Good Job Mom, Good Job Dad

Ryan asks Rebekah, “How do you get through the day when you are very tired? “

Rebekah talks about how sleep deprivation is blowing up her world right now and not in a good way. It’s been going on for a long time since she is nursing our youngest Ari.

Ari grew out of the co-sleeper bed and we live in a one bedroom apartment with two kids who sleep in the room with us. Liam has a toddler bed in the corner, and we set up a pack and play for Ari, but he will not sleep in it. So Rebekah holds the baby all night in bed. She has worked it out so he fits in a good spot, but she ends up sleeping sitting up. She is getting out of that stage and things are getting better.

When Liam was a baby, it was a whole different story. We had a traumatic birth which prevented Rebekah from being able to nurse him. Ryan ended up sharing the feeding responsibilities which formed a special bond with Ryan and Liam. For a long time, he only wanted Ryan to put him to bed at night.

Now since Rebekah is nursing, Ari refuses a bottle and Ryan gets TONS of sleep!

We are beginning to move into a new stage where Ari is able to eat real food! He loves those baby-food-squeeze-packs. This is allowing Ryan to start helping with feeding and Rebekah is able to get out of the house with friends...but not without feeling baby-withdrawals.

Our 3 year old savors his food, which we just realized. We share a story about how he recently got a cake pop from his Grandmother and made it last for 2 days! The other day, he was given a Starbucks card with 5 dollars on it. We let him pick out chocolate milk and pay for it himself....it was the first time he had ever had chocolate milk and it blew his mind. He would only take the tiniest sips to make it last as long as possible. He would tell us, “I need to save it for later”...

We have a feeling that Ari, is going to have the opposite relationship with food and that we may need to guard Liam’s food from him.

Rebekah shares a poop story — Our toddler playing with his poop in the shower!

Newsflash: We have successfully potty trained Liam!! We utilized bribery and hollowed candy. This has changed our lives!!! Sometimes we think things will never change or get better. But then something clicks and we move onto the next stage.

Rebekah brings up a quote “Dear God please let me not raise the child that I was, or the child I wish I had, but let me raise the child that I have”...It had never crossed her mind that she might try to raise her kids as if they were just like her growing up. Ryan and Rebekah discuss the idea of not projecting personal context on our kids. Just because they are our offspring, it does not mean they will be just like us and experience the same things the same way we did. It is important to utilize personal context and experience, but to make sure to remember that our children are different people. For Rebekah, this means that she needs to pay more attention to each kid and analyze each situation in it’s own merit.

Ryan digs into some internet memes on parenting which brings up some personal reflection moments on how Ryan used to be an “arm-chair-parent” before having kids.

Ryan talks about a great piece of advice somebody gave him to keep sane while parenting: “Establish a consequence and follow through if the child disobeys”. In other words, warn them they are going to get a time out, and if the child disobeys, give them a time out...no drama....Sort of. Ryan and Rebekah talk about the reality of following through on this advice.

[11:20] Playing Inside vs. outside.

This is different for Ryan because he as at work all day and Rebekah is home all day with the kids. Rebekah was noticing that when Liam is inside, he does imaginative play, but it’s very short lived and jumps from project to project. She notices when they go outside, his attention span increases. Ryan notices that he can go “forever” outside. He finds creative things (leaves, sticks, bugs) to play with.

Ryan brings up an article from psychology today that talks about the brain development advantages of playing outside. [Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/moral-landscapes/201404/whats-better-indoor-or-outdoor-play]

We live in a second story apartment, so it is harder to go outside. Especially because we are so tired all the time and we can’t let Liam go run outside by himself. If we had a backyard, it would be much easier. It’s city life, which is different than how we grew up as kids. Rebekah talks about what it was like growing up in her home.

Ryan points out that there is a thing called “Nature Deficit Disorder” (according to Psychology Today article).

Ryan and Rebekah share experiences of playing outside when they were kids. We also grew up before video games were a thing.

The challenge for Rebekah and Ryan is: What do you do when you are too tired??

[22:00] Parenting Pet Peeves

Being constantly tired is a major parenting pet peeve. We ask the audience to share their advice in the comments.

Ryan struggles with being patient. This is a personal pet peeve for him. He wants things to happen quickly and struggles to let Liam jump in and help —which takes longer.

Bekah does not like “mom-chit-chat”. It can feel like comparison between moms which is frustrating. Ryan loves “mom-chit-chat” conversations...

Conclusion: we are all wired differently. We need to be the best version of who we are, so our kids can be the best version of who they are!

We just got better from being sick...the kinda sick that is not bad enough to stay in bed, but ...it’s miserable.

**NOTE: We are NOT giving medical advice, only sharing anecdotes and our experiences. Nothing in this episode should be considered advice. Please consult a physician with any medical concerns.**

When one person gets sick...everybody gets sick. The whole ordeal can last anywhere from a week to a month!

Wintertime, especially the holidays is when people start dropping like flies.

Liam and Bekah were both sick up through Christmas Eve this year. We were traveling and staying with family, so we quarantined ourselves.

Liam was especially fascinated by “barfing”. He would ask for juice so he could barf more. NO!!! Yuk. He would end up barfing all over the floor and Ryan would end up walking through it.

Ryan tried to keep his distance from the sick room only going in when needed. Poor Bekah!

The quarantine worked! Nobody else got the flu!

The thing about toddlers is—you never know if they are barfing from excitement, or if they have a terrible stomach flu.

Playground equipment is an especially precarious scenario ...there was a season where Ryan debated letting Liam play on playgrounds because he did not want to have the consequence of the whole family being sick for three weeks. In the end though, he would let Liam play.

No matter what you do, people are going to get sick.

THERMOMETER DRAMA [8:45]

You would think thermometers would be straightforward.

Not at all.

There are way too many thermometers to choose from. Our doctor recommended the kind you run across the forehead. Ryan’s friend recently let him know we had been using the stupid thermometer the wrong way.

We discuss our troubles with wildly various results using thermometers which adds to the chaos of parenting.

We now have three different kinds of thermometers. Including an infrared sensor thermometer that would line up red lights on the forehead, but that would also give us unreliable readings.

One time, our youngest was getting high readings and lower readings, so we decided to go get a rectal thermometer. A horrifying proposal. But we needed to know if we had to take him to the doctor...Ryan bought the thermometer and Rebekah figured out how to use it...all that to say, his temperature was normal.

The other thing that is frustrating about thermometers is traveling...when you forget to bring them. We spend more money replacing thermometers that we already own.

For Rebekah, the thing about getting sick as the mother, is that it’s not fair because she is taking care of everyone and no-one is there to take care of her....Yup. she threw Ryan under the bus.

When parents get sick: life is already impossible with life and kids. But being sick adds that extra layer. Everything begins to fall apart, because nothing is getting done. Thats just how it is. It’s part of familydom.

What do you do if your kid is starting to feel sick, do you cancel everything? Or what if you find out other families are not feeling well, do you stay away? For us, if it’s obvious stay away. But if it’s mild, then each scenario is different. At the end of the day, it’s about communicating with and informing other parents so people can make their own discussions. We appreciate it when people tell us, even after the fact, that we’ve been exposed to something because their kids got sick after hanging out with us. We’ve all got kids. Life happens. The more kids you have, the more you realize that you cannot control everything.

We talk about a story where we took Liam to a playground at a zoo and came back with Hand Foot and Mouth Disease...But the memory was really incredible and he had so much fun playing with the other kids. Ryan says it was worth it, Rebekah is not so sure. We dig into how Ryan gets to go to work the next day, but Rebekah has to take care of the sick kiddos at home. It’s hard to see your kid suffering while sick.

We talk about the strange advice you get from doctors. When Liam had croup, we thought he had something stuck in his thought because he was wheezing. The doc advised us to stick his face in front of the open freezer door...which we did...but it was weird.

[27:00] PARENTAL INSTINTS

Parental instincts. We talk about having the first kid and how parents are overprotective...at least Ryan was. He was told it would happen, he tried to prepare for it, but instinctually he would respond to things at an extreme level. He believes it’s about creating new brain pathways and learning where to put new emotions and responses. The second kid is much easier because you have built those new pathways.

Find us on Facebook and instagram @goodjobmomdad