unlearn what I thoughtwas authentic manhood and then
learn what true manhood would.
At the same time, while I'mtrying to figure out this
parenting thing and being ahusband right, wow, right,
(13:14):
because all I had was myexperiences, what I've seen, and
my dad I lost him in 2014.
Great man, we had a greatrelationship, but early on and
I'm an open book, so the way Iwas conceived was out of wedlock
, you know, my dad was marriedand stepped out.
Yeah, and here I am right.
(13:35):
Yeah, and as a kid, you don'tknow that.
As a kid, all you know is, hey,that's dad, that's mom Right.
Why can't I go to that house,right, right, that's dad, that's
mom Right.
Why can't I go to that house,right, right.
So some of those childhoodexperiences, you know, when I
started to mature and go throughmy adolescence or whatever,
some of those things werebrought to my attention, right,
(13:59):
like, oh, this happened, oh,that's why I couldn't go here,
oh, that's why that lady lookedat me like that, and so all that
bitterness that I told you mybrother, had I had my adopted
brother, had I began to havethat bitterness toward my
biological father, yeah, eventoward my grandmother who raised
(14:20):
me, why you didn't tell me, youknow just so many other things
that just created somewhat of amonster.
I guess I can say, yeah,because what you would do is
you'd take it out on anybody.
You can right your frustration,so yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:36):
So you well, here's the thing, right, you were
challenged to emulate somethingthat you hadn't been practicing.
Pretty quickly, right, right,and you had to work through all
(14:59):
of this stuff to get to thispoint to you know, to, to, to
function as a man, right, andthe, the way that you had
learned, like you said, manhoodwas different than how you had
been introduced to it in yourold age of 25.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
Um and so how, how did that that unlearning manhood
process look?
What?
What were some examples of whatthat looked like?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Oh, man, one thing was learning how to control your
emotions, learning conflictresolution, you know, because
you used to handle this stuffthis way Right, this way Right.
But when you started to reallylearn about true, authentic man,
biblical man, who's a, you know, real man?
(15:51):
Fight on the knees.
You know, we don't take it toour, you know, to the fist, but
for me I had to kind of get overthe anger stuff, work some
stuff out with myself.
But, mind you, I'm trying to doall of this.
So all of my old ways of gettingmoney, my old ways of handling
my disputes, yep, all ways ofeverything, how I navigated
(16:15):
right, matriculated through theera of my life in that I'm still
trying to figure out how to bea parent, and that was the piece
for me.
So I probably made a ton ofmistakes.
I did the best I could, but Istarted to model myself.
But the transition for me waswatching again, men of God that
(16:40):
I looked up to.
I watched how they handledtheir wives, how they treated
them with class and respect, howthey nurtured their kids, their
relationship.
I kind of watched how theydisciplined their children.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
Because I didn't want to again my childhood
experiences to totally influencehow I handled my children.
If that makes sense, correct,there were some great elements
of it, I think.
One thing I can say I hope I'mnot getting ahead here but one
thing with my dad.
Again, he was not there in thehouse with me, but I think about
(17:19):
it.
I saw him two days a week.
He bought all my school stuff.
He was very loving to me.
I just couldn't go to his houseand I got something to say
about that later on when you'retalking about bleeding the
families.
But I couldn't go to his housebecause his wife didn't accept
me.
She knew about me but shedidn't accept me.
(17:41):
And so he told me in his latteryears we were talking.
One day he said son, he saidman, I made a lot of mistakes.
He said, but one thing I didn'tdo, I didn't deny you, and I
had to agree with him with that,because I mean all throughout
my childhood I had a dad.
I knew I had a dad.
I didn't know the dad'ssupposed to be in the house, I
(18:02):
just knew, hey, he'd take careof me, he'd come over here.
He even disciplined me andthat's something that I learned
from him about discipline.
People have different views onspanking your kid.
Or do you put him in the cornertime out, or whatever.
I got spankings, but I didn'tget beatings.
I got spankings.
My dad was a truck driver, sohe's in and out of town or
(18:27):
whatever and I'm just a boy, I'mtrying to set the big wheel on
fire.
I'm just crazy.
So my grandmother would tell mydad and I'm like, oh Lord, he
coming.
So when he would pull up in thetruck, I'm like, oh, okay, but
he would come in spend qualitytime with my grandmother.
Then he would call me in, hewould discuss the situation with
(18:50):
me in front of my grandmother,calmly, never raise his voice,
and I was super intimidatedbecause it was my dad, but I
wasn't afraid he's going to killme right now.
I knew I was in trouble, buteven before he would spank me,
he would sit down and explain tome why Wow, you can't do this,
(19:13):
and that's something that I'llnever forget.
So I was like, okay, in thisparenting thing, I know my kid's
going to do some crazy stuff,yeah, and there may be some
times where I may have todiscipline them like that, but I
want to do it like he did.
You know what I mean, so thatwas a good takeaway.
So that's one man that Iwatched and learned some things
from, and then my pastor andother people that I had an
(19:38):
opportunity to do.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
That's beautiful.
That's a beautiful picture offatherhood.
You said something you knowthat you could never go to him
(19:59):
Right, Right, Right to him.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:02):
Right, right.
So so this and and so there wasa, so I guess the a difference
right of fatherhood being thefatherhood you experienced, of,
like you said, two days a weekversus seven days a week.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right In the home Right.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Right there with you Are there some immediate
differences that you saw as afather, that you realized was a
different experience you had asa kid.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Right, I guess, comically.
First I'd say, get on yournerves.
I see why.
I see why you let me come toyou.
No, I'm just joking.
But no, my kids had, all threeof them had.
That I longed for was being ableto touch your father.
(20:52):
You know what I'm saying.
Yeah, I remember sitting thereas a kid, like what's my daddy
number?
You know, call him.
And nobody would ever call him.
And you know, later on you'relike man.
I was traumatized by thatbecause I wanted to talk to my
daddy, I want to wrestle with mydaddy, or whatever, right,
because I couldn't do that withmy grandfather anymore.
He was gone and so I had no manthat I could physically touch
(21:15):
to get that appropriateaffection from right.
And so my children had thatevery night, every, you know,
whenever I worked all the time.
So when I get home, man, theyjumping on your neck, your back,
wrestling, tickling.
It's just, and again that goesto with Barbara and I when we
(21:39):
decided to become one again.
She's bringing her biologicaldaughter into picture and I have
a biological son who does notlive in the house, right?
yeah so that's a blended familythat we now have, and nobody has
taught us how to manage thatthing.
Speaker 1 (21:56):
So um can I ask you this sure, sure what, how was
like?
How, what kind of conversationsdid you and Barbara have?
Or didn't have that?
Maybe you look back and be like, hey, we should have talked
about this Right, that's it.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, when it comes to handlingparenting each other's children
(22:21):
, Right.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
I think, man, we should have had the
conversations.
We did the best we could.
Yeah, we both were lovingpeople.
I was not a tyrant in the houseor never been a violent guy,
abusive guy verbally, or none ofthat.
No cursing around my kids, noneof that stuff.
(22:42):
So I wasn't that type of guy,none of that, you know.
No cursing around my kids, noneof that stuff.
So I wasn't that type of guy.
But I was probably morelegalistic than anything, like
when I first accepted Christ,man, you know, I was like not to
do nothing, you know, and Iwish I had been a bit more open
(23:03):
to allowing them to make somemistakes.
Wow, yeah, I hope I'm notgetting ahead, but that's what I
feel Like.
I feel like I was trying sohard to protect them from
becoming me that I may havestopped them from becoming them,
if that makes sense, if thatmakes sense.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
We're going to let that sit for just a second.
That's good.
Yeah, you said you didn't wantthem to become you, right?
So you may, in the process,have stopped them from becoming
them, right, right, wow.
Speaker 2 (23:41):
You know, but doing it out of love and trying to
protect them.
Speaker 1 (23:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Like I felt like it was my responsibility, to which
it is, you know, but I was sooverbearing with protecting them
, yeah, and I should have letthem learn a little bit more by
experience.
Now you know I'm mature Now.
My kids are grown and gone.
Barbara and I empty nesters,have been empty nesters now for
(24:07):
about one or four years and Ilook back and they're grown.
I'm like man, I wish I had it.
This different, that differentyou know what were.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
so you say, not becoming like you.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
So what were you afraid of that?
I think the biggest thing offtop, just coming from where I
come from, I didn't want thestreets to get them.
Yeah, you know, I didn't wantour daughter to be treated the
way I may have treated youngladies in my ignorance, right,
(24:42):
or how I've seen young ladies betreated, right.
So I felt like I got to protecther.
Yeah, no, you can't go here.
You can't go there, you can'tdo this.
You know, you can't listen tothis, you can't do that.
And again, that was justlegalistic for real.
But I tried the approach ofexplaining it too, but still, at
the end of the day, it was zerounderstanding, like no, this is
(25:05):
it Like, this, is it what I saygoes?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
Yeah, and I think I would have been if I could go
back.
This is hindsight, it's 2020,but if I could go back, I would
be more open to listening to whythey want to do this or give
them a bigger voice.
So how has that impacted yourrelationships with them as
(25:30):
adults?
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Right, wow.
I think one thing my childrenalways knew was that I love them
and they knew that they couldcome to me and talk about it.
That was a good thing.
Me working in youth ministrywas sweet, but at the same time
it was deceptive, because mebeing the youth leader, youth
(25:51):
pastor, I'm always doing thecrazy, creative stuff with the
youth.
So I was like super dad to somany other kids, like everybody
want to be around, miss, a Rightman, let's go.
So my house was the spot Wow.
So we got all the youth want tocome hang at my house.
Parents trust us, know they'rewith us, they're safe.
We're doing the lock-ins, we'redoing the camps.
(26:13):
We're doing the lock-ins, we'redoing the camps, we're doing
whatever campfires, we're justdoing everything together.
And my kids loved it becausethey got the super cool dad who
all the kids want to be around,who make everybody smile.
But I worked so much to providefor them and I'm volunteering,
doing all of this stuff here atthe church and I think I lost
(26:38):
out on you know, like the lovelanguages the quality time.
I think I missed out on.
They may not say this, but Ithink that I missed out on some
real quality time with thembecause it was always so crowded
.
You know, either we're atchurch, some youth function and
then me, being a Christianrapper at that time, traveling,
doing that.
(26:58):
I tried to always include myfamily but I was like they got
me but everybody got me.
So I would rethink how I didthat and probably fall back a
little bit and spend some moreintentional time with them
Instead of dragging them allaround.
Speaker 1 (27:18):
You saying a lot and I this is really because I think
a lot, of, a lot of men.
So you went from because Ithink this is so important and I
think the connection here is soimportant.
You went from doing your thingin the streets to being a
husband and a father, to addingon to that youth pastor, right,
(27:43):
right, and not just a youthpastor, but a really really good
one, right.
I hope I'm saying that I hope,yeah, just knowing who you are.
But, like you said, super dadto all the kids right.
Yeah, but even in that it'slike if somebody looked at your
kind of we'll call it manhoodresume.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
It's like man he is killing right there may have
lacked the attention with youryou know the children that
you're stewarding because of thekind of energy put in.
(28:26):
Being exactly who it is thatyou felt God called you to be
Right, so that tension is real.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Yeah, absolutely.
Again.
My wife and my kids probablywould say something different,
but it's my inner convictions, Iknow, and I'm like man.
I think I missed it in someareas where I could have been a
bit more intentional withgetting to know each of them
(28:53):
individually.
It was more like this is whatwe do.
Yeah, we.
You know what I'm saying.
Yes, this is what we do, yeah,but maybe she didn't, that
wasn't her love language, or her, or that wasn't his love
language.
You know, like this kid and Iwould advise any parent out
there, especially if you have ablended family get to know your
(29:16):
children's love languages.
Like one kid, it may be qualitytime, yeah.
The other kid, it may bephysical touch, and I use it in
my real life, like my son thatwas in the house.
He had dad 24-7 around theclock.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
And so I mean we roustled and the the crazy stuff
, but he didn't touch me as much.
But my oldest son, when hewould come over on weekends, he
couldn't keep his hands off me.
Wow, I don't care what he said,dad, you know, hit me on the
shoulder.
He always just, and I didn'trecognize that at first and as I
(29:55):
started maturing and growing Iwas like dang, that was me
wanting that as a kid with mydad.
Wow, he needed that.
Right, you know what I'm saying.
And he didn't have me all thetime.
Yeah, so when he did, he goingto take advantage of it.
He going to take advantage.
Just test me to death, you knowwhat I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
So can you, can you kind of talk a little bit about?
Um, the difference in parenting?
Speaker 2 (30:20):
yeah a child in the home and one who lives away from
home that's a tricky onebecause, uh, a lot of variables,
like it depends on therelationship between you, uh,
and the other parent, becausewhen you're co-parenting,
sometimes that can be smooth andsometimes it can be challenging
Absolutely.
For me, thankfully, it waspretty smooth.
(30:43):
That's good, and I'll tell youwhy I think it was smooth.
First of all, the grace of God.
Second of all, I didn't playwith her emotions and I talked
to a lot of young brothers aboutthat who are in situations
where they might have a childthat they had from a previous
relationship and now you're withsomebody else and you're
(31:04):
wondering why it's so difficult.
You know windows and tires andfoolishness.
You know, many times we kind ofwant our cake and eat it too,
right, and you play withpeople's emotions like that.
So when we decided that wewouldn't be together, we decided
we weren't going to be togetherand I said I'm not going to be
(31:27):
cruel to her.
She has my son in her stomachand so I want to make sure she's
straight.
So she wants some grapes?
Yeah, three in the morning I'mtaking grapes.
I'm like you know, I'm going tolive with my boy.
Okay, I didn't know better, Ididn't know, but we had this
understanding.
Hey, we're not together, nomore.
But guess what?
We got a son, wow.
(31:49):
So we got to figure this thing,yeah, and we didn't bet 100.
We ran into our challenges whenyou talked about the portion of
the child in-house compared toyour child that's not in the
house.
Even when it comes tocorrecting them as a parent,
guilt can kick in and you allowthe child outside of the house
(32:11):
to get away with murder.
Yeah, almost compared.
And you're super hard on theones who are right there and
it's not fair.
So I may have been a bit extrain the house at times and more
lenient with my oldest, becauseI felt like he couldn't touch me
when he wanted to, and so whenwe do have those opportunities
(32:33):
for touches, the touches can'tbe me fussing.
You get what I'm saying?
I do Right, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:41):
So how do you?
That's really hard to navigate.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Very hard to navigate .
Speaker 1 (32:46):
I mean, it's really, really hard.
Speaker 2 (32:47):
I don't think there's an answer to it.
I'm pretty sure somebody outthere yeah somebody wrote a book
.
Yeah, but I don't know exactlyhow we navigated through that.
I was learning as I go.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
So this may be and I want to get back to that
relationship in just a second,but I just want to kind of pivot
this way.
If there's something here atthis time you were a believer,
you were in the church, right.
Was there tension between youknow your relationships in the
(33:25):
church and your relationshipwith the relationships you had
with kids and family and kind ofyou know your parenting living
situation?
I mean, maybe there wasn't yourparenting living situation, was
it?
I mean maybe there wasn't.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
But I'm curious when you say the tension between so
did you experience.
You talked about guilt right,and you know was any of that
(34:01):
guilt catalyzed by church at allor by other Christians, I would
say no, yeah, I would say no,yeah, I would say no.
I can say this, and the goodthing is this is word to the
wise for anybody who decided todo a podcast, and you may talk
to your wife first.
I talked to my wife in theparking lot.
I said look, okay, I'm about tohave a real conversation, right
, you cool.
But my wife I think if anybodywould get on me, it would be her
(34:28):
about putting everything first.
And I didn't think I was.
I didn't think I was like man,I'm doing the work of the Lord.
You know what I'm saying.
But I didn't realize that I'mworking all day, and now I'm at
the church.
And if I'm not at the church,I'm at home working on church
stuff, doing PowerPoints andputting together curriculums for
(34:50):
Bible study and all of this,and I'm excited about it.
And I'm thinking she's lookingat me like, oh my God, he's
doing the work of the Lord.
But she's looking at me like,hey, spend some time with me and
your kids, yeah, yeah, you know, I thought including my kids in
that was exciting for them andthey would get with it because
(35:13):
I'm dead, but they need it.
So I think that the tensionwould come from there, in-house,
not from out-house.
You're the hero.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
Outside the house, right, yeah, and people don't—it
takes a very mature person torecognize and say, hey, man,
take care of home, we got this,take a break, take a sabbatical
and go spend time with your kids.
But me, coming from where Icome from, man, I just had this
(35:47):
zeal to live right, to serve Godand I'm thinking, if I'm doing
this, I'm happy, so everybodyshould be happy, right, you know
?
So it took me about I'll say ittook me about my God 10 to 12
years of ministry before Irealized I need to slow down.
(36:09):
It took that long for me to sayman, my kids are really growing
up and I'm still dragging themalong to do everything that I
want to do and I need to investa little bit more into who they
are.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
So with your oldest son, yes, talk a little bit
about that relationship.
I know that has been it's, um,it's been a journey.
Yeah, oh yeah what, what, whathas that journey look like?
And, um, what are some thingsthat you have had to unlearn as
(36:47):
a parent, particularly with youroldest son oh man, uh, eric, oh
man, eric Jr, my boy, that's myboy, eric is now 24.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
And again, didn't know what I was doing in the
beginning and I started to learnwhen I got 25, I'm telling you,
somewhere in that window, 25 to27, I was really on some more
stuff.
Like man, I'm trying to learnall I can so I can invest in my
family and all that.
But again, I'm learning aboutworking now and you know I had
(37:23):
neglected my education, so somany things stacked against me
but I was so crazy in believingthat, if God be for me, who
could be against me?
Right?
So I'm just zealous and going.
But as I learned and grew withEric, I knew one thing he is
(37:43):
going to be at my house.
Now that's good and bad.
Let me tell you why.
Okay, it's good because I needto do that as a parent, I need
to be in my son's life.
But it was bad because I foundout years later why I was doing
it, the motive behind it.
It was my own adverse childhoodexperiences, right as a kid.
(38:04):
My dad's wife said no, he isnot coming to this house.
So I had in my mind nobodywould never treat my son like
that.
So here I am, my crazy self.
I have my son at the housebecause I want him with me, but
at the same time, in my mind I'mtrying to show my wife that my
(38:29):
boy coming here.
So I'm walking around with amagnifying glass watching her to
see how she's going to treat myboy.
So I'm walking around with amagnifying glass watching her to
see how she's going to treat myboy, wow.
So I say this humorously but ifshe were to give our biological
son a green lollipop and givemy son a red, my oldest son a
red one, I'm like why are yougiving him the red?
(38:50):
Try to tell him to stop.
We're just conjuring upfoolishness.
Wow, but I didn't know why.
But it was my own adversechildhood experiences and I
didn't want him to go throughwhat I went through.
And it was not even the case.
She loved him, just like therest of our kids, and she had to
(39:15):
check me on that years later.
Like you know, what are youdoing?
Yeah, you know, and I'm feelinglike I had to protect him, but
there's a flip side to that coin.
She had the same thing with ourdaughter.
She felt like she had to protecther because of her experiences
as a child and her pastrelationship.
(39:38):
Yeah, so they had this bondthat you know.
In reality, I know now that we,as parents, should have been on
one accord right first, but shehad this bond with our daughter
, but I had the same thing.
Yeah, my son, yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:58):
Right, that's right.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
And so we had to have to come to Jesus meeting to hey
, this is not your daughter,this is not my son, these are
our children, yeah, so we got toget on one on one course.
So it took some hurdles and youknow, along the way, but God
did his thing.
I'll say, for us, in ourmarriage, year number 12 or 13
(40:28):
was like the roughest ever.
We hit a bump and it wasbecause of the blended family.
Wow, we hit a bump that wethought we couldn't overcome and
it took a lot.
It took some counseling, ittook some tears, it took some
(40:50):
real conversations,self-realization and all of the
above for that to be totallyrestored to where we say, hey,
nah, we're going to keep, we'restrong together.
Right, you know what I'm saying.
So now fast forward.
My oldest and I, we hit a bumpin the road.
Today is actually the one-yearanniversary of his brother's
murder.
His brother was killed.
Wow, everybody knew about theyoung doll situation.
(41:13):
Right around that time hisbrother was killed, and it had
nothing to do with that, but hewas killed around that time.
And so this is the one-yearanniversary today of his
brother's death.
But my son went through a realtough period prior to that and I
(41:35):
think about it.
I did the same thing.
As much as I admired andrespected my father, I had some
things that I felt like hedidn't quite get right according
to my standards and I cut himoff for some years.
No reason, he's trying to reachout to me, I just cut him off
(41:55):
and I was gone in the streetsdoing my thing.
So my son had his stint and hedid the same thing and it took
the Lord because I was so upset,and it took the Lord to show me
like hey, you did the samething.
So he had this moment where hekind of bagged off for a while.
Then he lost his brother in theprocess.
But through that God restoredour relationship.
So he and I are back.
(42:17):
You know, like we never leftright and but you said something
a few minutes ago about somethings that I wish I could go
back and do different and learn.
I learned with my oldest son.
We had a conversation duringthat process of reconciling our
(42:40):
relationship and I thought Ijust knew why he did what he did
and I was thinking in my headI'm like he and his feelings,
you know.
But he shared with me.
He said, wasn't the fact thatyou how did he word it?
He said it was not the factthat you didn't agree with me.
(43:08):
He said I didn't expect you toagree with the choice that he
was about to make.
He said but I did expect you tocome get me.
And when he said that to me,it's like it cut me Because I
was like man, I was so bent onbeing right, but the situation
was still wrong.
(43:29):
Make sense.
So for me, if I could go back,I would say man, it's not about
who right and who wrong, becauseif you win the battle but you
(43:49):
lose the war, I was 45 at thattime.
At 45, I had to apologize to myson for not being there for him
the way he needed me, not theway you know.
I thought I knew what he needed.
Again, that comes from youbeing the adult thinking you
know everything.
Speaker 1 (44:13):
So I would have listened more, eric.
You're saying so much and I'mtrying to.
(44:35):
Honestly, I'm sitting here,just I am just sitting here
listening at this story and justyour journey, and I know a lot
of people have experiencedprobably parts of what you're
talking about for sure, fromjust blended family coming into
a marriage, coming into arelationship with kids, having
to parent kids in the home, outof the home.
Speaker 2 (44:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
You know tension around you, know your marriage
relationship after being therefor a while and that still being
there, like you know, parentingan adult child, particularly
one who does have a little bitof a chip on his shoulder.
But in all of that you, andalmost every story you've told
(45:22):
you, have traced it back.
You've traced you.
You know what I'm saying.
You have seen you, you'veidentified you in the scenario.
I want to know what work haveyou done to get to the place
where you're willing to seeyourself in life, some of the
(45:44):
things that you've seen in yourchildren?
Speaker 2 (45:48):
I tell you what a lot of listening to other people
who have been here before, Someof my mentors in their 60s maybe
and they're like man, you know,I went through this and talking
to them about it.
Also, more than anything, it'sjust man using the word of God
(46:12):
as a mirror, you know, and notreally looking in it to see
other people, but to see myself,and just a continuous
improvement, looking for ways tocontinue to get better.
And you know, hey, I'm going tohave grandkids one day, right?
Yeah, yeah, you know.
So I want to be able to give mychildren advice, to say hey
(46:33):
here's some places where I mayhave messed up.
So I think there's no magic wandto it or particular strategy I
use or anything.
It's just man, I'm just tryingto improve day by day, get
better listening, and you know,when you see your children go
(46:54):
through things in life and youcan't just look at them and say
I told them you should have yougot.
To look at you, say what couldI have done different early on
to prevent this from happening?
Right, they make their ownchoices and decisions.
They do stuff.
But I think a lot of times whenwe look at ourselves we'll see
(47:14):
the root cause of it is againhow we handle them.
Right, right.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
And how your hurts have impacted your actions
Absolutely.
And and I think that's so, youknow, we you know, being an
adult child, havingconversations with my parents as
an adult is very different, andwe talk all the time like we'll
we'll share me and my siblingswill share experiences we had
(47:44):
growing up that we didn't say asas kids, but and then we'll say
it and they'll be like, oh mygosh, I had no idea.
And then sometimes begin tobeat themselves up because it's
like I should have known, Ishould have done something.
I hate that.
That was the case, that was notwhat we thought, or not what we
(48:05):
expected, or whatever.
You know what I'm saying andit's like no, no, no, no, no,
it's.
There wasn't anything you coulddo.
There's nothing you could havedone.
Some things like you were saying.
It's good for kids to gothrough, right, but what I think
(48:26):
has been interesting and isseeing is watching my parents
see them in us and like andhaving that, oh, like.
This is why this bothers me somuch.
Oh, this is what, and that isnot an easy thing to come to as
(48:47):
a parent, as an older age.
You know what I mean.
You're still learning you todayand I think it takes a level of
humility to be willing to dothat and be willing to continue
to grow and learn and shift andchange and unlearn, even
(49:11):
yourself, even the parts ofyourself that other people
probably prop up and reallyrespect and admire, like you
were saying about Superdad,right?
You know what I'm saying?
Hey, that's a badge of honor.
The minivan, yeah, Right, forreal, all these kids.
Like hey, that's a badge ofhonor.
Speaker 2 (49:27):
The minivan.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
Yeah, right, like for real, all these kids at my
house, right, they love comingover here, but your kids, you
know and you were able to see,like, okay, maybe I needed to
modify my actions a little bitfor that, even though other
people gave me the badge, gaveme the medal, for things like
(49:47):
that.
Speaker 2 (49:49):
I was talking to my brother on the way here and I
told him about the podcast andasked him I said, man, what are
some things that you wish youhad did different?
He said probably that militanttype style of leadership I had
(50:11):
in the home.
He said it was kind of like forme everything had to be planned
out and had to go exactly likethis.
He's a military guy and he saidI probably would be a bit more
understanding and listen a bitmore and give them room to
experience life and makemistakes.
Yeah, instead of.
And I told her and that's whenI said, man, we just got this
(50:34):
thing in us.
We feel like we have to protectthem.
You know, and and and I thinkpoverty breathes that sometimes,
like coming from where we camefrom, from nothing, and seeing
the things that we've seen, youjust feel like you have to and I
(50:54):
just felt like I may havemuzzled them a bit as kids and
by me not being exposed to a tonof things.
It limited what I could exposethem to you get what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (51:08):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2 (51:09):
So yeah.
Speaker 1 (51:10):
Yeah, so I think it's interesting having this
conversation about parenting andblending families, because you
know a lot of people.
I don't know the exactstatistics on it, but a lot of
people are getting married older, which means that a lot of
(51:32):
people are probably enteringinto some version of a blended
family.
And that's a lot more commontoday than it probably was 20,
30, 40 years ago.
Right, you know 20, 30, 40years ago, in that you know what
and you've said a lot.
But like, what are some thingsin when you are dating people
(51:58):
that have children?
You know, and are, or in, youknow, exploring a relationship
with people that have children?
What's some of the things thatyou can say?
Hey, it's important to havethese types of conversations.
What should you consider whenit comes to a life as a blended
family?
Speaker 2 (52:17):
I think the first piece of advice I would give
whether it be the man or thewoman don't force it.
Don't force it Because thinkabout a child who is away from
one of their parents.
So, no matter how bad it was orwhat happened when that child
(52:42):
is still young, and even as theygrow up in 10 years, sometime
in adulthood, they still havethis vision of the picket fence
and the poodle and mom and dadbeing together, Right, and
there's that inkling of hopethere saying they're going to
get back together.
Yeah, it's temporary, righthere, yeah, and so that child
(53:02):
and this is not from me, this isfrom Gary Chapman child's, and
this is not from me, this isfrom Gary Chapman.
I was listening to a podcastwith him and another gentleman
he wrote a book with and hetalked about how that child's
love language could be physicaltouch.
But they don't want your touchand you're trying to force it
(53:25):
because you think you've readall these books and all this
stuff and oh, so I'm going tokeep hugging them.
They don't want to hug from youright now.
Let that kind of be organic andcome natural.
You just might need to do afist bump.
Yeah, until that childinitiates, that's good.
That hug right and I was likethat's wisdom, yeah, that's
wisdom, that's wisdom.
(53:47):
That hug right.
And I was like that's wisdom,yeah, that's wisdom, that's
wisdom instead of forcing it.
And me personally, I'll saythis my daughter, who's not my
biological daughter, she had abiological dad in her life and I
mean took care of her.
He took care of her.
He and I didn't see eye to eye,but he took care of his
(54:11):
daughter.
And so one thing this isanother piece of advice I'll
give One thing I think I gotright.
I can say I got this right.
I would not allow her and that'sa strong word, allow but I
wouldn't allow her to talknegatively about her biological
father.
That's good, yeah.
And parents have to watch that,because children know how to be
(54:32):
manipulative as well to gettheir way.
The Bible said foolishness isbound up in the heart of a child
.
So they know how to bemanipulative to get their way.
So she would be gone with herfather.
But if she come home, he madeher upset.
I wouldn't entertain that.
I cut that off immediately.
(54:55):
No, we're not doing that Now.
I can't control what happenedwith her by a lot of your fault.
I can't control anything thathe may have said or anything or
didn't say, but I can controlwhat I do.
I'm not going to do thatbecause I want you to respect
your father.
Yeah, you're just upset rightnow because you didn't get what
(55:16):
you wanted and some parents fallsome of the bonus dads or bonus
moms, or even the biologicalthey again, it's all about
experiences.
They can be bitter at the otherindividual so they will allow
(55:36):
the child to talk bad about thatother individual because you
don't like them either and nowyou don't want your child.
So you're trying to livethrough your child, your
experiences, and that's a toxicsituation.
So I think that you shouldstill teach them to honor their
other parent.
Yeah, and don't try to make,don't like, don't make your kids
(55:57):
call you dad.
That should be natural.
Yeah, I want to earn it.
You know what I'm saying?
Just love them where they are,get to know them, let them
process it.
Don't try to force somethingthat don't fit.
That's one thing I would say,and have that clear
communication.
(56:18):
I would give the same advice Igive to younger couples who are
married.
It's funny.
I say that now.
I'm like I've been married 20years, but I bet somebody
married 50 years.
Like you're a rookie.
But what I say to my rookies.
I say, man, what do you say?
The, I guess, key ingredientsare for a marriage to be
(56:40):
successful?
I tell them three things, mankeep God first, have clear
communication and keep folks atyour business, especially your
family.
Speaker 1 (56:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (56:51):
Like you know and I think you do the same thing with
your kids.
Speaker 1 (56:55):
Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 2 (56:57):
You know what I'm saying, god.
First listen to them more thanyou talk, because we think we
know everything because we areadults, but we don't know how
they're processing theirexperience better than them.
I don't care how grown you are,I mean the books you've read.
So, clear communication withthem and keep focused.
(57:21):
You know what I'm saying.
Like, spend time listening andtalking to them, and when they
share something with you, that'sbetween y'all.
You know.
So that would be my advice.
Speaker 1 (57:37):
Eric, this has been incredibly rich.
Speaker 2 (57:41):
You brought me out, you brought me out.
I don't do podcasts.
Speaker 1 (57:47):
Y'all.
This has been a treat.
He really doesn't.
He's being for real.
He doesn't do stuff like me.
He does not typically do stufflike this and especially Cher,
and I appreciate yourvulnerability and your
transparency Absolutely and Ireally think this is going to
help a lot of people.
Speaker 2 (58:02):
I hope so.
Speaker 1 (58:03):
Like I really do, because it's such a tricky thing
.
And it's a tricky thing.
Relationships are tricky anyway, but bringing in children and
then by them other adults istricky, and to navigate that
(58:24):
well and then to have thehumility to be willing to
continue to learn is such aquality I think a lot of people,
I hope a lot of people canreally gain from.
So thank you for sharing.
Speaker 2 (58:39):
Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (58:40):
Absolutely.
This was so good.
All right, thank you once againfor listening to the Unlearned
Podcast.
We would love to hear yourcomments and your feedback about
the episode.
Feel free to follow us onFacebook and Instagram and to
(59:02):
let us know what you think.
We're looking forward to thenext time when we are able to
unlearn together to move forwardtowards freedom.
See you then.
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