Jey (00:09.436)

And welcome into another episode of the Young Dad Podcast. I'm your host Jay, super excited to be here with you guys today. Before we jump too, too, too far in, I do just want to give a quick message and a quick invitation for everyone listening to go down to the description on whatever platform you're listening on. It could be Apple, Spotify, YouTube, any other podcast platform, Pocket Cast, wherever you're getting your podcasts, wherever you're listening to this or watching this right now.

Rumble or ever it doesn't matter. I need y 'all to go down to the description very tippy top of that hit the Subscribe link to the email newsletter. That's gonna give you early access to the podcast podcast updates tips and tricks Dad vise dad hacks mental health tips every week. It's a bi -weekly newsletter. You're the first to know of when new episodes drop You're the first to know all the things that come out so bi -weekly Or twice a week. I mean bi -weeklies every other week. That's how often I get paid

Yeah, two times a week on Saturdays or Sundays and then again on Wednesdays I drop those for everyone. So please I would love it if you could go down and support the podcast in that way also down there You'll of course find our link tree to all of our deals specials promos and partners of the podcast So without any further ado, I want to welcome Eric Eric You are the host of the dope individuals only podcast our platforms?

Super similar, we both share people's stories for the betterment of our listenership. Your platform is based on inclusion and love. You use your platform to share people's experiences and expertise in order to inform and improve the lifestyles of your listeners. So you're a dad, you've been a dad for about nine years now, and we're gonna jump into all of it. So tell us a little more about you, Eric, the host, tell us about you, Eric, the father.

Erik The Host (01:42.179)

Yes.

Erik The Host (01:56.867)

Yeah.

Jey (02:02.716)

Tell us just a little bit about you, your podcasting journey, your fatherhood journey, and anything you want us to know about you.

Erik The Host (02:10.787)

Awesome. Thank you again for having me up on the platform. I'm very grateful to be here. As you already gave the listeners a quick briefing on me, I run a podcast called Dope Individuals Only, as you can see behind me here. Like Jay said, what I predicate the show on is pushing love out into the world, allowing people to come up on my platform and share their stories, share their expertise, their ups, their downs, their highs and lows.

ultimately to hopefully better the lives of the listenership in some way, shape or form. I became a father. I'm a father of three. I became a father nine years ago. My eldest son is nine years old now. His name is Jaceon. And then I've had kids pretty much every three, like two and a half, three years after that. The fatherhood journey has been one of constant, constant learning, humbling, and a whole lot of joy.

You know, they're the reason I get up and do what I do every day. You know, and they're the reason why I strive to leave an imprint on people in the world and push love out into the world because I realized that my kids wake up every day and even if they have a bad day yesterday, they don't wake up with the same attitude. So they get a little bit of, they got something that us as adults, we might not have, you know, we carry last week into today, we carry last month.

Jey (03:18.35)

you

Erik The Host (03:35.683)

we carry next week into today and things of that nature. But every day they teach me to be present. They teach me to, you know, enjoy the little things of life and be present in that moment and really get the full effect of it all and not be so hung up on the little things. So yeah, man, I don't necessarily know where to take it. It's really hard to always answer that question. Like, who are you? Who are you the father as a father and things of that nature. But,

I've been through, I'm only 28 years old now and I've lived a lot of lives in just 28 years. For my entire childhood, I wanted to be a professional football player when I grew, when I became an adult. And then I maxed out at five, six and 140 pounds. So that journey was short -lived, even though the love for the game is still there. I'm around 16 years old. I found a passion for music and I was a rapper.

and things of that nature for a long time. And then I went through my ebbs and flows of that when I was 25 years old, back in 2020, I ran for city council. This was at the time of like the George Floyd murders and Tamir Rice and a lot of like friction going on in the country. And I figured, well, you know, I sit here and I complain about things and I like to make posts on Facebooks about things and what am I actually doing to contribute to my community to actually making

Jey (04:40.732)

Mm

Jey (05:00.732)

you

Erik The Host (05:05.539)

for the people who live here, including myself and my children. So I went out and I ran a campaign to become a city council member in the city of Allentown, where I live in Pennsylvania. I ended up losing by a little bit less than 200 votes, but it was a very, very unique experience to be involved in the politics scene more than what we are, what we see on the news and stuff like that. I met a lot of great people. I met a lot of people that I no longer associate with.

just kind of seeing how the game is played, things like that. And I took that experience and I brought it into this, which was, I had to shake a lot of hands. I had to be in spaces where I was very uncomfortable with people that had a lot more experience than me, how to learn to speak the language and all these different things. But the biggest thing was I realized that I had a gift to connect.

people while I'm knocking on people's doors and telling them, Hey, I'm running for city council and this is what I'm trying to do. Um, and it, and it, and it really forced me to get out of my shell. Even though I've always been a very personable person. Um, I would say I sheltered myself in a little bit of a way. I was more of one of those people. Like if you don't speak to me first, then we're not going to have a conversation, but this experience pushed me, um, and it challenged me to kind of rise to the occasion and get out of my comfort zone. And, um,

Jey (06:04.284)

you

Erik The Host (06:32.195)

During this time, after I lose the election, I go through this really bad bout with depression, the first time I've ever experienced depression in my life. Pushed me into drinking a little bit more than I had up until that point in my life. Pushed me to start experimenting with marijuana and all these different things. And I felt like I was at a crossroads where I didn't really love music the way I once did. The football dream had sailed. I had lost in politics. So everything around me seemed like failure.

And I'm like, you know, I need something new creatively that I can do, that I can express myself. And one day I just woke up and I was like planning out the next 12 months of my life. And I'm like, you know, what do I want to accomplish? Started thinking about the things that I'm good at. I'm very good at writing. So I started writing a book a couple of years ago, which is almost complete now. And then one of the things on my list, along with trying to learn Spanish and travel to another country was start a podcast.

And I took my music equipment that I had collecting dust on the shelves in our storage room and I pulled it all out and I went for it. You know, in a year and about six months later, here I am. So, little bit of backstory.

Jey (07:39.068)

That's awesome, man. No, that's awesome. And that's so many, so many great things there. And for the listeners that aren't there, Eric, or for the listeners that are only listening audio only to give them, I think some important context here to who you are. Not that it matters to me whatsoever, but to the listeners to know that you are.

Erik The Host (07:50.175)

Thank you.

Erik The Host (08:06.531)

you

Jey (08:08.508)

African American, if they are listening and that can, I think can help give some context here because if you're in that politics space for the first time, like you mentioned having to learn a new language, having to speak a new language, having to get to know new people. I can see how that how you may not associate with a lot of those people anymore, how you may not understand or work with them anymore. And my I'm biracial, I'm mixed. My dad's African American. I know the...

Erik The Host (08:23.221)

Yes. Yeah.

Jey (08:38.044)

It's the light of the, the ring light. I promise that's showing me off the so why there hasn't been a lot of sun up in Washington the last few months. So, um, I'm pasty. Even my fiance looked at my hands the other day. He's like, wow, your hands are getting really light. I'm like, thanks. That's exactly what I wanted to hear. Um, yeah, exactly. Please.

Erik The Host (08:39.843)

Oh wow.

Erik The Host (08:53.603)

It's also winter time. It's also winter time. So, you know, we can cut you some slack. Everybody gets a look. Because in the summertime, I'm almost the same color as my hair.

Jey (09:07.388)

right? Yeah, no, I get there too. Like I get dark, dark in the winter time or summertime, not winter. I wish the winter time too, but yeah, no, I get dark. I get dark, dark in the summer. But yeah, no, it's so, it's not so cool. So you, that's a lot of things in the last nine years. So you became a dad when you were about 19.

Erik The Host (09:11.267)

ehehe

Erik The Host (09:16.099)

Yeah, right?

Erik The Host (09:30.595)

So yeah, I'm African American and Puerto Rican. I'm currently learning the language that has been something as I previously stated. I know that all too well. My dog Axel always does that. But yeah, I'm currently learning the language. I'm getting a lot better at this point in the language learning journey. But.

as far as like speaking the language of Spanish, it died with my grandmother. So, you know, I'm self -teaching at the moment. My wife is Dominican. My children are black, Puerto Rican and Dominican. They're a little bit lighter than me. They're like caramel color, because my wife is light skin. But yeah, definitely being in the political space at the time I was running our campaign, I ran with another girl.

Jey (10:06.236)

Thank you.

Erik The Host (10:25.315)

here at the time she was only 20 years old. So we were the two, two of the youngest candidates to ever run in the city of Allentown. I ended up, I ended up being unsuccessful in the venture. She ended up winning the seat in which she's actually up for reelection this year. So we'll see how that all shakes out for her.

Jey (10:46.332)

No, that's great. So. The dog barking threw me off. He probably just hear something outside. I just moved my my desk. Yes, last night I moved into the living room from the bedroom and.

Erik The Host (10:52.515)

Somebody's excited.

Erik The Host (11:03.107)

Mm -hmm.

Jey (11:07.388)

now they're out here with me in the morning because I don't want to like because my oldest daughter likes to try to sleep in my bed sometimes so not some most of the time she's six so she sleeps and try to sleep sleep in bed with me

Erik The Host (11:18.147)

How old is your eldest children?

Jey (11:21.276)

My oldest is six, my youngest is three. I only have two girls. So I only have the two. So she sleeps in...

Erik The Host (11:27.563)

Oof.

Jey (11:32.092)

She doesn't like

Erik The Host (11:34.755)

That's crazy.

Jey (11:39.356)

Yeah, so she sleeps in there with

Erik The Host (11:40.451)

That's crazy. Typically, it's like the youngest that doesn't want to get out of the bed.

Jey (11:50.524)

So we're working on it. But every time I would record like at this time in the morning, usually ends up waking her up at some point. And so her like the end of her sleep gets disturbed and she is not a morning person at all. Like she is the furthest thing from a morning person whatsoever, no matter how much sleep she get. So it's so, it's so fun.

Erik The Host (12:02.305)

Mm -hmm.

Erik The Host (12:08.643)

Heheheheh

Erik The Host (12:16.245)

Mornings are rough, man. Mornings are rough.

Jey (12:19.74)

they are. I love mornings. I get up and I just start moving but that's how like my dad is, that's how I am. It's always just been like a get up and get moving, get out the house and get on with your day kind of thing. So yep, get up, get going, get going.

Erik The Host (12:31.139)

Get out the, yeah, get out the door. Yeah. My wife's like that. My wife wakes up three o 'clock in the morning. She'll go back to sleep for an hour and she's back up at like five o 'clock and she's like, her day has started. Like by the time I'm up and out of bed brushing my teeth, she's already two hours into her day. And I'm just like, holy smokes. But she gets that midday crash where she's just like, okay, I need a nap now. I don't typically get midday crashes, but like.

Jey (12:58.16)

Oh yeah dude, I -

Erik The Host (13:01.731)

I'm a midday nap person.

Jey (13:03.93)

Oh yeah, no, I crash hard midday. Because I work at night, I work at nine to five. I work in mental health. So that midday crash, it's hard. Real hard most days. So it's, the afternoons are long. The afternoons and the evenings are very long.

Erik The Host (13:19.179)

Yeah.

Jey (13:28.444)

and just yeah it's it's super fun but no so oh go ahead go ahead

Erik The Host (13:31.043)

That's totally understandable. Well, my wife and I, it sounds like it. I was going to say my wife and I, we worked in childcare a couple of years ago back in, during 2020. 2020 was a very big year for us. It was a year full of changes, not only for the world and society, but like personally, we went through a lot of growth in that year, even though it was like,

in the moment while we're going through it, it was very tough. But we ended up opening up our first business. My wife runs our childcare business while I'm working on building up the podcast and things like that. But up until I started the podcast, her and I ran the business together and stuff like that. So working with children all day, you know what I mean? I mean, some of them have like mental health issues or like learning deficiencies and things of that nature. So like we...

I totally understand how you're like, you know, I get that midday crash and it's serious. Cause by time you're dealing with people who need help with everything. Yeah, it could be exhausting.

Jey (14:38.448)

100 % So Eric you became a dad when you were 19 And you've had kids every three years Which I think is the best age range best case two and a half three years because then that one's out of diapers And then you start diapers on the new one Next at least for me that was my experience between the two was my oldest was out of diapers And then my youngest is out of diapers now, so

Erik The Host (14:48.515)

Yes.

Erik The Host (14:59.105)

Mm -hmm.

Jey (15:05.372)

Now it's time for me and my fiance to start up on the next. We're talking about it, been divorced, so we're getting married here soon. Well, it would be her first and my third.

Erik The Host (15:13.475)

Are you guys are going for a third?

Erik The Host (15:21.635)

Okay, okay, okay, that makes sense.

Jey (15:21.66)

It would be her first, my third, because I'm divorced from my oldest kid's mother, my two kids mother. We've been divorced for about three years now and her and I have been together for the last year -ish. We're getting married here soon. And so yeah, we're talking about it. We're both getting close to 30. So she just turned 29. I turned 29 next month. So.

Both getting up there, we don't want to hit that biological curve of 30. So we're both young, we're both healthy. We just want to kind of get it.

Erik The Host (15:51.169)

Mmm, okay.

Yeah, we're everything.

Jey (15:59.58)

Exactly that 30.

Erik The Host (15:59.875)

Yeah, everything gets harder after you hit 30.

Jey (16:03.386)

I know it is like crazy because like the more and more I talk about it with like people on the podcast, like I've talked to some doctors and physical therapists and people who know their biology, their science or mechanics or kinesiology, their anatomy and physiology. Like these people like know this stuff. They get paid thousands and thousands of dollars to know this stuff. And I talk about it with them and I'm just like, I'm low key scared to turn 30.

Erik The Host (16:24.739)

Yeah.

Jey (16:31.132)

Cause I feel like my system just starts to like fail, even though it realistically, it doesn't. Like I feel like that's what's about to happen when I turn 30. It's like, all of a sudden I wake up and I'm 30 and I have a kidney going out. I have half a liver going out, half of my test. Like everything does happen. Me just starts to go out at like the day you turn 30. That's I'm, I am convinced. I am convinced at this point. Um, I'll have to talk to my, talk to my friends and.

Erik The Host (16:36.339)

I'm

Erik The Host (16:46.211)

Ah...

Erik The Host (16:50.371)

Just fall a fall apart.

Erik The Host (16:58.083)

That is so funny to hear.

Jey (17:06.748)

Yeah, so it's, I'm nervous.

Erik The Host (17:07.779)

That's so funny to hear. My wife has been waiting her entire life to turn 30 years old. And you're like, hey, when I turn 30, everything is gonna go haywire.

Jey (17:19.548)

pretty much I'm basically I'm basically out of the game at 30 at this point. Let's see. So you became a father at 19. Oh, good.

Erik The Host (17:23.043)

Yeah.

Yeah, right.

Erik The Host (17:31.427)

I'm actually kind of excited. I'm kind of excited for the 30. Yeah.

Jey (17:36.334)

Why?

Erik The Host (17:38.371)

Oh, I was just saying, I'm kind of excited. It's a new chapter. You know, when I was really excited to go from my teens to being 20, especially when I got to 21, because like, I'm like, oh, now I can go sit at a bar. I can have a beer, you know? So like when you hit, when you hit 30, it's kind of like, all right. I spent a lot of my, like all of my 20s up until this point, I still got another year of 20s, but just, just, it's been very emotional for me personally, cause it's like,

I didn't realize how little I knew myself. And then here I am raising children to help them figure out who they are as individuals. And I'm still trying to figure it out. Like, so it's like, I mean, I know every day we wake up for as long as we're living, we're going to be learning, but I feel like the learning curve when you hit your twenties is so sharp from your teen years. I feel like it'll be a little less sharp when you hit your thirties going into your forties.

I don't know, that's my personal take.

Jey (18:40.784)

No, I think you're right because it is a steep, steep, steep curve going from a teenager to into your 20s and everything that comes with being a 20, especially for us. I mean, you became a dad at 19. I became a dad at 21. And so we were just little wee baby boys. Our frontal lobe wasn't even developed yet. Like we couldn't even make adult decisions.

Erik The Host (18:50.571)

Yeah.

Erik The Host (19:00.739)

Yeah.

And exactly for us, it's like 25, I believe it is where like the brain is fully, fully developed and yeah, you know, so I'm, I'm still a child in some aspects or you, and we're raising children, even though, you know, I mean, were your children planned? Cause my first two were planned. The last one wasn't.

Jey (19:08.996)

Yep, there's 25, yep.

Jey (19:18.396)

Right?

Jey (19:24.604)

My first one... yes and no like...

Erik The Host (19:29.955)

Yes.

Jey (19:32.444)

Like how do I explain this? Like we weren't...

Erik The Host (19:35.299)

You were ready if it happened, but you weren't trying.

Jey (19:39.452)

No, not even that, like we...

I guess we weren't expecting it to happen so quickly because she was on birth control, she got off birth control, and it was pretty much within the first... The baby was born within the 10 months after getting off of birth control. So it happened pretty quick after that. She was pretty much instantly pregnant. Yeah. And then our second one was...

Erik The Host (20:05.187)

It's like that.

Yeah, I hear like their hormones go a little crazy when they get off birth control and that's what makes the process go faster.

Jey (20:13.596)

Mm -hmm.

Jey (20:18.364)

Yep. A hundred percent. No, you're right. I think that's true. Second one was definitely more planned, was a bit more intentional in that aspect for what that was going to look like. So that, that hurt. She was more planned. This third one, when it happens for me and my fiance, when we decided to start trying and whatnot, very obviously planned, very obviously like gonna, gonna be.

Erik The Host (20:19.523)

I've read that somewhere.

Jey (20:46.844)

explicitly planned and whatnot. So it's not going to be, it'll be a surprise still, but we're just really hoping for, we're just really hoping that the genetics worked out and that, you know, God willing, it's a little baby boy. We want a little baby boy. I want a little baby boy. I have two girls. There's no, there's no girls. Yeah. There's no boys in her family.

Erik The Host (20:52.355)

Yeah.

Erik The Host (21:04.355)

I was gonna ask. Yeah, I was gonna ask about that.

Jey (21:12.892)

So her brother has a kid, a daughter who's the oldest on her side. She's eight. My little niece, I love her to death. Definitely taking her in is just like one of like mine because she's only over so much like with her dad and stuff. And I love that little girl. She's so sweet. And then there's the little baby who's one and a few months. She's something. But yeah, there's only girls on her side.

uh girl grandchildren and then you add my two girls into the mix now there's just four girls yeah but my brother my brother cracked the code on his third

Erik The Host (21:45.699)

That's the same with my side.

Yeah, that's the same thing on my side. I have the only two boys on my side of the family. My daughter has, my daughter has, I mean, my sister has four daughters. I have one, my brother has one, my other brother has one. Like it's nuts, it's only girls over here too.

Jey (22:07.74)

That's nuts. Yeah, my brother cracked the code on our side. Okay, do you need to pause?

Erik The Host (22:09.731)

I think my dog has to use the bathroom.

Erik The Host (22:16.195)

Yeah, is that possible?

Jey (22:17.98)

Yeah, go ahead and just go ahead and hit mute so that it's quiet and I can just knock out the silence.

Erik The Host (22:26.915)

Alright, sounds good. I'm looking for mute.

Speaker Kim, Mark Cliffe.

Erik The Host (22:36.419)

could find this thing.

Erik The Host (22:41.091)

I see EchoCon. Oh, maybe I'm.

Nope. Okay, I hear you. I'm coming. I'm coming.

Jey (23:03.772)

I got you. I got you.

Erik The Host (24:04.737)

Alright, I'm back.

Jey (25:26.606)

you

you

Jey (26:11.034)

and we're back and we're back uh... short little pause there, oh I gotta fix my chair

Erik The Host (26:14.327)

Yes.

Jey (26:35.452)

My chair does this thing. If I sit in it the wrong way, it'll start to just deflate and go down. Uh, which don't love. But anyways, back to where we were. All right. So we both became dad super young. It is it's first world problem, but, um, that's what happens when you buy a cheap chair off Amazon that looks really cool, but you didn't read the reviews all the way. Um,

Erik The Host (26:49.987)

Sounds like an inconvenience.

Jey (27:05.436)

But it works, it works great, it works great. But yeah, so we both came down super young. We were trying to talk that through before our frontal lobes were even developed. Our kids weren't, well, mine was like one was planned.

Erik The Host (27:31.011)

Big surprise. Yeah.

Jey (27:34.844)

And so take a s -

Erik The Host (27:44.035)

Yeah, she's got me by six months. Her birthday's in December, at the end of December, which sucks because you got all the holidays right back to back and then her birthday and then New Year's, it gets really, really crazy every year. But yeah.

Jey (28:03.132)

my fiance's birthday right now like she so we have christmas and everything obviously like january there's nothing really and then february her birthday's in february uh but her there's like three birthdays in her family it's like every week during in february there was a birthday or something going on uh or valentine's day i think it was like her mom's birthday

Erik The Host (28:14.831)

Okay.

Erik The Host (28:24.671)

Yeah.

Jey (28:27.132)

was the first week, Valentine's Day was the second week, her birthday was the third week, our sister -in -law's birthday was the fourth week, like everything was a week apart and there was just so much going on. Her parents wedding anniversary was the beginning of the February so... Oh my gosh dude, I'm broke. I'm broke. I'm broke.

Erik The Host (28:32.563)

Oh my gosh, so much money. So much money has to be spent. That's how it is. That's how it is from like August to like January for me. Like, it's our anniversary. It's my son's birthday. There's a couple holidays within there. I got my niece.

birthday, Christmas, my wife, New Year's, like it's like, yeah, it's nuts every year. Yeah. So my wife and I, we've been together since we were 16 years old in high school. We started dating when I was, I believe in 10th grade. Yeah. So we've been together ever since. And then back in 2019, we got married in July of 2019. And,

Jey (29:15.352)

Awwww.

Erik The Host (29:30.627)

So we went and got married at the courthouse. We had planned our first family vacation ever for that summer, which was in August, um, in September, in the beginning of September. And then we get an email from the resort. They're like, Hey, if you have a wedding here, then you can have the wedding for free. We'll do the cake. We'll do the ceremony, everything. You just have to stay here for four days. And yeah, right. And, and we had, we had booked our family vacation.

Jey (29:52.392)

Say less.

Erik The Host (30:00.607)

for four days, so it was perfect. But the only problem was it was such short notice. It was like, I think we booked it in like March and we were going on vacation in September, so it was like six months and we didn't get this email, I wanna say maybe until May, so it was even less time. So we started telling everybody, hey, we're gonna do our wedding over here, hope you guys can make it, yada, yada, yada. A couple days before we leave to...

actually go get married in the Dominican Republic. My son was conceived unknowingly. We're down there, we're having a great old time. We just got married. We're at an all -inclusive resort. We've never been out of the country. We're drinking everything. We're getting handed. Literally my wife left the resort with a nickname. They call her Mama Juana at the resort because she drank so much of it, which is like a Dominican alcohol.

Jey (30:45.852)

Hey!

Erik The Host (30:58.403)

Um, and we come back and she just not feeling well. And, um, we're like, okay, well, let's go see if, you know, let's go get tested. And it comes out that she is now prior to finding out she was pregnant. This is not one of my, one of my best moments, but, um, uh, I think like a year before we had had a conversation and I was like trying to get a vasectomy. I knew I didn't want no more kids. I had a son, I had a daughter, and I wanted to enjoy my life. I wanted to be able to enjoy our lives.

And I love my children, but I kind of feel like kids kind of get in the way of that sometimes, you know, you want to go to want to see your favorite artists coming to come into your local area and you can't find a babysitter or you want to go on vacation for the weekend and you can't you don't want to leave them behind. So now you got to pay two grand more than what you would have had to pay if it was just me and my wife, you know, so it's it's in areas of like that where.

Like sometimes being a parent is a little inconvenient, you know? So I was like, our kids are getting older, our kids are potty trained, our kids are speaking, they're self -sufficient somewhat. I didn't want to have no more kids. And we have had this conversation and she's like, I'm cool with not having no more kids. Essentially, like as long as we take care of what we have to take care of, I'm cool with just two, even though my wife had one at six. So.

But the fact that we had a boy and a girl, I guess it made it a little bit easier. Yeah, six kids. My wife comes from a family. Her grandmother had 12. Her grandmother had 12 kids. So she comes from a really big family. Her dad has nine kids alone, I believe. Like eight or nine kids alone. So she has a very, very big family. And they're somewhat tight knit as well. So like having a lot of kids is no thing to them. But me, fuck.

Jey (32:26.918)

Yeah.

Erik The Host (32:53.667)

I'm not sure if I can curse but f that Okay

Jey (32:54.364)

No, no, you, you can curse, you can curse, but no, no, I, I'm with you there because I, I didn't understand how big a, well, I guess I did, but I did understand the full scope of it. My stepmom that raised me, um, that was with my dad for a really long time. Um, you know, she's from Mexico city. So like we had a pretty good size extended family and whatnot, uh, where we live. Like even on my dad's side, we had a pretty good extended family, like good.

Erik The Host (33:18.883)

Yeah.

Oh, Mexicans can hump.

Jey (33:23.58)

Yeah, dude. And so then, but now being married to getting married to a Latina, I had no idea. There's always there's like family over here. There's a house over here. There's a house over here. We got to go this place, this place, this place, that place, this place, all over all these fucking places. Everything. Oh, my God, dude, like it is. It's everything like. It's shots, it's bottles, it's food, it's tamales.

Erik The Host (33:26.083)

You

Erik The Host (33:37.313)

Yeah. And they celebrate everything.

Everything.

Erik The Host (33:49.647)

Even Holly, yeah. Dancing, like everything, yeah. They know how to party. They definitely know how to party. I'm sorry, you cut out. You cut out, you said we don't even do something. Okay.

Jey (33:53.564)

It's everything, everything. Like that's why we don't even want to, that's why we don't even want to have like a big wedding because it's like, we just know it's going to get crazy. And like, we don't want all that. Uh, and so we're going to try to do something small and, Oh, we don't even want to have like a big, huge wedding. We don't want to have a big, huge wedding because we, we know it's going to get crazy and everybody in there, literally everybody and their cousin are going to come over, um, and try to be a part of it.

Erik The Host (34:21.259)

Like I don't even know this guy who is this guy?

Jey (34:25.564)

right she's like oh that's my uncle's cousin sister brother um twice removed on my exactly i'm like then who's oh well that oh that's that person then it's like oh we don't talk to this aunt we like this aunt we don't we don't really like this one as much but we like this one like oh we don't really like the parents but we like the kids kind of thing like it's all over the place it's a whole thing it's a whole thing but yeah no um

Erik The Host (34:28.771)

That's right, yeah right. On my dad's side.

Erik The Host (34:34.211)

ehh... ehh...

Erik The Host (34:49.539)

Yeah, it's messy. It gets real messy quick.

Jey (34:54.268)

Yeah, and I can't even keep track of everyone's names. I don't even know everyone's names. I'm just like, oh, that's your uncle, that's your aunt. Who's that person again? I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. And then there's me. I'm just like the one like.

Erik The Host (35:06.339)

Yup, I'm 13 years in and I'm almost 13 years in and I'm still meeting uncles that I've met a bunch of times for the first time. Like, oh, it's Eddie? Okay, nice to meet you. Oh, we met last at two Christmases ago. Like, hey man, I ain't seen you in two years.

Jey (35:27.676)

Lots happened. Lots happened.

Erik The Host (35:30.147)

Yeah, that's always my mindset. But so yeah, my wife comes from a big family. We're okay with having two kids. And then the oopsie happens with my youngest son, Isaiah, and I was still in the mindset. I don't want no more kids. So this was, this is all around the same time I'm running for like the...

Jey (35:33.372)

So true.

Erik The Host (35:55.747)

I'm running for the politics and everything like that. So my life is going through a lot of changes in a very small amount of time. And we're at this crossroads, her and I, where she wants to keep the baby and I don't want to have the baby because I'm cool, you know? And this was at like a really rough time. Like we almost got divorced over the fact that I didn't want to have any more kids and she didn't want to, and she wasn't willing to get rid of it.

Almost four years later, I'm very blessed that she didn't, but at the time, um, I couldn't really see past what my mindset was already. And, um, we went pretty much the entire pregnancy, not really talking. This was the first time we have ever had a child and there was really no communication. It wasn't a lot of teamwork. I still showed up to all the appointments. Um, but like as far as our connection during it all, it wasn't really there. Um, for the last child, we kind of took that.

Jey (36:33.972)

you

Erik The Host (36:55.491)

that idea that everything was so much different from the first two, that everything was different for the last one, even to the point where my wife gave a, I had a natural birth. And when she had decided this, this is where like our relationship in the, in the pregnancy started to change because it requires you to have a partner in that, you know what I mean? With the breathing exercises and.

like using the balls for the activities to help the baby get in better positioning and all these different things. So in the later months, we actually started to build that connection. But I remember my wife, like a couple of years later, we talked about it. And for all my children, I had helped the nurses pull them out and cut the umbilical cords and things like that. And we got to the hospital in just enough time. Like my wife pushed one time and my son pretty much flew out.

And my wife told me, now she didn't do this, but she told me after they had put my son on her chest, she wanted to tell me, okay, now get out. Because like things weren't great with us. But even in that, as the months went by and my son had started to grow and things like that, there was like this disconnect between him and I, where I kind of like, my first two children,

Jey (38:00.444)

Hahaha.

Erik The Host (38:18.051)

I didn't have no trouble building a relationship with them, but my youngest son, he gave me a really tough run to like have this father son relationship with him. And I think it was because for pretty much 10 months, there was none of that. Like, you know, I used to sing and rap to my children. I would read them books, you know, I'd rub them and I talked to them. And for the youngest, I didn't really do any of these things. So there was kind of, I kind of feel like there was like,

a little unfamiliarity between him and I because the way him and his, myself and my wife's relationship was during his pregnancy. But you know, he's almost four years old now. The kid is a spitting image of me and it's ridiculous because as a child, I was a professional at getting into things I had no business doing.

from busting my head, getting hit by cars, all that stuff. My son has absolutely no fear and no filter. We have this car that I used to drive in the front of my house, and he climbs up on the car and he jumps as high as he can from the top of the roof and lands on his feet. You know what I'm saying? But to me, I'm like, this dude is six feet in the air at three years old. But to him, he gets a kick out of that kind of stuff.

So like a spitting image of me as a child, because I used to do that. I used to like, you know, climb up eight steps and jump from eight steps just to do it, just for shits and giggles, you know? And that's the type of childhood is so I think the more time that went by, the better things have gotten as far as like him and I, our relationship and things like that. I forget how we even got here. You asked a question. Yeah.

Jey (40:05.56)

No, you're good. We got here perfectly. That's so cool. So would you say like there was, there is a pretty big difference then, or at least there was, there's not anymore, but at first when he was first born, because there was that lack of like prenatal connection between you and your wife and you didn't really get to bond with him while he was in utero more or less.

Do you feel like that's impacted y 'all's relationship now, like years out? Or do you feel like it's kind of been past it, gotten past it now, or there's still struggles, or there's still some things there?

Erik The Host (40:36.355)

Yeah, dude.

Erik The Host (40:47.189)

No, there's, we can have those conversations without having our emotions get in the mix of it. There is certain times, right? Because for my son, I didn't grow up with a dad. My mother raised myself, my little brother, and my sister. And my sister had a very huge role in our lives as far as going from teenagers to young adulthood.

My mom worked a lot. There was times she worked three jobs just to keep the lights on. I would leave out for school. She'd kiss me bye to school and I wouldn't see her again until 1 .30 in the morning when she got home from her last shift at McDonald's. It was stuff like that. And my sister would be pretty much our caretaker from the time we got out of school up until the moment my mom walked in the door. So there was a lot of scenarios like that. So...

Um, as, as we had previously talked about, you know, I, when I had my first son, JC on, um, it was a lot of a child learning to be a man and also raise a boy into a man. Um, and then I had Elizabeth, which is my middle child. She's six and she kinda, uh, and like for my son, I was, I was very immature, but I was very fun and loving for him, um, as a little boy. And then my daughter comes around and then she turns me into this big ball of mush.

And then my son's getting a little bit older and then he realizes that he might be able to like get over on me on some things. You know what I mean? Because like the way that I, the way that I am at this time in my life. And then my youngest son, Isaiah comes in the picture about three years later and he turns me in and because of what I endured in this time, I turn into like, like very like rough in a way where it's like, I don't know. I have like this, this,

over sense of responsibility. And it's like, I want to do all the things that I didn't have. And I want to do all the things I didn't get from my father as a child. But then there's moments where like my wife would like essentially tell me like I was turning out, like I was being a little bit rigid in certain situations. Like I don't, I don't have to be as hard for him throwing a ball in the house than what I did or something like that. And there'll be instances like that where it's like, Hey, you,

Erik The Host (43:08.867)

You don't got to do all that. And so it's still like a balancing act. And I don't think I'm too, I don't think I'm too rough. But sometimes she, I guess she sees it another way, you know, but like, um, I have, I have, I, I know I have this huge responsibility. Um, you know, I'm raising three children and I'm raising three children in a world that might not love them. I'm raising three children in a world that might not respect them just because they're, they're a person and they're deserving of respect. Um,

Jey (43:26.172)

Okay.

Erik The Host (43:38.627)

I'm raising three children where, you know, their pigment might have something to do with the opportunities and spaces they can get into. So I do everything I can in my power to prepare them for the world that I've been here to experience and one that I'm a little bit more cognitive of than they are. And even to some degree that my wife doesn't even really understand because her background is totally different from mine.

And so there's a little bit of that that goes into it. But I would say overall, I have an excellent relationship with my children. Like, they're one of the only reasons I'm still connected to my childhood in some aspect. And I'm not just this ball of rigidness because I've been through a lot in my life that if I wanted to quit and just say, this is the way I'm going to be, I think it would be justified in many aspects.

And my children remind me that life is to be lived and life is to be enjoyed. And despite everything that you go through, it's all to build the character for the man that you're ultimately striving to be. And they serve as a reminder every day for that.

Jey (44:58.772)

Man, that was beautiful, man. I'm gonna record that, I'm listen to that part back, back and back and back and back, because it's so true. Everything you said there was just so true. You know, you're raising three kids who very unfortunately, you know, reality is unless things drastically change in the next eight to 12 years, there may be limits to opportunity. There may be just hate because of the way they look. Racism is a very real thing.

Erik The Host (45:05.143)

Yeah.

Jey (45:28.444)

country. It's not gone. Slavery might have ended so long ago. We might have had Brown versus the Board. We may have had all these significant racial victories throughout time. But, you know, even today, our society still very much feels the effects of the post -World War II de jure segregation in this country, the legal segregation of African Americans and whites post -World War II.

Erik The Host (45:31.011)

Yeah.

Jey (45:58.556)

during the economic boom, during the industrialization of like big cities like San Francisco and the auto boom and everything that was happening in the 40s and 50s and 60s, we still feel those effects of it today, very, very much so. It's very prevalent. It's very prevalent in...

Erik The Host (46:15.715)

Yeah, I even take it a step further. When you look at our classrooms, as far as just education goes, and you look at public schools about who's being served in these public schools, and I shouldn't even say who's being served, who's being underserved in these public schools, and a lot of the time it's black and brown kids. And then you look at privatized education, and you look at the statistics of that, and what the private education sector.

Jey (46:29.208)

Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.

Erik The Host (46:43.619)

does as far as success, opposed to public education and the student success, you know, 10, 15, 20 years down the line, there's still a huge discrepancy. Not only that, like what these kids are actually being taught so that way they can live a fruitful life, totally different. And there's a whole lot of information that I've had to teach myself and I've had to learn myself.

in order to put myself in a better position that in many cases, the education that I've gotten up until that point in life when I graduated high school probably should have been responsible for. You know what I'm saying? But I've had to learn how to write. My wife taught me how to balance a checkbook, how to file my taxes. I had to teach that myself, how to rewire receptacles, you know what I'm saying? So I can maintain the upkeep of my house. Like...

Jey (47:19.642)

100%.

Erik The Host (47:34.819)

Like it costs 800 bucks. I looked this up. It costs $800 to pay a plumber to come to your house and change a faulty toilet. Yesterday, I changed a toilet all by myself. And I had to say this today because I'm very proud of myself. But I changed a toilet. Thank you, man. I changed a toilet in my house. 230 bucks. 230 bucks. 240 bucks because I had to buy some. Yeah.

Jey (47:48.292)

I'm proud of you too! It cost you what, 200 bucks? It cost you what, 200 bucks? Yeah, you just changed the toilet and the ring!

Yeah, you change, you swap the toilet, change the ring, you silicone the silicone, the ring in the toilet down and let it dry and bada bing, bada boom, you're done pretty much. That's it. Yeah.

Erik The Host (48:03.235)

And it's not that complicated.

Erik The Host (48:10.083)

Yeah, and make sure you don't got no leaks. Bada boom. Yeah. But, but if I was going to pay somebody else 800 bucks, you know what I'm saying? But like, I didn't necessarily have the tools to like have somebody teach me like little things that will be so monumental in my life, but changing tires, I had to learn that by myself. So like, I take the responsibility of being a father very serious because there's so many little things in life that are monumental, even though,

Jey (48:18.15)

Oh, eight, yeah, 100%.

Erik The Host (48:40.099)

It seems a little like you don't care about not knowing how to change a tire until you're stuck on the side of a highway in the middle of the night. And it's going to take AAA two hours to get to you. Then you kind of wish you had those skills. Then you wish you had somebody to guide you in this aspect. But you know, in many cases you don't. And even though the information is accessible, even though the information is accessible via YouTube or whatever.

Jey (49:01.404)

100%.

Erik The Host (49:08.515)

Some people might not think about it, but if you got a role model or somebody that's willing to help you along the path, then you're gonna be a lot better off. So, you know, there's still a whole lot of discrepancies as far as race and the tools our children are given and children everywhere are given to give them a leg up in life, you know? And I don't take that responsibility lightly.

Jey (49:36.316)

No, 100%. No, I hear you. In the field I work in, so I work in mental health, but I work a lot with youth and families in schools. And I see it, I've seen it so many times where we've had first generation immigrant children who are now in school here in the state and they don't speak a lick of English and they're already second, third, fourth grade age. And the schools just don't give a flying fuck.

about these kids. They don't want to offer them a 504. They don't want to offer them any accommodations. They don't want to offer them any help. And it's like, okay, but the reason that we have things like 504 is in IEPs. By the time this comes out, my episode with Tim Viagas, a host of the Think Inclusive podcast will come out and we'll have talked about this in great length. But the reason these things exist is because it's too

Erik The Host (50:02.979)

Nope. No child left behind.

Jey (50:29.926)

create an equal bridge to education, to bridge those gaps. And if we're not using them, then we're not using them. But the reason they're not being used is because a school, I don't think so. The reason we're not using them.

Erik The Host (50:40.515)

Did you freeze?

Erik The Host (50:46.211)

You froze for me. The last thing I heard was... There you go.

Jey (50:52.028)

There we go. And the reason that they're not used and the reason that they're not pushed in the schools to help create it is because the schools don't want to pay for them. And I've been talking about this so much lately. I've been talking about just how shitty school boards are because your local school board doesn't have a single educator or former educator or educator of any kind on it, which is why it's so important for regular people who give a flying fuck about their kids' education and kids around them education.

Erik The Host (51:02.051)

Yeah.

Jey (51:21.532)

Like Eric, you would be a great school board member. You would be a fantastic school board representative through and through. I would do it, but I've never had that placed upon my heart to go and do it. I talk about it and I think I can definitely use this platform for that change to hopefully the right person listens to the podcast with the topic being brought up of going and running for your local school board or enough people listen and they vote for the right candidate.

for their school board and they do some research, instead just fill in a box for a name that looks pretty or a name that aligns with their party, it's okay to break party alignment. At the local level, party alignments don't matter whatsoever. It's because they have to. Literally pick the best candidate. Do your research and pick the person that matters the most to you, that is going to have the most impact on your community. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.

Erik The Host (51:55.275)

Yes.

Yes.

Erik The Host (52:07.811)

I say that same thing.

Erik The Host (52:14.243)

And these are the people, yes, yes.

Jey (52:19.75)

It doesn't matter if they're Republicans, they're Democrats, they're independent, they're moderate, they're everywhere in the spectrum of politics. If they are the right person for the job and they want to do the job, most importantly, they want to do it, then let them do it. Get them in there. If it's a Christian, if it's a Christian, that can do the job really well and cares and has respect and

Erik The Host (52:35.075)

Get him in there.

Erik The Host (52:38.979)

Yes, I totally agree.

Jey (52:48.188)

all his other traits and characteristics, I think he's gonna do a great job. I think he's gonna be a high value, high character to this position locally. He's gonna make an impact on our community versus, oh, I know that lady, she's getting paid off by the hospital, which then, or her campaign is being funded by the local hospital kind of thing or a local thing. No, give me the guy that's local to my community. Give me the guy that's being supported by the food.

Erik The Host (53:14.625)

Yes.

Jey (53:15.42)

by the local businesses, by the community, by just my neighbors. Give me that guy or that woman. Give me that person a hundred times over than the person that's just out there campaigning and having signs put up on their name because they have money or funding or trust fund or something to get into it because they're trying to get in now so they can work their way up for political gain. No, give me the local dude, 100 local guy or girl.

Erik The Host (53:23.297)

Yes.

Erik The Host (53:42.339)

That's the big thing. That's how school boards are today. That's how school boards are today. They're like used as stepping stones. I just had the youngest city council, the youngest school board member in the entire state of Pennsylvania. She might even be on the whole East Coast. They're trying to figure that out now, but she's the youngest school board member of all time in Pennsylvania.

She was on my podcast. Her episode might be dropping tonight. If I can't get the episode that's supposed to drop tonight all completed. But I had her on the podcast and we were talking about this and how some of these people are just really out of touch with what's actually going on and how to properly serve the community that they work in and that they work for. Some of them, they'll be like...

when they're going up for re -election, oh, I've been a school board member for eight years, this is gonna be my fourth term. And then you look at the schools in the district and they're underfunded, we can't hold on to principals, the superintendent keeps leaving, the student to teacher ratio was one to 35. You don't need to be on school board any longer because things are dire right now and the only thing you're gloating about is the fact that...

You've been here for eight years. Where's the progress in eight years is what I'm curious about. So I totally agree with you. Get out there, make sure that you're freaking, you're looking into these people, you're talking to them, you're making sure that they're involved, that they live here in the community, that they want to serve. I think all those things are super important to make sure that we're really trying to help our children and our neighbors' children, you know, and et cetera.

Jey (55:25.404)

percent, call them, email them, conversate with them, find them on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, threads, true social, rumble YouTube, find them, find their social media, contact them, talk to them, be like, hey, I know you're running for local election. What sets you apart? What should I know about you? What street do you live on? How long have you lived here? Because I mean, San Francisco is a great example of this, unfortunately. They just elected someone.

Erik The Host (55:31.211)

Yes.

Erik The Host (55:35.819)

Yes.

Erik The Host (55:46.767)

Yeah.

Jey (55:54.684)

from, and this was like a big news article, we're recording this in March. This may come out in a couple months, who knows when, I haven't decided, got that far yet. But San Francisco recently elected a woman from China who has been in the United States for I think three years. So she's not a citizen. She's not a citizen of the United States. She's a Chinese immigrant.

And I'm not trying to say anything bad about that because I know plenty of people from Asian America, Asian Americans, fantastic people. But she's from China in politics and her position that she's holding in San Francisco has to do primarily with voting, vote counting and vote like regular voting regulation.

tell me how that makes sense for one of the single most important things in our country to have someone who's not from here, who's been here for only a handful of years, maybe is in that position to begin with. It doesn't make any sense to me. I don't like it. I don't support it. Like, great. I'm glad you're getting opportunity, but there has to be a different job in the city for you to do. Or how?

Erik The Host (57:05.123)

Yeah, I agree.

Jey (57:14.396)

There has to be something else for you to do here. This, this cannot be your position. You cannot be any kind of elected official. She's something with like the voting and like voting regulations and like making sure the votes go processed well and all that stuff. So it's a pretty big deal position. She's the first ever like non -U .S. citizen to get one of these positions. Um,

Erik The Host (57:20.609)

What's the position again?

Jey (57:42.492)

Call me a conspiracy theorist. Call me right wing. Call me whatever you want. Um, but just the fact that it's someone, and I don't care if it was a man or a woman from China in this position, that's not a U S citizen. Like that to me just raises some red flags. We have the whole AT &T outage yesterday on super Tuesday. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Yesterday on super Tuesday. I don't know if you tried to log on to your.

Erik The Host (58:04.195)

Sleeper agent.

Jey (58:11.26)

to Facebook, Instagram, threads, Twitter, T -Mobile, every, there was WhatsApp. There was, I think about 15 to 20 different tech companies, tech industries, tech entities that went down for a period of time yesterday coincided with like Facebook and Meta entities on super Tuesday, the day after the.

Erik The Host (58:31.189)

I heard, I read it, I read it like an hour after it happened. I didn't even know it occurred. I seen the NFL say, now that we're done with the technical difficulties, this is what happened in the last hour while Instagram was down. I was like, Instagram was down? But yeah, that's crazy.

Jey (58:49.052)

Yeah. No, it was a whole thing and it was, it was so peculiar. I listened to Pete, uh, Patrick David Best. Uh, I listened to the president's daily brief or Patrick Best, or I listened to the president's daily brief and I listened to the PBD podcast. Um, Patrick David Best. Yeah, whatever. Um,

Erik The Host (58:58.659)

Okay.

Jey (59:12.348)

And what they were saying, cause they were recording it live while it was happening, their podcast, while it was happening. Um, and they looked up a list and it was so many companies and it was literally within 24 hours, almost exactly 24 hours after the Supreme court's decision on the balloting and who can be on the ballot, that unanimous decision that no, this can't happen. Um, like Trump can be on the ballot.

Erik The Host (59:39.363)

Sounds like they broke the internet.

Jey (59:41.596)

something and then that happened and then 24 hours later, all these entities go down while people are voting because there were 16 states that had their primary elections last night on Super Tuesday. And so it was all just, it all just lined up. It is, it all just lined up and I'm not, I'm okay talking about it. I feel like I'm educated enough to have a conversation. I lean my way, I lean, I support who I support.

Erik The Host (59:54.499)

Oh wow, that's timely.

Jey (01:00:07.708)

I'll never say on the podcast who I voted for who I didn't vote for I'm not gonna mind myself that closely, but I do vote I do hold my stance on certain things But again, I want the best individual possible for these elected positions So I know that my vote at least went to trying to get the right people into these positions in my opinion That's gonna be best for me for my family and for my community. So It's important to

Erik The Host (01:00:30.339)

I totally agree.

I totally agree. I've never been the person to do the party line sting. I want the best person for the job, the person who I think are gonna align with my views and ultimately help the next generation because it's good to think about now, but we're also here only for a short amount of time. Even if you get 99 years out of this life, you think about it in the scope of time, that's not a lot of time.

Jey (01:00:37.584)

Cough cough

Jey (01:00:56.06)

Uh -huh.

Erik The Host (01:01:03.875)

So, you know, somebody that's thinking about how do we move this thing forward? How do we, how do we set things up for the next generation to pick up where we left off? So those things are constantly like in my mind frame when I'm trying to see who I think should represent us in, in whatever positions that they're running for. I think we all should be a little bit more mindful of that because I think like world politics, local politics in many aspects in America has been a.

I'll be frank, a shit show of people being elected to positions that they don't care about, they're unqualified to have, they've been sitting in too long and haven't done much with their opportunity. So I think there definitely needs to be an overhaul on the way that we address politics on a local and a world level because we're working for the future. We're working for our children, we're working for our kids.

and our grandkids and that shouldn't be taken lightly, you know, personally, it really shouldn't. And it seems like it's been a while since we had like truly, in my opinion, truly good leaders. And I can only speak for my city as far as city, but even like on a world stage, it seems like it's been quite a while since we had some good leaders where we're like, you know what, I like the things that they're implementing.

and things of that nature. And even if we do have a good leader, do we have good people that work under them in the Senate or Congress? So even in that, it's a constant battle of us just trying to make sure we're getting the right people to represent and share in our values and our beliefs and our direction that we're going in. So, yeah.

Jey (01:02:50.68)

100 % it's so important. All right, let's let's wrap up Let's get wrapped here before I ask you the ending question. I do just want to give a Quick if it loads, maybe it's not gonna load I want to give a quick shout out to today's sponsor of the podcast the June app. That's J o o n If you haven't heard me talk about June yet. Well, you probably haven't been listening to the podcast all the way through

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going to sleep on time, to brushing their teeth, all the little things that I want them doing every single day. They have a task, they have incentive, and they get rewarded within the game. They get screen time, and they get to play the game, and they get to take care of their pets and earn new pets and buy things with their coins and all the things that are super fun for them. I love it so much. Give the app a try for free and use my code YNGDAD to earn 25 % off your subscription price.

see why over 500 ,000 families and over a thousand therapists, myself included in both those numbers are recommending June, that's J -O -O -N. And visit jounapp .io backslash young dad to learn more. And again, you can find that link, the code down in the description of the episode and in our link tree right below our email subscription sign up as well. So Eric, last question here. If what's...

Jey (01:05:06.328)

one piece of advice that you would give to a dad that you know is struggling, that just needs to pick me up, that's really going through it. What's something you would say to him to help, you know, kind of start getting him out of that place a little bit.

Erik The Host (01:05:21.539)

Can you ask the question again? You cut out. You said, what's one piece of advice you would give to, and that's all I heard.

Jey (01:05:28.956)

of advice that you would give to a dad who's like struggling, who's going through it, that just needs, you know, pick me up, that's really dark, really down and really just on that edge of going down even further.

Erik The Host (01:05:44.887)

One of the things that helped me immensely when I was going through that my first bout with depression was I was trying to figure out how I can get to the root of where a lot of the way that I was feeling was stemming from. At the time, my wife had suggested journaling. And as I said, I've done music. I've always enjoyed writing papers when I was in school. And I've always had like this gift to put words together. So,

Journaling actually came pretty easily and it was the one place where I could I could say my most inner feelings and Nobody would give me what they their opinion opinions on it how they felt about it Nobody I didn't need anybody's Validation for the way that I was feeling and ultimately it allowed me to actually reread and Process the way that I was feeling to start to come peel back some of the layers and comb through the things that I was feeling at the moment

And then the other thing I would say is your kids, your kids are, are vehicles of happiness. They are living, breathing instruments of joy. There's another, even after a very long day of work and it could have been stressful when I get to come home and my kids want to like play fight and they want to wrestle or something. Um, honestly, I could have a great day. I could have a crappy day.

And that's probably going to be the best 20 minutes of my entire day is, is being able to interact with them, play with them and share and share that moment of joy with them. So, you know, spend some time with your kids, pry, pry into their lives, into their heads, see why they think the way they think. And you know, why they wake up every morning and they're not worried about yesterday, unlike us. And, um, and take a page out of their book. You know, they're like I said, they're, they're living, breathing vehicles of joy and, um,

And that little boy, that little girl is always going to live within us. So allow them to help you bring that out. And I promise your days will begin to improve.

Jey (01:07:52.956)

Alright, tell the people where they can find you, find more of your podcasts, more about you, connect with you further, and all that good stuff. Give yourself a natural plug here at the end.

Erik The Host (01:08:06.211)

Awesome. Awesome. I want to say thank you again. Thank you for having me up here on the podcast. A great conversation. I love what you're doing. I love how you're out there being a voice for people just like you and I having children young and learning to navigate the world of being a, the world of parenthood. So thank you. I appreciate it for real. You can find me at dope individuals only. This is my logo here. You can find me on Instagram and Tik Tok at dope individuals pod.

You can follow me on subscribe to the YouTube page dope individuals only podcast. You can listen to me anywhere where podcasts are found at dope individuals only podcast again, I'm Eric the host That's what I go by I want to thank you guys if you guys gonna come out and check out the podcast Please leave a comment. Let me know where you're coming from where you found me at and I respond to all the comments. So feel free

to jump in the conversation. That's what these conversations are all about. Whether you agree, you disagree, it doesn't really matter. I just want to talk to people and I want to give people a platform to voice their opinions and have some open dialogue. That's one thing I don't think we do enough of is talk to each other. And I'm happy to be that person to start the conversations.

Jey (01:09:21.276)

love that. Well it's appreciated, it's needed, it's very much needed.

Jey (01:09:27.868)

I appreciate your time. I appreciate you coming on today.

Erik The Host (01:09:29.107)

Agreed.

Erik The Host (01:09:34.211)

Thank you for having me.

Jey (01:09:36.342)

Thank you.