DOD108: How To Handle Grumpy Kids

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:29 Tom: Dear Old Dads, the only podcast recording from inside a garbage can. I'm Tom Curry. I'm joined as always by Thomas Smith and Eli Bosnick. Hello, gentlemen.

0:00:34 Thomas: Geez

0:00:37 Eli: Wow. I am so sorry. That is how we were going to unveil our charity fundraiser for the unhoused. And I can't believe that is how Tom would introduce this topic. Everybody, I've

0:00:46 Tom: Jesus, that's not... It's an Oscar the Grouch reference.

0:00:49 Thomas: Yeah. I's starting to see a problem with, like, problematic tendencies, yeah.

0:00:55 Eli: Said it. I've said it for years is the way that Tom, Tom, you, the language you bring to our podcast is so violent, you know, so hateful.

0:00:57 Tom: God damn it. That's me.

0:01:04 Eli: I just wish, just wish you had other people in mind when you spoke, you you know, just speak from your heart. Listen to your heart song a little more, right? Know that we're all connected.

0:01:04 Tom: He got me. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. God damn it. My heart's on.

0:01:15 Eli: We're all matter in this universe surrounded by atoms.

0:01:16 Thomas: That's worse than telling him he needs to watch an entire sunset. That's actually worse. Yeah, that's the other thing that helps you with sleep, Tom.

0:01:22 Tom: Listen to.

0:01:22 Eli: Yeah. Oh, Tom, how did it work? Did you try watching an entire sunset between this episode and the last one?

0:01:27 Tom: Yeah. Do you think I'll ever try watching an entire sunset, Eli Bosnick? No, I will never try watching a sunset. I will glance at the sunset and be like, yeah, it sure is in the window that I'm looking out of.

0:01:36 Eli: I did it. Nailed it.

0:01:38 Tom: Yeah, look at that. All right.

0:01:39 Thomas: I'm surprised you guys were surprised, but have none of you, neither of you ever had the like sad issue, like the seasonal affective disorder, like, or at least Eli, you've suffered from depression. Like that's always the first thing. Well, maybe yours was too acute or something, but that's almost like the first time you like the doctors do like, yeah, yeah.

0:01:52 Eli: No, my mom has pretty, really bad seasonal affective disorder. So we We grew

0:01:55 Thomas: It sucks.

0:01:55 Eli: Up with the crazy lamps and everything and

0:01:57 Thomas: Exactly. The lights. Yeah. So to me, when you said that, I was like, Yeah, no, that fits sunset.

0:01:58 Eli: Yeah, I did not have the seasons to blame for my depression. No, I, I thought it was cause I was like, Hey, it's winter and I'm sad. And they were like, Oh no, man, you're just, youre just going to be sad all the time forever. And I was forever. And they Were like, well, until, you know, so, you Know, hope you're sad forever. I'm kidding. Get on out of here. You scamp. Happy 11th birthday.

0:02:03 Thomas: Ha. Ha ha, you're A man for all seasons.

0:02:21 Tom: I don't, I don'T have the seasonal effect, Haley has that, though, like, to the, to the tune where, like I actually bought her, like so we have the lights, but I actually bought her a tanning bed, so yeah, yeah, her full tanning bed, which

0:02:28 Thomas: Yeah. Nice. Oh,

0:02:32 Eli: That's nice. Cause you can use it as a George Foreman grill when she's not using it.

0:02:37 Thomas: That's disgusting, the fat dripping out of it I had one of those. Did you guys have one of this? I have one, of us in college, yeah.

0:02:37 Tom: Hopefully that, that helps, Just, just rendering I One, I Had a George Foreman girl, yeah.

0:02:45 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah,

0:02:44 Eli: George Foreman grill? Every man goes through a George Foremen grill phase. Like, I know we're here to fight against toxic masculinity, but the one part of masculinity that I think is important and essential is buying a George Forman grill and then burning the shit out of yourself on said grill.

0:03:01 Thomas: Yep. Yep, when it comes to that rite of passage for a man, we're with Jordan Peterson on that one, we're like, well, yes, don't you, of, of course, don't you know that of

0:03:07 Eli: Yeah, absolutely. You know, the Ixos of the ancient Greeks, they were all talking about out the George Foreman groom because

0:03:11 Thomas: The dripping? Yeah.

0:03:12 Tom: Well, getting rid of that stupid piece of shit grill because it's impossible to clean you cannot be cleaned so

0:03:18 Thomas: Yeah.

0:03:18 Eli: The handle is gets as hot as the rest of the grill does

0:03:22 Thomas: Yeah.

0:03:22 Tom: My when I got my first apartment, my dad bought me a stand-up George Foreman grill so I could like, and it was like this well, it's it's a giant fucking thing, man. And it was like huge, and it had to be plugged in so you couldn't use it outside. So now you're grilling inside on this fucking giant.

0:03:30 Eli: Yeah

0:03:42 Tom: And then like when you're done, you've got to like clean this fucking enormous, like it doesn't fit in the sink. I piece of shit.

0:03:41 Thomas: What's that? Oh, I always was using it inside. Okay. Okay. I had a tiny one. I had one the size of a waffle maker.

0:03:51 Eli: No, you're supposed to have a tiny one. That's that's the other rite of passage is the fact that it, it cannot do an entire piece of bread, so you've just got to like toast bread one half at a time. It's admirable that you even attempted to clean yours, Tom.

0:03:55 Thomas: Yeah. You're in a tiny ass stupid apartment. Yeah. Yeah.

0:04:04 Eli: I looked at that thing the first time it was dirty and I was like, all right, well, germs get cooked off, right?

0:04:05 Thomas: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Heat, heat equals fine. Yeah, exactly. I love how you're like, also you're cooking the, you're doing the bread and it's like, I didn't know bread had so much fat in it. How's that like leaking fat out of it?

0:04:10 Eli: Yeah. It's just leaking out of the thing. Hey, is this machine on a downward angle? Yeah, no, it is that way. You can always harm yourself with the greasish, let you, but

0:04:19 Thomas: Is everything made of fat? Yeah. Burning, burning grease, liquid. God, I'll never forget the smell of that. Like there's a specific smell to burning the fuck out of part of the thing, but it's still the rest of it is fine.

0:04:34 Eli: Yeah. The rest of It is still frozen solid.

0:04:39 Thomas: Oh no.

0:04:39 Tom: The rest of it is still raw,

0:04:40 Eli: There's nothing like it.

0:04:40 Tom: Raw as fuck. Yeah.

0:04:41 Eli: Yeah, absolutely.

0:04:41 Tom: Mm

0:04:42 Thomas: I'm remembering now it's specifically specifically because I was in college. So it was fucking Costco hamburgers, you know, like Costco hamburger patties that have a specific smell when you George Foreman them that I'll never get out of my psyche. Yeah.

0:04:42 Tom: -hmm, yeah.

0:04:48 Eli: It was. Yeah. Because it's people. Yeah. But you know the only thing worse than hot grease that permanently scarred Thomas Smith's penis guys? That's right. It's the auto ads. The hot grease that splashes over the naked genitalia of your podcast listening experience and though Thomas was forced to settle his lawsuit against the George Foreman corporation and George Forman himself, you don't have to settle for an ad -filled podcast. You can head over to patreon.com/dearolddads, where for as little as a dollar you'll get a commercial-free version of every single show, an extended version with a little parenting story at the end when Tom, of course, can be bothered, as well as bonus episodes and all sorts of cool stuff. Check it out, patreon. Com forward slash Deer Old Dads. If you don t will burn your genitals with a George Forman girl. I thought I'd

0:04:55 Tom: It's pink slime

0:04:56 Thomas: I hope came Don't remember that being part of the story.

0:05:47 Tom: Jesus

0:05:47 Eli: Add a threat this week, Thomas will you keep your eye on the numbers, let me know if that gives us a little uptick because honestly I feel like the this is a bad thing bit might get it tired and a threat might be a new way to

0:05:48 Tom: That's that's good, that's motivating. I bet it'll I'll help

0:05:51 Thomas: Yeah yeah sure. Yeah like literally you're in in danger if you don't

0:06:01 Eli: Mhm.

0:06:02 Tom: Well, guys, I wanted to talk today about dealing with grumpy people, specifically grumpy kids. So this came up because Haley and I were talking about last year old dad's episode and kind of just about the different stages in life that the kids go through. And like, you know, when you've got little, little kids and they get grumpy, it's very different than when you have like or they have like a temper tantrum. And it's very different than when you have, you know, an older kid that gets grumpy or, you know, has like an emotional outburst. And like, one of the things I was telling Haley is like, I found the temper tantrums and the grumpiness of little kids much easier personally to deal with than the grumpyness of older kids. Like as kids get older, I have a hard time and she and I are reversed a little bit on this. Am. I have, I'm a super even tempered person. So for me personally if I'm grumpy or grouchy and you can tell something is wrong with me and needs to be addressed.

0:06:02 Thomas: Yeah yeah

0:06:02 Eli: Yeah

0:06:59 Thomas: Your penis

0:06:59 Tom: My penis

0:06:59 Thomas: Might be in a George Foreman grill as we speak

0:07:02 Tom: Is probably The George Foreman girl

0:07:03 Thomas: Yeah

0:07:03 Eli: If you're feeling grumpy, your penis might be in a George Foreman grill. That's the new, that's for our new

0:07:08 Thomas: That's our new like you might be a red redneck

0:07:09 Tom: That's canon now

0:07:10 Thomas: Yeah

0:07:10 Eli: No collars comedy tour, uh, that we're doing. We're really desperate for money, guys yeah thank

0:07:10 Thomas: Yeah no collars oh that's

0:07:10 Tom: Yeah. Oh, very

0:07:16 Thomas: Such a good stupid, fake idea, Eli, that we we need to make it fuck

0:07:20 Tom: Good.

0:07:19 Eli: You thank you. Yeah, Ron White is also a part of this one, which is weird. I

0:07:23 Thomas: Fuck. Do

0:07:24 Tom: We were just talking about like the different kids too. And like all of our different kids, the way we deal with their grouchiness or their grumpiness, when you can tell that they're, you know, like having a moment is really different. Right. Way you would deal with an Aislinn when she's grouchy is very different The way the way you might deal with a Donovan who's grouchy or if Finn gets grouchie, which I've never encountered yet, that would be dealt with differently than if Eamon were grouching for me. So I just wanted to kind of get a sense from you guys of like one, like how do you deal with grouchiness with your kids specifically? Is it different from kid to kid? And like, how how does dat affect you? Like as the kids get older or have you thought about that at all? Like what is your interaction or your your feelings around their grouchness?

0:08:05 Thomas: Have to go first, Eli?

0:08:06 Eli: Was gonna let you go first because you got, you got seven aka

0:08:09 Thomas: Yeah. Well, okay. If there's one thing that I thought as a parent, I would never do. When you're a kid, there's nothing worse than when you having a genuine problem, you're having a real, a real kid problem. It's the fucking, your taxes. No, it's probably something stupid, But for you, it's a real kid problem. You don't understand. My sibling, you know, cheated on it. It was going to be my turn. And then this sibling took my turn and you're like, that's a real legitimate kid concern that I should take to kid international court. Like that's, I have a legitimate, legitimate suit here. And what's the first question out of your mom or dad's mouth essentially, when you come up crying about a problem that you have, like, what's that? The first, okay.

0:08:42 Eli: Mom and dad. Yeah. Is that a George Foreman girl clamped on your genitals

0:08:55 Thomas: What's the second question? No, no, no. No, of the story is now I do it every time unwittingly. So it's not anything evil, but it's just like, what is the typical response?

0:08:57 Tom: Who fucking cares? No,

0:08:59 Eli: Who

0:09:10 Thomas: Is, oh, are you hungry? You hungry Do you need something to eat? Are You hungry? That was the question you'd ever had that. That was the question for, and for my parents, obviously it it was probably way too much, you know, like it was probably again. Well, I thought I thought I had legitimate kid problems.

0:09:06 Eli: Are you right

0:09:11 Tom: Why are I

0:09:24 Eli: Your high school girlfriend broke up with you and they were like, do you need eat a snack? You seem like you need a snack all

0:09:28 Thomas: Yeah,

0:09:28 Tom: Mean I feel like that would solve a lot of my problems though, I'm not gonna lie. Like if I like I could be, I'm 45 years old, I could be really upset and if somebody was like snacks, I'd be like, yeah, I feel better. I already feel feel better. Like, yeah,

0:09:39 Thomas: But that's not going to feel worse with a snack. It's like, yeah. Okay, try that first.

0:09:41 Tom: Yeah.

0:09:40 Eli: Right okay snacks but then we're talking about this genocide thing okay, we're talked about it, we're

0:09:45 Thomas: Yeah.

0:09:42 Tom: Yeah, I, I told you guys on the, I told you the story on the air before about when my buddy shot me in the eye with the BB gun and like the next day, like shit to like repair our friendship. He brought me donuts and it worked. Like the next day, I was like still super pissed and he's like, dude, I'm really sorry. And I brought donuts. And I'm like, well, we're cool.

0:09:53 Thomas: Yeah, man's a saint in Tom's mind.

0:10:06 Tom: And I had a patch over my eye, I had a fucking patch over my eye and I'm like, yeah man, we're cool, I got food out of it

0:10:07 Eli: Fine yeah all the

0:10:06 Thomas: Yeah. Especially knowing how hungry I imagine Tom was all the time as a kid, you know?

0:10:16 Tom: Is

0:10:17 Eli: Time yeah, eating towel grout yeah

0:10:17 Tom: Yeah is yeah

0:10:20 Thomas: Yeah, but now you have money. I mean, back then you must have had like less recourse to get your own food.

0:10:23 Eli: But he doesn't have time he doesn't

0:10:25 Thomas: Oh, that's true.

0:10:25 Eli: Have time to eat. I've

0:10:26 Thomas: So if you, so we can still, if Tom's ever mad at me, I'm bringing donuts. Note to self.

0:10:20 Tom: Yeah it will work golden

0:10:31 Eli: Never seen Tom befall. We've eaten at a variety of places that claim to be, uh, large portions, and every time I could turn to Tom afterwards and be like, hey, chicken sandwich? And he'd be like, yeah, where from? Where Where are we going?

0:10:38 Tom: Corral yeah yeah

0:10:33 Thomas: Yeah. Boy, you and Remy both. You and Romy both. I've never seen Remy me fall in his life ever, ever. It's incredible.

0:10:44 Tom: You're not wrong yeah yep yep yep.

0:10:51 Eli: Have I told the story about us just feeding him teething crackers for the entire time we watched him when he was here in New Jersey?

0:10:57 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. That you could feed him anything, but here's the thing that's teething crackers. So you might be like, oh, but those are basically air. No, do that with, you could feed him fucking entire George Foreman hamburgers and it would be the same thing.

0:10:58 Tom: Yeah.

0:11:07 Tom: New York strip stick.

0:11:09 Thomas: Yeah, he'll, he'd never stops. It'S incredible. And he's mad all the time about, I think I have a little Tom, I the family. He's always mad because he's hungry. He's like, yeah.

0:11:08 Eli: The whole grill.

0:11:18 Eli: You should buy a snapping turtle puppet and see how he reacts.

0:11:21 Thomas: Point, though, was that, like, I always thought as a kid that that was, okay, that's this belittling thing. They're not taking my problem seriously. They're just being like, are you hungry? Do you need to eat? I'll be like, no, I don't need to Eat. I have real problem you need understand. And then cut to, you a parent and seeing that what happens is your kids get hungry and then everything is a tragedy. Every time. So now I fucking do it. I feel bad, but basically every time I'm like, yeah. All right. Do you need to eat?

0:11:46 Tom: But you shouldn't feel bad. Shouldn't feel bad at all because like, you're not invalidating their like experience of being grumpy. But are doing is intuiting the truth that which a lot of like kid anger and kid grouchiness and kid Grumpiness. And like, Like, I've come to discover even a lot of adult grouchiness. It's like, it's just like you're physically deprived, right?

0:12:08 Tom: Like, you're overhungry, you'RE overtired, youRE Overstressed. And it's like you don't, and then your brain is like, well, I feel all these fucking horrible feelings. It's probably because this thing didn't happen. And you're like, it's nothing about the thing didn't happen. It's all because your feet are hot or your belly is empty or you slept too little or like your hormones are going crazy. Like, there's all those things, that's actually the real reason, so totally right, like you are right and you're not like invalidating the kids when you're like, hey, you need, you need to lay down, like you want to, you want

0:12:04 Thomas: Yep. Yep, you're hungry. Yep or tired. Yep oh hungry

0:12:39 Tom: A cuddle for a minute and have a snack

0:12:40 Thomas: Grab a Snickers. Yeah I just realized that this gives me the opportunity to mention what happened on Friday. It was this is literally that. So we have times where Phoebe will just, man, you know, Eli tells the story of his friend's kid and it's, you know it's Phoebe times 10. Well, sometimes Phoebe has Phoebe days that are Phoebe times 10 and she'll just come home and everything will be like the saddest. Not yelling or angry. It's like something will happen and be like, oh, we're out of, we'RE out of chips. Yeah.

0:12:41 Tom: Yeah

0:12:57 Eli: It's the best.

0:13:12 Thomas: You know, Like this genuine sadness where you're like, this is really hard to deal. She's crying in like the sweetest, tragic way, but over everything, literally everything. And it's alarming. And you're like, what do I do? I don't, no, you can't have an interaction with her when she's in that mode that doesn't result in that. So I try to be like, hey, or like, maybe she didn't sleep much the night before. I don't know what it is. But what happened on, I think it was last Friday, was one of the funniest things ever that I instantly had to miss message you guys about. So last Friday I picked up all the cat, picked up all our fucking kids and our racist dog and all that stuff. Like our dog, this mentioned, like I'm not celebrating.

0:13:13 Tom: Right.

0:13:50 Eli: Tom from a meeting. Yeah, exactly.

0:13:52 Thomas: Yeah. Our dog was like, I am definitely not taking Monday off. Cause we don't recognize that all days or dogs. And so I pick everybody up. We got got everybody in the car. I get, we have the routines we do, you know, I have to clear, it takes an hour to unload the car just from school pickup, you know, cause there's a hundred beings. Now there's just, it's a lot. Everything takes 10 times longer with three kids. And just in the time between, you Now, when I parked the car unloaded, have to get Daisy out, have to get Remy out. You know, they're not really, they can't do it well themselves. Just in that time I walk in and Phoebe who had kind of gone in ahead of me is just in tears with with Lydia. And I'm like, what, what happened? It's been like a

0:13:52 Eli: Yeah. Yeah.

0:13:53 Tom: I

0:14:32 Thomas: Minute. You know what I mean?

0:14:33 Tom: Just saw you Yeah.

0:14:33 Thomas: Yeah. Like she just bounced in the, in the house. Oh, la la la. I'm a kid with like a lollipop, you know, or whatever, you know? And I come in, she's crying. She's like, and it looks like someone died, you know? And so Lydia, and I can tell something weird is going, you know, it's like some weird vibe, you just feel the vibe. It wasn't like an owie. It it wasn't like whatever, Lydia trying so hard not to not to laugh, she's like, so, you know, because we don't want, we really don't want to build it, and I mean this earnestly, we don't want to make her feel like her emotions are dumb, but sometimes it is So,

0:14:33 Tom: Right, yeah. Right. Sure.

0:15:05 Tom: They're dumb.

0:15:07 Eli: But they are. Yeah, that's the thing that you gotta do. Right here.

0:15:07 Tom: Yeah, that's the thing is that very often they are dumb emotions, like you're sad about a bagel that's not Allowed.

0:15:14 Thomas: Oh, just Wait, oh. Uh Close, close, um, we like, so, so, um, Phoebe's crying because, um, she, I told her that we don', don't celebrate Hanukkah? And I was like, oh, you know, I'm trying to do the thing. Oh, explained that. Yeah, no, that's just, we just don't happen to, to celebrate that. We don't, you don't have like a menorah or anything, like we don't, it's fine. Like this is a, you get in these situations as a parent where you're just clueless. Like, I want to validate, you no, I want to validate, I want to fix the situation.

What a fucking, what do you do when she's come in and, and she is like in mourning, she's crying because she's like, yeah, I don't. And here's it's, and it gets even more ridiculous. She's like so yeah, I've decided that I'm going to go celebrate Hanukkah in my room with my dolls by myself. And I was like, Jesus Christ, this is so true. We never told her like, how dare you? Like we hate Eli Bosnick specifically don't sell. We're just like, yeah, no, it's just not, we We don't, we're not Jewish. And she's, she can't, she doesn't know what that means.

0:15:52 Tom: Dude.

0:16:07 Eli: Okay.

0:16:15 Tom: Dude.

0:16:18 Thomas: She's sad.

0:16:18 Eli: She's so sad, she's never gonna control the media, I get it.

0:16:19 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah,

0:16:24 Tom: Aisline had a fucking meltdown one time because it wasn't Christmas, just that day wasn't Christmas. That day was like a random, not Christmas day, and she just like woke up and wanted presents, and it wasn't a day where presents were there, and it was just like completely lost it, just absolutely Completely. The thing is with kids too, especially little kids, is like the distance between their expectations and reality is just like this vast, enormous gulf, this fucking like chasm that, for us, for grown-ups, we're like used to being disappointed, we've been disappointed for fucking 40 years, we're like, Yeah, most of the time things are the worst, you know, you walk around, you're like, most of time you're not going to get what you want, and you just have to like, just be like, yeah, less than what I want, that's probably what I'll get, and that's just fine.

0:16:30 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

0:16:30 Eli: Yeah,

0:17:04 Thomas: Especially Tom and I. Yeah. It was a point, point of pride for the Smith family.

0:17:14 Tom: Right,

0:17:16 Eli: And it just hardens, it gets worse and worse and you stop sleeping and you won't look at the sunset because it reminds you of the passage of time, yeah.

0:17:16 Tom: But like an artery, you know.

0:17:18 Thomas: Come Yeah. Combine that with children have no ability to be like, Oh, this is a kind of an unpleasant thing. Let me tough through it. Like the minute they're at their fucking barometer goes to negative in any way. They, someone died, you know, it's like they have no, but, but also I can't tell you Phoebe's big, I know it's cause I'm her dad, but Also Phoebe is big eyes, you Know, well up with with tears, and she's, she's so tragic, you tugs at the parent heartstrings, where you're just like, babe, I can't, what do I do of it, and then you find out, yeah, I know, but okay,

0:17:40 Tom: Yeah, right, There's no sense of perspective. You're

0:17:40 Eli: It's the worst.

0:18:00 Tom: Like the menorah, motherfucker, that's what you're doing, you're getting out of menorah, you're on the fucking stereo now, let's go man, you're allowed to have a bris, that's it, Thomas.

0:18:05 Eli: Yeah,

0:18:07 Thomas: What am I allowed to say in this moment, like, I don't, uh, yes, we will what

0:18:13 Eli: Do whatever the fuck you want, Thomas.

0:18:15 Tom: Thomas?

0:18:15 Eli: Thomas, it's 2024. If we know anything, it is that you can do whatever the fuck you want to Jews. You put on fucking sitzis and the full beard and do the horror if you want. Put on a one -man production of Fiddler.

0:18:14 Thomas: Oh, Sure. Yeah, Oh,

0:18:22 Tom: Yeah. Oh, fuck.

0:18:30 Thomas: All those presidents of uh Harvard and the other universities that learned that they're doing great, yeah, they still have their own job, yeah, so, no, yeah, but like, I'm like, what am I gonna do, put on like fucking racist, like, outfit and pretend, pretend I'm, like a rab, you know, what am I going to do? Am I going to put on, you now, Lydia's been in Fiddler on the Roof. So, I feel like she's, but

0:18:34 Eli: Write your own paper.

0:18:50 Eli: I would love this so so much. Thomas, I speak for all Jewish people. Let me tell you, the only thing we want is video. The only thing the Jews want is watching you fake through Hanukkah. All right, let's see. I got nine various birthday candles here and, um, it's eight. Fuck. All right. Um, and, uh, now we sing the song. Uh, it says, money, money. They like that one, right? Who do they produce for? Everybody. Everybody, do you like the Taylor, the non-Taylor's version, versions of her songs, those are probably yeah

0:19:24 Thomas: She instantly went into what was, and it's so funny because she knows none, obviously, none of the cultural context of this, but, she instantly went in to like a biblical story of like, I will shut my windows and celebrate Hanukkah in secret with my dolls. Like she instantly went into like, she's going to be the family in the beginning of Inglourious Bastards. Like somehow, yeah, intuitive, but she doesn't know. We haven't taught her any of that. She doesn't knows about that. So she's just doing that coincidentally in the funniest, and I have to not laugh about this. I have to see my crying child is like, oh, go with my dogs. We'll get a menorah. And I'm like, Jesus, this is the funniest thing I've ever heard in my life. But I'm like, oh yeah.

How, what, so I start to do is I go to the, you know, the tried and true method that Tom's talked about. I'm like, how do I deflect out of this? And so I'm like, hey, maybe I tell her this. I was like, hey, what if, uh, do you want to, do you want to call my friend Eli?

And you can ask him like about how, how he felt, you know, like what Hanukkah is, or what I was just finding anything to get her on another topic, you know, or, or move her past this like tragedy. And she's like, oh, maybe, but that's also scary strangers. So she's like, oh, I don't know. And so because of that, then my next thing I said, or my, that might've been Lydia, was, oh, you know, also Eli is a magician.

And so then we're like getting on the magician thing, cause like, you know, the natural flow of trying to get your kid to stop crying. I was like, yeah, he's a magician, he could, I bet you could do a trick for you. She's like, really? And she, and threw tears, she goes, really? I was like, yes. She like, can he pull a rabbit out of a hat? Cause that's like the main one that's the

0:19:43 Eli: She's Anne Frank, yeah

0:19:45 Tom: Jesus Christ.

0:20:57 Eli: No

0:20:59 Thomas: Funniest thing I've ever heard in my life because that's like the main one

0:21:03 Tom: So, though. I got to tell you, buddy, you're working too hard. Let me tell you. Like, Eamon came over the other day. Here's all you got to do. This is like, I can simplify your life, I think. EamON came overthe other day, very grouchy. Just walked in the door out of nowhere, very

0:21:14 Eli: Idea who would win in a fight between Sonic and Batman

0:21:17 Tom: Struggling to suss that out. No idea why. Like, hey, buddy. You don't seem like you're kind of grouch. Why are you grouch, buddy? One word answers, stalks upstairs. Jesus, all right, fucking kid's grouching. But, like, I'm a terrible parent. Haley is good at this.

So Haley's like, no, I got this, Haley was in the middle of making a birthday cake for Aislinn, she's like hey, Eamon, come downstairs, grouch, grouch, grong, grumbles and comes down, and she's like, you wanna lick the spoon of fucking frosting, and like immediately, immediately, whatever it was that he was grouchy, but so what you need is like, just treats, like you don't try to like suss out, just spray fucking whipped cream on a plate, that's it, like this is all kids need, that's like, like when they're little it's so much easier, like that's kind of what I was saying, like when they're little you can just deflect, they're probably grouchy about nothing, it goes away, like flits in and out of their minds in a moment, it probably is some physical thing that they're like, grouch you about, but like when, when kids get older and we start to take their like real internal world a little bit more seriously because they have more serious concerns, you know, like they starting to mature into real world problems and real world worries and anxieties, we to take that stuff more seriously, and then for me it's like fuck, that's way harder

0:21:43 Thomas: There you go, yeah, of course, yep

0:21:51 Eli: Can of frosting you throw it like a grenade yeah

0:21:55 Thomas: Yeah yeah, well

0:22:32 Eli: So

0:22:32 Thomas: Not only that, they're gonna take themselves seriously, it's like a Dunning-Kruger period of like, when you're a little kid you don't know fucking what's going on, when you're an adult, you and I, Tom, can be like, all right, I'm grumpy and I I realized I need to eat an entire fucking horse or whatever. Like, we get reached the age where we're like, yep, human brains are illogical and I'm hungry and that's making me an asshole. And I tell Lydia that a few times a month, like, hey, sorry, I think I was being a piece of shit and it's because I'm angry. Apologies. When you're in that fucking Dunning -Kruger zone of being an older kid, you're taking yourself even more seriously and you're going to be even

0:22:35 Tom: Like right right oh yeah so

0:23:05 Eli: Seriously

0:23:06 Thomas: Less willing to be like, no, I'm not just hungry, hungry, mother, father. It's a tragedy.

0:23:06 Eli: And

0:23:07 Tom: Seriously yeah well had a period of time where like she has PMDD and she was struggling, struggling really hard before we got her on birth control and kind of like, you know, medicated that back to some semblance of hormonal normality. She was not in the best like mental state, right? Like she was just a real, real grouch and it was not her fault, right. Like she had a medical condition that she was responding to that needed to be treated.

0:23:36 Eli: For those not familiar, that is post muppet dysphagia disorder, that is if she sees a muppete, um, she can't see anyone as not a muppe, for, I think it's 24 to 48 hours, is that right, Tom, she loves her period too much women

0:23:43 Tom: That's true, yeah yeah yeah that's, yeah, that's, that's exactly, no, it's, it's premenstrual dysphoric disorder, it's, so it's like it on steroids yeah so she is actually like, it's a fucking nightmare to have to deal with, it's migraines, it's huge hormonal swings swings. It's like severe anxiety and irritability and all that. So, was like a real bear with it, and she would be like really rude and really unpleasant and like snappy, like right at you, like, right in your face. And like, there's a part of you, like when it's a little kid, it's like, yeah, whatever. It's a little kit, but like when it's like a 13 year old it's feels different, like I feel like a little, like, hey, are we having a fight, like do we have a problem because we have an actual like relationship and not just a caretaking relationship, yeah

0:23:58 Thomas: Oh yep yeah yeah yeah

0:24:04 Eli: Am I right hey well Tom, you can relate to this, and I know I've talked about this on the air before, we say mean stuff for a living, so when people are mean to us, we're like, do you want to and have a mean stuff off, child, oh

0:24:42 Thomas: Women

0:24:48 Tom: Right, right, well that's the other thing is like, because Haley gets it, like Haley really understands the kids, and she also had PMDD as a teenager, teenager that was not treated. And so like it, so like she has some like experience here and I'm just like, well, look, like if I'm grouchy, like you're never going to know. So like, I'm going to be grouching. I'm you're Never going to Know I'm Grouchy.

0:24:58 Thomas: Am I, right

0:24:59 Eli: Thank you Thomas I was staying so fucking silent

0:25:14 Tom: Well, maybe

0:25:12 Thomas: Okay okay can it can we give Hayley on the phone real quick, just uh yeah

0:25:17 Eli: Oh let's get everybody on the hey Cecil, welcome to the pod

0:25:21 Thomas: Can we, we get that worker who you called in on a holiday to have a meeting at 8:30 a .m. on the phone

0:25:25 Tom: I'll well let me rephrase the way you'll know is because I'll be quiet most of the time, that's like how you'll no, I'm grouchy is most of time I'll just like, I'll get real quiet because I'm like, I don't want to say anything that's what I want to do is I want or not say anything, I'll just lock down and make sure I don't snap off because I used to have a problem with that

0:25:35 Thomas: Yeah yeah you're in damage mitigation mode yeah, you're like

0:25:43 Eli: Podcast

0:25:42 Tom: Yeah exactly exactly are

0:25:43 Eli: Listener look, I love my friend Tom, but if you had ever seen your

0:25:46 Tom: You going to tell me I'm wrong about this, this would be shocking to me

0:25:49 Eli: Absolute it's the craziest thing possible, it's like, look, I can't ever exaggerate, I don't know if there's one thing you should know about Eli Bosnick, is like, when I, when I'm saying something, it's the truth and nothing but the truth, let me tell you, I'm a, I'm just a man committed to, when Tom is mad, first of all, he's not loud mad, and he is self-controlled, he's nicht scary, but he is absolutely white hot with rage to everyone around, I've seen Tom be mad at a table in a public place and people walking by are like, is that guy mad, he seems mad, and Tom's like, no one could tell I'm squeezing the table so so hard it's cracked in the center also

0:26:01 Thomas: Calls

0:26:23 Tom: I'm vibrating with rage but it's

0:26:23 Thomas: Man it might be the other side of the coin of how we've talked about Tom, like, like the way you present, you actually think that this makes sense, that also so you maybe wouldn't realize it. I think I'm the same way a little bit because my natural voice is so fucking grouchy that like, I think I'm not displaying much grouchiness, and then someone's like, Jesus Christ, I'm like, oh yeah, I'm already like annoying normally. So it's like getting to that next phase is just too much.

0:26:27 Tom: Well this might this might really be a moment of just like really total lack of self-awareness because I thought my impression of like, I know when I am feeling grouchy, but I'm like, I'm just mostly not going to say anything, mostly what I'm going to do is be very quiet in

0:27:00 Thomas: Yeah. What, what, what I was getting at though is like your normal voice is so authoritative normally that I think when you move an inch already, people might be reacting like, oh okay, the guy with the deep voice and

0:27:11 Tom: Yeah

0:27:12 Eli: You know how You put that horse's bit in your mouth and then you bite all the way through it, Tom, sometimes people can pick up on that my favorite Thing about when Thomas is mad, just to tell all the tales, is when Thompson's mad you get zero seconds before he tells you what a piece of shit you are, right? Which, I've seen, he'll just be like, "Why would you say that? That's just an ugly, rude, horrible thing to say to another person." No, I know, I don't, don't want to talk to you anymore because you said that horrible shitty shit. All right, so I play two lands and one water, I'm gonna tap my lid all

0:27:15 Tom: But

0:27:15 Thomas: The table, you were mad at you, clove in two, like also affected it

0:27:41 Tom: Yeah it's just it's a weird space and like all the kids display their grouchiness or their grumpiness very differently and you have to deal with it differently Like with Aislinn, for like example, if she gets like grouchy or snappy, it's like, okay, like you have to do is be totally not responsive to it. And then you let that moment pass and then you come back to her and ask her if she's okay. Hey, you know, you don't address like the fact that she snapped off or like whatever, because like, no, she's not okay. She would not behave this way if she were okay. OK, so like addressing that anger with your own sort of like demand for resolution in the moment is a terrible thing to do. Right.

0:28:23 Tom: It doesn't work. It just escalates and it's a mess. But in the movement, it's like I got somebody being pretty fucking rude right to my face. And that's actually kind of hard to just set aside for me with the other kids, like with Donovan. If Donovan is grouchy, well, he is almost never grouch. Grouchy. So if he's grouch, it's like, okay, something's wrong. And we need to dig a little bit into it and get them to talk about it. Yeah.

0:28:13 Thomas: Yeah yeah yeah yeah alright

0:28:43 Eli: Everybody let's figure this out

0:28:45 Tom: Like you got to dig in and be like, all right, buddy, I need you to talk to me. Yeah, like I need to talk. And like if Amon's grounchy, he's still a little kid, you know, he's nine. So he's like a little. And so we deal with that in like little kid ways, you. And I don't know that I've now I'm thinking I don't know that I've ever seen Finn get grouch. So I don know what I'll do, but I would take it very seriously because it would be so rare right he

0:28:46 Thomas: Everybody make some frosting yeah yeah

0:29:07 Eli: Hey Finn it's me from the future, um, you have IBS now is what you have um, nortriptyline yep sure does nortriptyline is the little green pills, uh, probably 25 milligrams, you and I are about the the same way, right, buddy, uh hyoskyamine for when it gets bad, bud, just hyoscyamine, just, uh, under the tongue, two pills every four hours you

0:29:11 Tom: Does have IBS actually yeah yep so what about Max like what I mean because like Max is at an age where like he certainly is going to like lose control of his emotions

0:29:33 Eli: Know it's tough it's rough because there is a, there is a real slippery, uh, and out between a kid with ASD dealing with sensory processing stuff, which is one kind of grumpy, and then there's today, which, right before the record, so I'm sitting here, I'm I'm chatting with Thomas, right? You know, hey, how you doing, man? I'm good.

0:29:34 Tom: Right

0:29:46 Thomas: Oh why why was it just you and I why was it

0:29:58 Eli: Yeah. Oh, because Tom was fucking late because he was skronking it. He didn't watch any sunsets in between the episodes, everybody.

0:30:03 Tom: As usual is what it was late as usually

0:30:06 Eli: And so he is fucking late as usual. We'll see if he sticks around for the end of the show. No way of knowing, podcast listener.

0:29:59 Thomas: Oh oh yeah that's right night

0:30:13 Eli: It's about how much he values you in this particular moment. No, but I'm, I'm chanting with Thomas, blah, blah, and I'm like, hey, I'm going to run upstairs real quick. And I don't say this, but it's because I hear unearthly screaming, right, I assume I'm gonna get upstairs and, uh, Anna has accidentally thrown a javelin through Max's chest, right and he is about to disintegrate off it like fucking Age of Ultron style

0:30:13 Thomas: Yeah oh yeah I didn't know what you're doing and he does not like the texture of that javelin that's in his chest

0:30:37 Eli: Right exactly, it's the texture of the javeline, I get upstairs, again this is why I so like, Anna so fucking has this shit like the the is just wild because And maybe it's me in comparison, because I'm just like, there is unhappiness in the castle. I must ring the bells of torment. Why? But she's totally handling the situation. She's 100% nailing it. But what has happened is they were at Barnes & Noble just before, and he picked up the Paw Patrol movie. He loves Paw Patrol. Why? Because he doesn't celebrate Martin Luther King Day. And so that's a great joke

0:30:42 Thomas: Well he was watching

0:31:18 Eli: That's reference to last week. I would love for you to jump back yeah

0:31:19 Thomas: It is really good he was uh watching with Daisy, just he and Daisy like fucking

0:31:24 Eli: He's watching it with Daisy, those dogs, also, no, he loves that little copaganda, by the way, can I say for those of you who have not the

0:31:29 Tom: Copaganda.

0:31:24 Thomas: Yeah it is I fucking Fucking ACAB applies to fucking Paw Patrol.

0:31:34 Eli: Paw Patrol uh, applies to Chase and Sky and all of them, so here's a fun thing, little side note about Paw Patrol, Paw Patrol knew it was copagandha, but it's like a children's television show, and I don't know if you know this, right wingers don't care about children unless they're pretending they're at at risk from gay people, so all the people who make that show are left -wingers so what Paw Patrol has done in the recent years, which is fucking amazing to watch, is they've just gotten super crazy progressive and all the cops all the cop dogs have quit their jobs and replaced themselves with social services, yes so it used to be yes

0:31:34 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:32:06 Tom: No. Excuse me, what?

0:32:05 Thomas: No. No, really? That's awesome. I actually love this.

0:32:10 Eli: Yeah Chase is the only one that's still like, I'm a cop, everyone else is like, I'm a community service expert, and I'm like, fuck yeah, I'm just waiting for like Bingo, the fucking de-escalation social worker, to be introduced next year fucking great, anyways

0:32:19 Tom: That's awesome.

0:32:25 Thomas: Amazing. Okay, so Paw Patrol back on the menu. Because I literally don't let them watch it because I fucking don't want them to form a cutesy relationship with police.

0:32:31 Eli: It out, check it up it's they're, they're overcompensating, it's

0:32:35 Thomas: That's Awesome.

0:32:35 Eli: Great, they're like a right wing, you know how left wingers, they get in trouble because they like fucked around or did something bad, and then they're Peter Boghossian, they're on the fucking fucking Blaze being like, and that's why there's no such thing as eyeballs, right, it's, they're doing the opposite of that with Paw Patrol, check it out, it's worth their time, anyways he sees a DVD of Paw Patrol at Barnes and Noble, and he's like, Paw Patrol, and my wife is like, yeah, you can get Paw Patrol, she calls me, she's like, can we get him his Paw Patrol DVDs?

I'm like, yeah, we got PlayStation, put the Dvdy in, the Paw Patrol, she's Like, cool, is it streaming, and I'm Like, yeah, it's fucking streaming, of course, everything's stream, they don't make non -streaming content that isn't child porn these days, so I'm googling it, and most of the child porn is streaming too, so I go, I'm like, yeah, no, it's on Prime, come on down, watch it, problem is what I come up to is Max did has not realize that the DVD because he didn't know what a fucking DVDs he's not looking for a throwback, he thought that the Paw Patrol DVC case was a little TV that

0:32:44 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wow.

0:33:32 Eli: Opened up and played the Paw Paw Patrol movie.

0:33:31 Tom: Oh. Oh, okay.

0:33:32 Thomas: Oh my God. Of course.

0:33:35 Eli: So when my wife,

0:33:35 Thomas: Why wouldn't,

0:33:35 Tom: That's fucking adorable though.

0:33:36 Thomas: Yeah. Why wouldn't you think that? That's completely rational.

0:33:36 Eli: Yeah. And, and to be fair, a bunch of his toys have screens and shit that do the thing. So When my wife is like, Hey, do you want to watch this movie for your screen time today? Yeah. He's like, get the fuck out of here. There was a special TV inside that was going to show me the fucking Paw Patrol that he is destitute. Luckily again, Anna handled it. She had him on, you know, she was like, "You want watch Daniel Tiger instead?" And he loves Daniel and Daniel Tiger, he's on lithium, so Daniel Tiger gets everybody chill right away, right, his half lidded eyes, he's like, "Hey everybody, let's lie on a beanbag chair," and you're like, "Fuck yeah, Daniel Tiger, keep it calm." But yeah, I mean right now, because of Max's communication issues, it's, it's hard, I still feel like a lot of the time we're dealing with like a pretty young kid, right, you know, according to Max's assessments, he talks about the rate of like a 18 to 20 month old, right?

0:33:41 Thomas: Yeah, here's a useless disk. Oh my god.

0:34:31 Tom: Okay.

0:34:31 Eli: So I don't know if you remember that age, but like he's in the like two three words at a time phase of communication, and some of it he does really well and, you know, we're amazed and happy at all the progress he's made, but like it makes grumpiness and crankiness and that kind of stuff a lot harder to navigate, um,

0:34:32 Tom: Yeah.

0:34:33 Thomas: Wait,

0:34:49 Tom: That's so much a part of like makes everybody, but particularly kids and even older kids, like grouchy is an inability to feel like heard and, and seen and communicate. Well they have take for granted, I think like the depth of their toolbox very often and like they just are in this constant state of minor frustration I think because and I remember being a kid and it's hard for me sometimes to like go back in my memory and remember what it feels like to be a kid but I do have some memories of times where I felt just like really emotionally worked up and even as like a teenager I remember feeling like really mad at my dad because like I was trying to like give him free CDs from this Columbia House CD

0:34:59 Thomas: Yeah you can't

0:35:29 Eli: Stop.

0:35:30 Tom: Club. This is the dumbest fucking thing ever. Like, I, right. Like I read this whole thing and I'm like, wow, I can get six free CDs or like whatever it was. And I'm signing up for it. And I's like, I'm asking him like, which ones do you want? I'm trying to like give him some CDs.

0:35:33 Thomas: Afford not to do that. It's such a good deal.

0:35:47 Tom: This dumbest thing.

0:35:46 Thomas: It's only a penny. You don't understand, Tom's dad. It's a penny!

0:35:50 Tom: And my dad was making fun of me. Right. And, and kind of like, oh, just teasing. He wasn't being mean. He didn't ever like mean tease but he was teasing me about it and I was like trying to do something nice for him and instead I was getting teased and I didn't know how to like bridge that gap in conversation with him and I remember getting like way more upset than was reasonable and I had to leave the room No.

0:36:01 Thomas: Oh, I see. Yeah.

0:36:12 Thomas: Did you eat a door?

0:36:14 Tom: I left, I had to get up and leave the room. I like I got up and I was just like, I gotta go. And I went in my room and like I didn't like storm off and have a fucking thing, but like I remember still rip.

0:36:14 Eli: Sitting

0:36:17 Thomas: Yeah.

0:36:24 Eli: In his room with a half of a down comforter in each hand. No one knows I'm angry right now. I've hidden this so perfectly. There's not a person in the world that suspects my rage. I took the quickest route into my room where I'm engaging In activities unknown to man or god, right?

0:36:32 Tom: Well, I, I

0:36:35 Thomas: At the Tom -shaped hole in the wall next to his door. To make it even less obvious that I'm angry.

0:36:51 Tom: Was probably 15, you know, so I wasn't even a little kid. And that entire like moment came from this inability to feel understood. And I think about that with the little kids and with the bigger kids that like just kind of take for granted that we have this great big adult adult toolbox of like ways to be understood and ways to like comforted and to comfort other people like, and they don't know how to do any of that shit. Like they've got none of those tools.

They don't know how to be like, I just need a hug right now. Like they don't really know how to like ask in that way. Like, I'm trying to do something nice and I know you're just teasing me, but like, really, am just trying to do something nice here. It feels like kind of awful at the moment Like they don't know how to like call that out. So this huge like golf for these kids where like we have to sort of be like, all right, you have a different checklist. Like, there's a checklist when they're like babies, right? Like, are they hungry, do they take a shit, do they, you know, but like as they get older it's like, all right, are you

0:37:26 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's

0:37:41 Tom: Hungry, do you need to take a shit, but then also it's like, are you being heard, like do you, like, am I really hearing you, and like as they get older that starts to maybe be more and more of the issue is like, do they really feel right now and do they know how to make themselves feel seen, right?

0:37:41 Thomas: The same checklist though Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah.

0:37:54 Thomas: Well, What I never thought I would do, the like, do you need a snack thing, because the way my parents were doing that was, holy shit, we don't have the patience or time or ability to care about whatever you're talking about, so what's the fastest way to resolve this? Do you eat food, you're tired, you need food, you're tired. And that's why I was always like, I'm never gonna do that, and have accidentally, I think, done that a little bit.

But what I've really tried to do is, with a the knowledge that, oh, actually they were right though, it is usually because you're hungry or tired, like, that that is the correct information, but the kid doesn't necessarily know that and they also do have a legitimate problem, unless it's Phoebe, then she's made up, we're that not Jewish is her problem, and then you don't know what to tell. But, like, so what I've tried to do is make sure that first step, Tom, to your point is, is like, hey, what's, you know, what's bothering you? Why don't you tell me, tell me all about it. And then you find your moment to, to like, oh, hey, I was just, I'm proud of nothing, I was going to make a little sandwich, would you like some of the, you don't like just sneak

0:38:27 Tom: Yeah. Right

0:38:59 Thomas: It in? Like, Oh this is total. This is for me actually. I don't, it's not for you, you now sneak it.

0:38:58 Tom: Come tell me about this in the kitchen Come, come talk to me but we're gonna, I got some stuff to, come follow me into the kitchen until, while you talk to me, like, real, like, yeah

0:39:04 Thomas: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And the not being heard thing is particularly hard with Arlo because Arlo actually is really amazing at talking in some ways, but he's he's always with his sister who if Arlo was the best talker in the history of time, it would still be an issue because Phoebe's, you know, almost two years older and Phoebe his mind moves at 4000 feet per second.

Like she's just her mind is so fast that if he has a problem, an issue, she can't hear him like he'll be trying to say like, no, Phoebe, you don't understand. And then she's come like, up with 14 new pretend games in the time that he's decided something's wrong, you know? And so, like, it's hard enough.

But then he also gets a little stuck because she's talking over him so much, like his kind of concentration on trying to, you know, form his sentences, which are not super easy for him, you know? So, like that, happens with Arlo a lot. And it's harder for me to not get a little upset at Phoebe. Like I have to control myself and be like, Phoebe, please let Arlo finish his sentence because like she's I'm not going to lie. She gets pretty awful to him like a lot. And it's hard. It's it's really hard sometimes because you see this poor, like, you who's kind who's of stuttering his way through trying to talk about something that's really important to him. And Phoebe just has no, no patience whatsoever for it, doesn't care, has moved on, whatever. And I just, you Know, multiple times a day I have To be like Phoebe be Arlo's turn to talk. He has to express whatever thing it is that's bothering him. And then we have to sit there for 10 minutes while he does that.

0:39:10 Tom: Yeah. Oh,

0:40:36 Eli: And then it's worse because now you've made that a boundary, it's a boundary she wants to push against, and well, this situation is different because what I had to say was actually a response to that and it can be so much harder, so much more difficult. Yep, I get it, no

0:40:46 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But One of my pleasure, great pleasures of being a parent for me, because of, you know, it's always nice to try to not make some of the same mistakes I think my parents did, is, I but I just loved the no questions asked hug rule. It's my favorite rule, where no matter who's having a problem, even if like Phoebe's gotten gotten in trouble for, you know, murdering Arlo or something, there's always like, hug anytime. I was like, hey, do you want to, do you want a hug? Do you want a quick hug? Let's have a hug. There's always a hug available. No matter how you upset anyone might be at anyone. Always a hug on the offer. And then they take me up on it. It's nice. They take me up on that a lot.

0:41:27 Tom: Another interesting thing that I've found really varies person by person in a big way. Like, Finn was little and he would get upset, right? He didn't really get grouchy, but he would get upset. Of course, when Finn was upset, he always wanted a hug. He always wanted to hug. If Amen is upset, He absolutely does not want to be touched.

0:41:31 Thomas: Mm -Hmm. Mm -hmm. Yeah.

0:41:43 Tom: He does not want to hug, like, that. Haley, when she's upset, 100%, you better not touch that woman. Like, if she is upset, like, she does not want to be touched, like, not until she's able to like calm herself down. Aislinn, same thing for me. I'm upset, you can give me a hug, it'll probably fix the the whole problem, like I'd be like, yeah, I'm hungry, or you can touch me, like, one of those two things probably fix it, like I'm pretty simple. Finn, same way. Donovan, like, if he's upset, a hug, that dude hug you and he won't let go, like, he, you gotta like pry him off with the jaws of life, like once that boy like latches on, you're just like, like you like get in there, you're like, oh, we are fucking hugging now, like we are in this thing. So too, is, like, really different kid to kid, like I always thought about that as like my toolbox

0:42:23 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, for sure. You definitely want to approach that as a, as a question. I'm always like asking, I'm not like telling them or anything, you know?

0:42:26 Tom: Yeah for

0:42:30 Eli: Thomas demands it it's weird they sing the time to hug daddy song It's time to hug daddy, if we want to or not, we have to hug daddy or he'll die. A lot it's, we and Lydia sings it too, and they all wear these robes, it's weird. Nothing but the ropes, yeah Exactly, it's funny, I is very like, don't touch me, when he's super upset. Although he has learned, we have implemented a chill out step. So he will sometimes take the chill out stuff. He'll be like, you want to chill out? And I'll be like, yeah, you can go chill out. And he'll just sit on the stairs and do some deep breathing by himself, which is pretty funny. I experience any, I'm interested.

I'm in an interesting period in my life right now because I was a very angry young man who said and did unkind things to everybody around me when I felt emotions. And I went to therapy and I turned into a robot, which was the point. And now all the people in my wife are like, hey, you're a robot right now, cause you're mad at me.

And it's kind of like Tom in that I'm like, what do you mean angry, for I am speaking in the calmest of tones of voices and I have my gestures and my expressions, the words in which I am using are of the most highest of non-emotionness, there is no way you could see past my facade into this possible emotion I might be feeling. So a lot of people in my life are like, hey, this

0:42:31 Tom: Me, it's super weird

0:42:34 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:42:53 Thomas: Family bath time.

0:44:02 Tom: Yes.

0:44:02 Eli: Is fucking insane, can you please just feel your feelings and have have a conversation And I'm like, I'm afraid you killed that young man many many moons ago, he was a jerk

0:44:06 Thomas: Yep. Yep. Yeah.

0:44:10 Tom: No, dude. Yeah, dude, I'm right there with you. It's like I it's don't have any idea how to like not be either under control or out of control. So I don't understand that like middle space where it's like yeah you can just feel your feelings it's if I do I'll say something that hurts you. And I can't do that.

0:44:13 Eli: Yeah Right. I- Did the feeling feelings thing. It wasn't- Good. No one liked- it. You-

0:44:33 Thomas: Yeah.

0:44:32 Tom: Yeah. Right. It's- It's like it's okay, feel your feelings, well then I'll- I might obliterate you in your heart and that's where you live inside of you and you're like I don't- don't do that then, but still feel. You- like no, I'm just gonna grind my teeth into pearly white- nubs.

0:44:48 Eli: Want me to feel your feelings because it seems like your feelings are fucking awesome about this scenario.

0:44:52 Thomas: Yeah.

0:44:48 Tom: Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. I- Don't know, I- Know. There's a middle ground sane people can reach, I'm aware that this is a true thing, but I'm just like, no, like it will be either under control or out of control, those are the options you get to pick from.

0:44:55 Eli: Yeah.

0:45:05 Eli: Not- not to be the guy who quotes his therapist, but this is something I'm working- working on is healthy anger. Uh, it's not going great. And, uh, he was like, look, the- the key to understanding anger is that what you're communicating to other people when you're angry is that it's not the end of the world. And so I got angry about something. And what I did is I said, I want you to know, it's not the end of the world.

0:45:18 Thomas: Exactly.

0:45:28 Eli: And I told my therapist and he was like, you know, I didn't mean, and I was like I did know, but that's, that is what came out of Mm

0:45:26 Thomas: Yep, yep, it- feels like a good first step though. You know, like yeah, and figure out how to internalize that somehow. Yeah.

0:45:35 Eli: Hmm. The Other habits I've developed, now is he's like, you know, it's about expressing anger in a way that lets people know that you're still on equal footing and that you're not trying to be the boss. So the new habit I've picked up is I like, look, I'm not the boss and people are like, we didn't think you were the boss, man. What?

0:45:49 Thomas: And we- are on equal footing. You-

0:45:54 Eli: You know, that makes it seem like you thought you werethe boss until you declared it in this moment. And I'm like, Like, if you excuse me, I need my hyoskyamine. Grrp, grrp.

0:45:56 Thomas: Thought you were Yeah, exactly. All-

0:46:13 Eli: Gentlemen, before we go, I replaced my rooster with a duck. But now, I wake up at the quack of dawn.

0:46:19 Tom: All- right. I've-

0:46:19 Thomas: Tom's

0:46:25 Clip: Want to meet sexy DILFs in your area? Email the dads at DearOldDads.com or, better yet, send us a message on Patreon. You can follow us on all social media by checking the links in the show notes. And if you need more podcasts in your life, you can find Tom on Cognitive Dissonance, Thomas on Serious Inquiries Only, and Eli on Godawful Movies and all the Puzzle in the Thunderstorm shows. Dear Old Dads is edited and produced by my favorite DILF, Tom Smith, who also wrote and recorded the intro music, which is used with his permission. This podcast is a production of Daddy Issues LLC. Copyright 2022. All rights reserved.

0:47:04 Eli: Is that guy mad he seems mad and