Modern Fatherhood... Is Actually Motherhood?

Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the family teams podcast. Um, I am joined by my partners in crime from both from Greenville, South Carolina, Riley Pilgrim and Tyler Graham, who don't know each other and didn't know each other lived in Greenville until five seconds ago. So, uh, welcome to the podcast guys.

So, our friend from Los Angeles, she came here, she's like, Oh, I want you in Via Hills. I was like, I like the sound of that. Yeah, that's nice. Here we call it Villa Hills. Yeah, it's always got to have a little bit of a drawl. Um, yeah, Blake, Blake originally is from the other side of the river. He's, he's, he's definitely a native.

Things that are happening, um, and ideas around fatherhood. And we're going to buy it by the way, we are going to do this for motherhood. Um, soon I've got, I've got a, I've got a, um, I got some ideas so that those, those, uh, conversations on the podcast are coming, but, um, but we, I think it's really important for us to try to try to get our head around, um, both the challenge of fatherhood and, and, and what the implications are towards family, which I think this is great for mothers to listen to as well.

I'm like, yeah, that, that one does trigger something in me. Let's talk about it. So I will play this for you guys. If you're watching on YouTube, you'll be able to see it. Otherwise, you will, uh, be able to hear it, hopefully. Recent findings in modern dadhood. This new era of dad has been born. They're no longer just a provider to their families. They are involved in the nurturing roles that were once only associated with mothers. The modern dad isn't just a disciplinarian.

He realizes the short time he has before they don't need him in the same way. Okay, so, I'll play the rest of this, but you guys can kind of see where this is, this is building up. So he's saying, Here's all this, this baggage that we all had. So yeah, there's a lot of, so he's basically describing, um, the, uh, the transition that's happening and I think his accurately describing the transition about our vision of fatherhood is changing, um, culturally. And, and this video is highlighting some of those elements.

or the house, no matter the dynamic between partners. There is no competition. There is no set jobs. There is no gender roles. There is only one goal. And that is to create a household that is a positive environment for raising good humans. If I could sum up parenthood with one phrase, it would be, I'm tired, but I'm also the happiest I've ever been.

Basically it says, had me in the first half and then, uh, and then lost me in the second half. Okay. Talking about the feminization of, uh, of fatherhood there. Yes. Well, that, that's exactly what I want to talk about, which is that I think that people, the church people, um, people within society would be cheering the first half and then all of a sudden shocked about the move he makes in the second half.

And then, and then in the next season, when they, they show the actual role reversal happening and gender being erased and, you know, then they're like, Oh, I didn't see that coming. And I'm like, wait, wait, wait, guys, you didn't see that coming. Like, don't you realize that's the whole point like of this transition that if, that if you untether fatherhood from its, its basic, um, you know, it's, it's basic objective design that we, we, we are given in scripture.

And I think we're being very susceptible to it. So, yeah, Riley, what are your thoughts about this? Instead of living into a fuller picture and vision of what fatherhood is supposed to look like. And so people are reacting to that flawed. Um, picture that they receive as children, uh, instead of looking for a fuller picture. And I think that's what you see playing out in that video. Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting.

Um, there's only, uh, the, the move towards equality, which is we see men having things we want to make sure that we're not denied those things as well. And so the move is in the direction of the reaction instead of towards the ideal. We desperately need an ideal and we are living in a culture without an ideal.

And this is every time I make any of these, uh, anytime we, we address this issue, The immediate reaction is that the assumption that we think that the idea of fatherhood, um, dads being active in a home environment is somehow negative or being very present and playful with a child is somehow negative.

Like we actually, we don't know what he's doing, but I think it's very natural. Uh, for us to, I think it's natural in the early stages of fatherhood to actually embrace this as the ideal. And I'll say that I've actually fallen prey to this because at the early stages, There's actually a need for more nurture than there is for, let's say, masculine energy.

Um, but they don't know that yet because I think it's the there's like, uh, I think the most content is created by the youngest fathers and Because I think the older fathers one are maybe less familiar with social media and two Probably have more important things to do than to create Great social media posts a lot of times, right?

And I cannot empathize with him and say, Oh, he was just being a provider and whatever else. And now a decade and a half later, I'm like, Oh my gosh, I'm so thankful for that masculine act of being a provider. And so I think there's some element of this thing where I think we're actually propagating a story of harm when actually maybe just purely masculine energy was, was enough.

Um, but some, somebody is actually fathering this family and it's not the dad. And so this is part of what's so confusing about the way our culture talks about this. And if you can provide for your family, and then at that point, you're You choose not to be present. You know, there could be, uh, injuries, but a lot of times gaps exist within families or out of necessity, because we are in a survival mode season.

And so only for me to go absent. Yeah. Yeah. Just the absent father. Yeah. So the reason matters. Now, I, again, there, there are certainly examples of, of fathers that are neglecting their families for absolutely selfish reasons. Um, but I think that we have to get into the details and you can be just as injured by an absent father.

Especially like, I think that it's critical to think about the kind of father your father had. Um, and I, I do have a lot less patience for men who have great fathers who really set them up well and then really drop the ball with regards to their children. Um, I, that really bothers me. But man, there are a lot of situations where an abusive father, um, uh, was, um, uh, you know, a man coming from a family with an abusive father becomes a much, much better father.

No one's ever going to be the ideal father, but because we don't know that this Instagram reel literally defined it for us. It told us this is the ideal father. And, and so who cares if you work, of course, money and provision is going to come from somewhere, anywhere. Um, but you need to be, to be present for that three year old and Blake, I love what you said about the, um, I think a big part of what I was writing in the articles about Abraham was that when you think about a father, you have to think about the head of a, of an actual family, which could include adult children, a much larger number of children.

So they don't know the counter arguments to what they're describing. And I completely agree. That's what's happening in this video. Tyler, go ahead. What are your thoughts about this? Yeah, I think you made such a great point there. And maybe I'll illustrate it by talking for just a second about my, my family.

My great grandfather died when my grandfather was two. So my grandfather grew up without a dad. They're in rural Ohio, living on a farm and living that type of lifestyle. And so my dad's growing up in that environment, you know, I'm sure his dad's doing the best that he can figuring out life, having not grown up with a dad of his own.

And it really wasn't until I was adult that I realized the, what he had done. And it's his, those realizations have helped me come back to, to the center a little bit, see like the ideal of who we're called to be as dads and the ways that my dad did that. And so it's interesting to wrestle through that because, you know, I post a lot on LinkedIn about present fatherhood and what that looks like.

Uh, he, he has an exercise like a gratitude letter where you just tell your dad everything you're grateful for, uh, that he did. And I went through that exercise a few years ago and radically shifted, uh, kind of my relationship with my dad. That's so good. That's awesome. Yeah. What, what did your dad do?

It's, it's awesome what he's posting on there. Um, so I think that one of the things that, as I have friends who are leaders in churches, who are like, One of the things that they will say, um, that is that we, we don't want to talk about family or fatherhood in any kind of ideal way from the stage. Um, it, it just, it makes people feel, you know, crappy.

And you want to spend more on education. Um, and of course you want to take care of people that are sick, but a lot of what we're experiencing is sort of like saying, we can't teach kids to read when there are people in the hospital that don't have sight, like, you know, how every time you teach that kid to read, you're making the blind kid feel terrible, you know?

Riley, let you speak. And I'm curious what your thoughts are. And then I got one other topic I want to hit with you guys. Awesome. Um, yeah, so, I mean, y'all brought up so many good points. I feel like we can talk about just this one reel for hours. But, um, one of the things I wanted to hit on is, is, um, I feel like the, to what you're just talking about, the church right now is in a bit of like an identity crisis.

That's same with government, church, blah, blah, blah. And, um, you know, like, we, we are ashamed, typically, of the sins of our fathers versus giving grace and attempting to pull out and extract the beauty of what came from our forefathers, right? And that goes for our actual fathers and for the fathers of Christianity beforehand.

Here's some, here's some of the things that, you know, are regrettable about the Crusades. But here's also the entire context in which that took place. And trying to pull out the heroism and some of those things without necessarily saying that it was all great and good and cheerable. But what can we take from that and learn from it?

What was their upbringing? And so we are multi generational creatures that are, that exist within family systems. And if you take an individual out of that family system, Then you're not going to understand that individual very well. And so we have to get into what, what was happening in each of the people in the family to get a proper picture.

Who's basically saying my boyfriend, like lost a job a couple of months ago and he's depressed and I'm working and I come home every night. To be with him and, and I find my, and he wants me to comfort him. He wants me to feel bad for him and I just don't care. And I'm now I'm losing my attraction for him.

We're going to conversate about female solipsism All right. Well, look let's get I don't like that framing solipsism means selfishness. I think this is much deeper Other than that, but here we go on the road So I realize this might sound a little bit repetitive to some of the folks that have been watching me for some time now But there's a quote that I've said many times that has been used by others out there It is women do not care about your struggles They hang out at the finish line and they pick the winner that is an innate baseline nature of female survival techniques Okay.

We have computers. We all pay taxes. Women mean a man like a fish needs a bicycle as a feminist like to say a lot of strong independent women out there today that aren't in the need of the care or the love or the protection of a man these days. So that being said you have to understand like from a baseline and perspective.

You know what I'm saying? One of the things you'll often hear them say is, well, I had to untie the knot because he was a loser. One of the big complaints you'll hear women make often is he couldn't keep a job down. Women don't have any patience for men that are unable to provide for the family. Now, the flip side of the coin is.

But as soon as she goes off hormonal birth control, and she's a normal woman who is going to have children and wants a husband that can provide for a family, then all of that DNA or all of those hormonal elements of attractiveness that are innate to women become kind of come online. And this is where a lot of divorce occurs.

Bitter men describe this as loving opportunistically, or what this guy said, solipsism, selfishness, basically, but it's really not is what Dean Abbott says is just part of how female attraction mechanism works. Now I'm bringing this up and most people who are talking or who are tuning into this are, um, you're, you guys are mostly fathers and in marriages.

Then what I'm hearing increasingly from, from men is, is she is, she's losing patience with me. She doesn't want to comfort me. In fact, it seems like she's doesn't even like she's becoming unattracted, unattracted to me. So, and I'm like, nobody's ever told me this. Nobody ever, I've never heard of any.

I, I'm heterosexual, I could care less. I want you to succeed and I want your family to succeed. And so if I think that you're actually, um, making progress, then I've got a lot of energy to coach you and to encourage you. Um, and I, I wonder if in the church we did this more. So anyway, um, so there's really two topics there.

It's when I'm unemployed for two months, trying to like figure out something. And, uh, you know, but, but Hey, there's another mechanism at play. You should probably be aware of. Amen. And then how do, how do men, especially in the church, how do we as, as fellow fathers support each other? So Blake, I'll start with you and then, yeah, we'll go right, go around the horn, hit Riley and then Tyler, but Blake, yeah, what does it start for you?

Um, now, am I going to leave her if she doesn't have that ratio? Or is she going to leave me because I don't have that ratio? No, we are in a, uh, Covenant before God, right? And so there's a certain level of safety, which is actually really important, especially when we're feeling down. If we have a failure in our career or something like that, that there is actually a fundamental level of safety, which is that no one's leaving anybody here.

Um, and in terms of actually helping each other on the career side, 100 percent for, for my standpoint, I need more positive self talk at home. So like, I don't actually want to get deep into my issues around my work, into my frustrations around my work at night, uh, or in talking with my wife, I actually want to be like, no, this is what I'm thinking.

He seems to have some negative views, like calling women selfish and all that kind of stuff. Um, but at the same time. Yeah. I definitely think hypergamy is a real thing. Hypergamy being the idea that women are attracted to equal or higher class. Um, you know, however you want to look at that, um, where that doesn't typically play a role for, for men, um, as much we're more visually attracted to physical attributes as far as, um, in, in the beginning, you know, on the surface level of attraction.

Um, I think what he's getting at here goes. Like you said, it goes deeper than what he's saying. I think it gets to the idea of, um, vision. I know you talk about this a lot. Um, it gets to the idea of biblical, Patriarchy, the idea of father rule and how do you rule if you don't have vision? And if a man is is not casting vision Like the whole idea of leadership is to chart a course look at something far from the distance Have a plan of how you think you can get there and then gather the two on board And and and not just force them to go with you But sell them on the idea get them excited about what you're doing and then go face the challenges to get where you're going I'll say when, when, uh, when a husband and a father is doing that and, um, it doesn't matter as much from my experience, even just talking to my wife, it doesn't matter as much of how, how much you're providing financially or how, how tight the budget is. If you are actively.

Working heartily towards a vision that you have Gathered your family around and you can have a wall period where you are unemployed And things are tight and you're struggling financially and typically I have not seen people lose, like wives lose attractiveness towards their husband if their husband is actively pursuing the vision in the midst of a challenge.

Um, You know, there's, there's a level of you need, you know, making sure that you're being vulnerable with your wife so that she knows what's going on with you and isn't completely lost. But I think two aspects for one, like, like you were saying, it plays into the idea of her insecurity. When you're insecure, she's insecure.

Women typically aren't going to be the ones to do that. Yeah, those are good points. I, a couple of things you said, Riley. So, um, first of all, shout out to my mom. So one of the things that, one of the things that my mom and I've, I've said this to her during like her birthday Shabbats when we're kind of thinking about, Um, different ways in which my mom or dad or, uh, has have really impacted me.

Um, so anyway, I, I, I like, I think that that's really important to understand. And then I think what you said, Riley, I think it's also really critical to say This can't be about comparing to other families or some absolute amount of money that we're trying to chase as men or whatever, who cares? Most women don't care about that.

And by the way, um, when we do the motherhood roundups, we might bring this back, I would love to hear a woman's perspective on this for a bunch of guys trying to figure this out. Um, and, uh, and so I, I'm, I'm, I'm, if they're willing to talk about it, because this is, I think it's a pretty sensitive conversation, but, um, but yeah, this is a, I love, I love trying to understand.

I want to like love you, you know, Like she's maximally attracted and you know, I need her like there is something there that I think is a beautiful moment between husband and wife Um that I think uh where that comes out in a positive way that doesn't It doesn't stop me from, cause I think what, what in the beginning of the video, the guy was dealing with somebody who wanted comfort when he was literally sitting at home depressed all day.

Person like when left to myself, I can be pretty low ambition, low vision, uh, kind of that idea of, of like sloth, not, not taking the right action. I'll do something, but it's, it may not be the right thing. And it's been this constant thing that has come up, especially in the early years of our marriage, where, uh, if I were struggling or if I was just feeling like, Hey, I'm, I'm, I'm trying, I'm doing things, but right.

Action towards vision versus exhaustion out of a place of inaction and lack of vision. And so that has been a thing that we've had to navigate, right, especially now with with raising six young kids, my wife homeschools, all of them, if I find myself in a place of of complaining or being frustrated for a prolonged period of time, you know, break and hit this point to say, hey, I have to make a thousand decisions a day for all of the kids.

You know, there's a very direct relation to that. I think it's very, very true. Um, and like I said, it doesn't have to be as big a thing as being unemployed for an extended period of time or trying to start a new business. I think it can be in the mundane moments of navigating daily life with young kids, uh, that you can easily find yourself in that place.

And I imagine going home after like solving 30 problems, diagnosing, you know, all those people and then coming home every night. And the reason why people become doctors and lawyers or get, You know, or craftsmen or get into a profession where it's like, I'm going to use whatever my skills are. And then I'm just going to like enter into the workplace.

Is a critical part of attractiveness, then it seems like one of the things that we need to be really careful about is to make sure that there isn't a period, Tyler you mentioned this, like a lot of it does have to do with how long this goes on, like you can only exist for so long in a state in which you feel Yeah.

Yeah. I wonder how much, Jeremy, just another like thought, kind of on that same vein, and we've talked in the past about dads that are over invested in their work, giving themselves to work more wholeheartedly than they are their family. And I wonder how much of that is a result of feeling more competent at work, right?

Yeah, um, this is, this is something that I'm super passionate about. Um, internally and trying to figure out because man, it feels like a beast of a problem. But, um, I feel like. Men nowadays in general are just lost in terms of how to think about anything, like a frame of reference in which to put these things.

And, and I just got fed up with it. And so after 10 years in service, I left. That was one of the driving, it wasn't the only one, but it was one of the driving reasons is I was just like, I know that I'm competent, and I'm tired of feeling incompetent because it does bleed into your household. You know, you doubt your own decisions at home, you're more insecure, just by nature of how you've been for the majority of the day.

And you have to learn how to. And even have the framework of delegation, you know, of, of how do, how do I assign this responsibility to my wife and then manage that responsibility that I've assigned, uh, in a way that's competent. Right. Yeah. So much of that transition I think is, is the difference between a family and a household.

And yeah, the structure is completely different. And that's really the biblical structure of the household. It's assuming a household. It's not assuming this strange, uh, Frankenstein that we've created in the, in the West, uh, that we call the modern family. Yeah. Um, and so, so much of the confusion just as we don't, we don't really have the proper, um, entity in our heads when we're reading scripture and trying to understand where that's coming from.

And, um, I think that, yeah, so help, help your young, help young fathers in your community. I think that's going to be a lot more hot for their, for their, uh, their wives. Right. Do a brother of solid younger brother. Okay. Awesome. Thanks guys for doing this with me today.