Sisters-in-Service
Are you a women veteran who feels unseen and unheard? Do you struggle with finding your purpose after service? Sisters-in-Service is a podcast that gives women veterans the platform to talk about those exact issues and more. Hear from other veterans, military spouses and Veteran Service Organizations (VSO) just like you that have overcome their transition from the military. Every Tuesday this podcast encourages women veterans to stand up and be counted because as a group we have a voice. From your host - Cat Corchado - The Voice Connecting Women Veterans
Sisters-in-Service
Children Don't Need Perfect Parents, Just Present Ones
What if the most powerful mental health intervention was simply asking someone "How are you?" and truly listening to their answer? Dr. Iran McGann, psychologist and former Israeli military officer, has built his life's work around this deceptively simple approach.
From his unique perspective as someone who served in a country where "being a veteran isn't really a thing because everybody's a veteran," Dr. Magen bridges worlds that rarely intersect. He draws compelling parallels between military and medical cultures—both demanding heroism, suppressing vulnerability, and facing alarmingly high suicide rates. This insight led him to create Early Alert, an innovative suicide prevention system that texts regular wellness check-ins to vulnerable populations, connecting them with resources when needed.
Dr. Magen's work extends deeply into family dynamics, particularly through his organizations Parenting for Humans and Divorcing Dads. He challenges our focus on tactical parenting problems, instead emphasizing relationship quality: "The better the relationship, the easier everything is." His approach to supporting divorcing fathers addresses a critical gap in mental health services, noting that men experience significantly higher suicide rates during divorce than women, largely due to isolation and lack of support networks.
Perhaps most powerfully, Dr. Magen reframes our understanding of how divorce affects children. "What's bad for kids isn't divorce—it's conflict between parents," he explains, advocating for children to remain children during family transitions, not messengers, spies, or judges between warring parents. His practical guidance reminds us that self-care (particularly adequate sleep) forms the foundation for healthy relationships, and that small daily "deposits" of attention and respect build the connection children need to thrive.
Join us for this illuminating conversation about connection, mental health, and the profound impact of asking someone how they're doing—and caring enough to listen to their answer. Whether you're a parent, veteran, healthcare provider, or simply someone who values deeper human connection, Dr. McGann's insights will transform how you approach your most important relationships.
Welcome to Sisters in Service podcast. Most of you know me as a strong advocate for women veterans in being recognized not only as veterans but also as women who are changing the world through our passion of serving even after service. This podcast is my passion by telling all the stories of military brats, military spouses, active duty and veterans, not to forget the veteran service organizations that help us along our transition journey. I want to thank you in advance for listening. I hope that you will join me. Every week, a new podcast and episode comes out every Tuesday, so I hope that you will join and I hope that you enjoy. This podcast is brought to you by Small Space Pilates. Are you ready to get fit and fabulous from the comfort of your own home? Look no further than Small Space Pilates. With live online Pilates and strength training classes, a video library and a no perfection allowed policy, you can achieve your fitness goals without ever leaving your house. Click on the link for your complimentary week and start your journey to feeling fabulous today.
Speaker 1:Welcome, sisters in service, to another episode of our podcast. You know me. I am the host, kat Corchado, and today I have a very different type of guest for you. He's a very special guy. He's a man who has worn many hats, from serving as an officer in the Israeli army in the middle, I keep saying the army, israeli military to becoming an esteemed professor at the Yale School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry. He's an educator, a psychologist, a founder and, above all, a passionate advocate for mental health. Please join me in welcoming Dr Iran McGann. Iran, nice to see you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, nice to see you again.
Speaker 1:I'm going to call you Dr Iran, is that okay? You?
Speaker 2:can? You can also just call me Iran when you say Dr Iran, I'll keep turning around.
Speaker 1:Well, I feel that anybody who went through all the changes to become a doctor deserves that name to be attached to them. So, iran, tell us a little bit about the Israeli military. Is it something that is a requirement for men and women after a certain age, just for the men? And how long do you have to serve?
Speaker 2:It's generally a requirement for everybody, with a couple of important exceptions, but it's a requirement for men and for women. The service duration is three years for men, two years for women, unless women serve in positions that were traditionally assigned for men. In this case, they'll serve as long as men will serve, including the training and the actual deployment. So maybe it was a long time ago, maybe 15, 20 years ago. There was an Israeli woman who appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court and said she wanted to go to to apply to be a combat pilot. To apply to be a combat pilot, which is something that anybody enlisting has a right to request a test into it. And at the time the military in Israel was really not into equality in this regard. And they put up all kinds of reasons, right, absolutely From like strengths and competence, like the fear of, oh, if they're captured then they're subject to very different possible forms of abuse. And she was like, well, my choice, you know, and I'd like to do it anyway. And she fought really hard, took it to the Supreme Court, like I said, and eventually the Supreme Court said, yep, she has a right to do it, and she tested into the course and then flunked out within a couple of months. But the woman that came after her finished it and became a combat pilot, yeah, and so she really opened that gate and basically ever since then it kept expanding over a few years. But at this point women in the Israeli military can do any job, just like men in the Israeli military, and then the length of their service will become longer accordingly. And then, like I said, there are some exceptions.
Speaker 2:Not everybody serves in the military. One is the Orthodox or the ultra-Orthodox in Israel are excused from serving, which is a cause for a lot of internal debate and disagreements in Israel. A lot of people are against it, disagreements in Israel. A lot of people are about it, arab Israelis often excused from military service, which creates more challenges down the line, because serving in the military is a prerequisite for lots of other things later on. So it's a way to keep people who are not serving from becoming fully integrated in a sense. So that creates its own set of problems. And then there are people who just really don't want to serve and you can get out fairly easily In the most extreme version. You can just refuse to enlist and then they'll kind of try to scare you for a little while and you might go to military prison for I don't know some weeks, and then they let you go, cause what are they going to do? I mean, they're not going to do it forever.
Speaker 2:Some people will fake injuries or fake mental illness in order to not go into service. Sounds like the military.
Speaker 1:here People make up stuff or get a doctor to pencil whip a prescription that they can't. You know yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but in all it's extremely common in Israel to serve in the military. I think everybody that I know, like all my friends and people I grew up with and now their kids and all, like everybody goes to the military. So in Israel being a veteran is not really a thing, because everybody's a veteran. It's, you know, like being a veteran is not part of my identity. I started doing work here with the Department of Veterans Affairs and as we were talking I realized that part of the culture is you explain your connection to military, military service and so on, and I learned to start saying I'm a veteran of the Israeli military, even though I don't think of myself at all as a veteran, any more than I think of myself as a taxpayer, like it's not part of it.
Speaker 1:It's not. It's not part of your job, your title that you attach to your name.
Speaker 2:It's a thing that everybody does. There's just nothing special about it. In Israel, everybody's a veteran.
Speaker 1:What's the max amount of time you're allowed to serve in the military? Is there a maximum or?
Speaker 2:no, the mandatory service period for men is three years and then you will serve longer depending on the job that you have and the position. So most importantly is if you go to officer's course so in Israel everybody starts out as non-commissioned Then some people are sent to officer's course. Very few people are just going to parachute in as officers. It hardly ever happens.
Speaker 1:It's unheard of. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so if you do that, then it's about an extra year in training and they ask you to stay a couple more years to kind of pay it back basically. But whether you're an officer or not, you have the option to stay if your service was satisfactory and you can become a career soldier and you can do it forever. So that's an option that's open to everybody.
Speaker 1:I find that interesting because here and you probably already know this that 1% of the population serves, there's no requirement. If you want to and you pass the test, okay. If you don't want to, then you don't. But I think when I was in Turkey I remembered not so much the women but the men had a mandatory tour that they had to do in the military. I want to say it was two years for some reason, but I just thought it was interesting. So it's always fascinating for me to ask about the military in other countries and what it's like, and it's very cool to know that, you know, a woman can just, you know, go and say, hey, I have a right to try to do this, and they say, oh okay, you know, because here they'd be like, oh no.
Speaker 2:Well, they definitely said no in Israel first.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:The Supreme Court order in order to make that happen. That was, I think, a huge step for women's rights in Israel, because the military provides a launch point for everything that happens later in life. So sociologically, in Israel the military serves much of the same function that college serves in the States. Oh, got it. Because you have people from roughly similar backgrounds getting funneled into similar units and they form these social networks, these very powerful social networks. They stay in touch because you go back to reserve service in Israel. If you're living in Israel, usually you go do your reserve training and sometimes deployment a few weeks a year, so you're getting back with your buddies. These networks are extremely powerful. So very similar to what happens here in college.
Speaker 2:And again, the variety of jobs that exist you might go do computer stuff, or you might be an infantry guy, or it might be in a artillery person, or you might be in the Air Force doing mechanical work, or you might do HR work, or there's just like such a huge variety. It really sets you up for what happens in the rest of life. So having access to this big variety of jobs is a big deal. It's huge. So having access to this big variety of jobs is a big deal. It's huge. It's so important for women to be able to do it, for some minorities in Israel to be able to do it and access these things and really become integrated into Israeli society, which is really in large part founded on the military. Like a very common question, especially when young people meet, is what do you do in the military?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's sort of like what was your major. It's like what do you do in the military?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's sort of like what was your major. It's like what'd you do in the military?
Speaker 2:Yeah, when you asked this right. Were you? Were you a jarhead? Were you an intelligence guy? Were you? Yeah, that's kind of the same thing, and you kind of suss out the person just by hearing what they did in the military.
Speaker 1:So did you know? Cause? I think you know. If I'm wrong, let me know or if I misheard, that everyone comes in enlisted and then you can request to become an officer. Is that correct?
Speaker 2:You can request. More typically, your commanding officers will suggest to you.
Speaker 1:We'll ask you if you want.
Speaker 2:So we think this is a good idea and would you be interested? You can't be forced to go into officers, well?
Speaker 1:true, but I guess my question is after being an officer, did you decide to go to medical school? No, at that point, or was it something that happened after your tour in the military.
Speaker 2:Um so I, first of all, I never went to medical school. I'm a PhD, not an MD. That's an important thing.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm sorry I elevated you, did I?
Speaker 2:Oh, some would. Some would say um, but yeah you, I'm not the person you want answering. When on an airplane they say is there a doctor?
Speaker 1:Like, I'll help you process the trauma from what's happening here. But right, help with your shortness of breath, sorry.
Speaker 2:Why psychiatry? Why was that such a pull for you um so psych psychology?
Speaker 2:so again this is right, psychiatrists are physicians, um, and they think a lot about medication and they think a lot about um prescriptions, and they work within a medical system. Psychologists, um, usually in most states, psychologists don't prescribe medication, it's only talk therapy, sometimes other modalities too. Why psychology for me? Um, I remember growing up and I remember really being very self-centered in a way, right, I really thought a lot about what my experiences are and how they've led me to make one choice or another, and I think through that really ended up either understanding or imagining that I'm understanding other people, right, in the same way that maybe somebody who's very physically talented and is super in touch with their body can understand what other people are going through physically when they see them. You know, dragging a foot in a minor way or sort of because something's like oh, maybe there's a sense of pressure here.
Speaker 2:So for me it was more about my, my own psychological makeup. I was very curious about myself and about other people and felt like a very, very, um obvious extension of that. And I think to improve my relationship with myself and tell people improve relationships with themselves and with other people just has such an enormous impact on on the quality of life and of kind of how, how nice people are to themselves and other people and ultimately I think that that has an enormous impact on the world and that's the path I wanted to?
Speaker 1:Oh, definitely. First of all, thank you for clarifying that, because I just learned something today. You guys, I have to say I did not know that, but thank you for clarifying In my case it's confusing because I'm to say I did not know that, but thank you for clarifying.
Speaker 2:In my case it's confusing because I'm a psychologist but I'm in the Department of Psychiatry right In the university, so I mean there's obviously a lot of crossover, yeah.
Speaker 1:Now you have founded several organizations, including Parenting for Humans and Divorcing Dads. What inspired you to start these platforms and how do they support parents in building strong relationships with their children?
Speaker 2:As I mentioned, I've always been very curious about relationships and how people support people and how people form strong relationships. And somewhere in the middle of my PhD I got kind of seriously curious about this and learning about how do you teach people to do relationships and how do you teach people to do emotional support with each other people that are not clinicians and I started doing these workshops with a buddy of mine. There we would just hang up flyers around town and say you know how to be a friend, you know? Workshop Tuesday 6 to 7 pm and people would come. It was very heartwarming, oh wow. And I started kind of figuring out my stuff then and what I feel good about when I teach and what exercises I think work and so on.
Speaker 2:Anyhow, fast forward a few years and realize that a very specific kind of relationship that I care about very much as a parent-child relationship. This is even before I was a parent. For years I was waiting to be kind of booed off and out of rooms because I don't have a kid. Why am I talking to parents about kids? But that just wasn't an issue back then, and now I have a kid, so I'm legit, but at the time I was really concerned about it. Got the kid check. Yeah, got it the last piece of certification I needed. Check Got it the last piece of certification I needed. So the more I do it, the more convinced for kids.
Speaker 2:The parent-child relationship is sort of the original model, the schema we have for what relationships look like in life in general. And if that didn't go well, that's going to take many years and a lot of work to learn to relate to people differently. And if it goes well, then you get these like happy, by and large very well-adjusted people who are helpful and nice and contributing, and so that just feels like a place where such enormous impact can happen. Right, and I I want to help. I want to help people and the world in general. I haven't lost that drive yet and I've come to realize that for me, the place that feels like the most likely place where I can actually make an impact make a difference.
Speaker 2:Yeah, is by how helping more kids have better relationships with their parents and helping more parents have better relationships with their kids and helping more parents have better relationships with their kids, because I think most of the world's problems are the result of people who grew up with bad relationships.
Speaker 1:Are you seeing more now, or just in general, of kids that are unable to associate with other kids, like they're having a hard time? So, as being in the military, I was a military brat, so we were moving all the time. I was a military brat, so we were moving all the time and I had to learn how to become a really good friend. I had to know how to put people at ease, to make friends. Are you seeing a difference now in kids that they kind of want to become isolated, or maybe not, or maybe not.
Speaker 2:First of all, I don't feel like I exactly have great room for comparison right. I don't see all kids today, and I certainly saw even less when I was a kid, so you know my basis for comparison is very kind of right around here. In general, though, like what I'm hearing from parents that I work with and school districts that I work with, parents, one of the main concerns is screen time and the kids are not socializing enough with one another and at the same time, kids are socializing plenty, just in ways that are not very recognizable to parents. It's different Because they are on the computer with their friends, just their friends are in the earphones and they're doing this stuff, but it's still a form of bonding and connection really different than what we're used to.
Speaker 2:By and large, I don't think people are, I don't think kids are less social now than they were before. Clearly the impulse still exists. I do think social media makes things really different than they were before and provides a lot more opportunities for shallow connections. So I'm not sure that the amount of deep connections has changed, but I think there are a lot more shallow connections now. In addition, and those are dangerous and kind of interesting and terrifying ways that we've all heard about before. Right, that kind of the fake news of relationships, right, people that seem like their life is perfect all the time, or the opportunity for cyber bullying, like these are all new things, but kids still have friends, kids still connect and are happy with each other.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. I know that you know in your field you're working with parents and kids having better relationships. What kind of problems are you seeing or are you hoping to fix? The kind of problems that parents come and say I can't talk to my child, or is it something that's simple or is it kind of more deeply rooted?
Speaker 2:The main thing that I work on with parents really is the strength of the relationship. It's usually not tactical, it's not like how do I get my kid to eat more broccoli, or how do I get my you know what she did at school today, or how do I get my kid to do more homework. It often starts there, right? Parents have all these specific questions, which makes sense, right. It's sort of like when we're not physically well, we say how do I have less headaches? Or how do I you know play longer outside? But the general system of underlying the answers is always the same, Right, how do you live a healthier life? You know you eat well, you exercise enough, you socialize, you make sure you get enough sleep, and it's kind of like that with relationships. Right, you want your kid to eat more broccoli, or you want your kid to tell you more about how was school fine. All these things depend on this overall strength of the relationship.
Speaker 2:So I always pull back in that relationship and talking about how, in the day to day, how do we do better relationships? I think that, again, the shape of the problem has changed over the decades, but I think it's a similar problem to, or a similar challenge to, what's always existed. Parents don't feel like they have an easy time connecting to their kids because we all grew up in different times and we have different sensibilities, and parents want to impose their will on the kids, but don't want to do it so much as to alienate the kids. That's a different thing now.
Speaker 2:In the past, I think there was a lot less concern about imposing your will on kids yes probably when we were growing up like it was much more okay to impose your will on kids, and now people are more sensitive to that and to the maybe not. People don't quite know what to do. Well, if I'm not imposing my will, then then what free?
Speaker 1:reign. Yeah, that's what I had growing up imposing my parents will on me, you know, you will not, you you know. But I think each generation has their issues, like it just changes, don't you think a little bit?
Speaker 2:Well, for sure, we all have our issues. Yeah, I have mine. I don't know about you. Yeah, I think so, and I think for this generation the most, the most common issue that people talk about again is around this idea of social media, the need to be as good as it's just more, more interfaces, what other people are like and how to belong or how to stand out. Still, this all relies on kind of basic tenets of the human condition. Right, we want to belong, we want to be loved, we want other people to think that we're good, but the core hasn't really changed?
Speaker 1:Hasn't changed at all. Now I know you're the founder of an initiative called Early Alert, where you are working to prevent suicide among students and veterans. Can you tell our audience a little more about this initiative and the impact it's having?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's. It's a commercial. You know, it's a for-profit company that I started a few years ago and it's kind of also what pays the bill now, in addition to just being good work that I feel good about. But it was originally something that I created to support medical schools and medical students. There's a lot of suicide in medical schools, as you may know.
Speaker 1:I did not know that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and in the medical profession in general, it's very, very dangerous for your health to be a physician.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, I just learned something else, you guys, I'm sorry, doctor, go ahead.
Speaker 2:And there are a lot of similarities between medical culture and military culture. If you take a step back and you think about it for a minute, so in both cases you are the person who is the hero, not the person getting help. You're the person giving help. You're exposed to a lot of bad stuff on a very frequent basis and are supposed to just kind of take it. You know, without making too much of a fuss. Again, asking for support doesn't really happen. Showing any kind of weakness can translate into problems with promotions, with license to operate, with whatever may be there, very hierarchical organizations, extreme demands, physically. In both cases, I mean, you know somewhat different. You may not be like lifting a lot of stuff in medicine, but you're staying awake for very long times and you're very focused and attuned, and so there are a lot, a lot of similarities between the world of medicine and the world of military. And in medicine, as I mentioned, there's just a lot of suicide. A lot of physicians take their own lives. A lot of physicians in training and a lot of medical students do this as well. A lot of physicians in training and a lot of medical students do this as well.
Speaker 2:And so I developed this product that checks in with people to see how they're doing, because the main issue is, people don't ask for help. But if you ask people how they are, they often tell you. And so I developed this product that asks people how they're doing once a week. We just text them. A robot texts them. I mean it's all explicit, we're not fooling anybody. And the robot says how's it going, how's your sleep this week, or how's your mood, or do you have enough money for your stuff, or how are relationships going? So every week it's a different kind of question about a different part of wellness, and if people are not doing so well, then we start connecting them to support resources that exist in their organization, in their area. The idea is to do really early identification and early intervention, and it started out with med schools and then, after a couple of years, we realized this is a very generalizable tool. Everybody deserves a. How are you like? Why limit it to med students?
Speaker 2:And so we started doing this with other professional programs law and dentistry and pharmacy and all that and then started doing this with K-12 and started doing this with first responders. And then a couple of years ago, the VA issued or not issued. The VA ran this innovation challenge for suicide reduction called Mission Daybreak and they invited submissions from anybody and everybody about ways to reduce veteran suicide and so we threw our hat in the ring, as it were. They got a lot of submissions. They got over 1,300 submissions from individuals and universities and corporations and whatnot. They picked 30 out of those and we were one of those 30. And they took us through a process those 30 organizations just learning more about VA and how to talk with VA and work with VA and how to work with veterans. And that's where I learned to say that I'm a veteran that I mentioned before, and that's where the work with veterans started as well with veterans started as well.
Speaker 1:Now can you elaborate a little bit, cause a lot of people, a lot of veterans, are a little wary of the VA for different reasons, and I know that you're a separate entity who's working with the VA, but you're not affiliated with the VA, correct? Yeah?
Speaker 2:caught me mid-nose blow. Yes, sorry, no. Part of part of the idea. Here is um again same as in medicine and law, for examples, where people are very worried about information. Going back to the organization, yes we're very clear about the fact that we're a third party and we will. We're, to put it bluntly, we're paid by the organization, but part of the agreement is a total firewall.
Speaker 1:There's total confidentiality, yeah no information is being exchanged back and forth.
Speaker 2:And so a med school might pay us to check in with their students and refer students to their services, but we don't. We keep the content of the conversations private and it's in the contract with them. And similarly with VA. Va pays us to check in with veterans and see how they're doing, but the information does not go back to VA. And so the thinking is I mean, first of all, if we can help anyone, then great, then we may refer them to when a veteran says I don't have enough money, I'm worried about, you know, being able to make mortgage payments.
Speaker 2:Right we may refer them to VA.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And we may refer them to community organizations that can help, and the veterans can choose which ones they want to use. Part of our goal is to show veterans the specific services that VA provides that match their need, because then there's probably a higher likelihood that they'll utilize it, rather than saying VA can help with stuff. Va can help with this particular thing that you're concerned about, great. If they want to use it and try it out, wonderful. And if they don't, then that's fine and use community organizations, and we work with veterans that are not eligible for VA services.
Speaker 2:We don't care, we'll serve anyone that are not eligible for.
Speaker 1:VA services. We don't care, you know we'll serve anyone. I think it's interesting when you said that you, you know, you. Just it's automatic that you send you know, how are you doing today? I used to do that, I still do that with my clients, and so we always talk about you know, being thankful for things you know, and I always say I ask the question, I'll send it to my clients. I'm like what didn't suck this week? And it's easy to pick that stuff out right, rather than, oh, I'm, you know, talking about oh, what are you grateful for Gratitude? And then I have to sit there and go, oh, okay, this and this and this, what didn't suck? Oh, that's easy, this didn't suck, that didn't suck.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you picked the right door right For for whatever person you're talking with, Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Exactly so when you are working with parents. Um, can you speak a little bit about how the kids are, especially when parents are going through divorce? You know you've got the parents going through the divorce, but they forget that the kids are going through the divorce too. Do you see a lot of that, this disconnect, and do you have to speak to the parents separately and then speak to the kids separately and then bring the two together?
Speaker 2:speak to the kids separately and then bring the two together? Great question, and I have so many thoughts around it. So, first of all, I don't generally work with kids. I work with the parents. Gotcha Kids have enough going on With respect to divorce in particular.
Speaker 2:So my focus isn't, like you were saying before, about divorcing dads. My focus is on the dads, not because I think moms deserve a lot of support, but there are a lot of resources for moms. There are very few resources for men and men. Men going through divorce have this big jump and again risk for death by suicide, whereas women don't basically like. Going through divorce does not increase your risk of dying by suicide, and this is most likely because women have better support in their lives, just like more friends, more close connections, and men don't.
Speaker 2:Men tend to sit in their cave quietly and just feel bad, and so that's much of the inspiration for creating this Divorcing Dads program, although initially, when I started going down that path, I was very concerned about being typecast as like an angry men's rights activist. Really like that's not. You know, I grew up my mom and dad divorced and I grew up with my mom and sister. I'm sort of like I'm an ally, like I'm used to being with and around women in general. Yes, I was very concerned about being just typecast. It turned out to be a non-issue, which I'm really really grateful for, and I have a podcast where I interview men going through divorce and we talk about successes and kind of how to navigate it. And I recently got an email from a woman who was listening to it and said how helpful it's been to hear it because the issues are so similar and I agree they're very similar to hear it because the issues are so similar and I agree they're very similar.
Speaker 2:but I think for men going through divorce and men who can stereotypically have a harder time reaching out asking for help, yes it may be easier to have a resource that is defined as being for men, by men, even though the content is probably very similar.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Otherwise. So that was the thinking behind that. I'll take a quick moment for a word from our sponsor, Tissue.
Speaker 1:I think that you know, you bring up this, you know very interesting concept in that we always feel for the wife or the woman, because a lot of times the kids go with the mom and we're like, oh, we're going to make sure she has the resource, we're going to make sure, but we never really think. We think, oh, dad's going to be fine, but a lot of times dad isn't fine.
Speaker 1:And if dad isn't fine a lot of times he doesn't want to, he doesn't want to reach out to he doesn't want to reach out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, a lot of times men are really not well during divorce and a lot of times men don't want to lose contact with the kids or don't want to be less present, but end up kind of drifting out. Because there's a really common societal expectation and message Kids will be with mom and if mom is not comfortable with dad, then dad shouldn't be around.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's kind of a helpless feeling.
Speaker 2:It seems like for the men, yeah, um, I think in some ways, I think that the default in the system is to protect the women and I think that default is there for a very good reason, like it's true that women are more likely to get hurt physically in the process of a separation by the men.
Speaker 2:The protections are there for good reason, but they create this externality, like the men do get hurt as a result of these protections, and I don't know that there's a great solution, but at least to be aware of the fact that this is a dynamic that exists and that men deserve support and that it's very easy to demonize men. And for men hearing this, if you're open to that message and you take in that message that you're actually a horrible person and dangerous and scary, it can be hugely detrimental to your mental health. Divorcing dads is one, to make sure that they are able, they have the, the tools to stay in their kids lives in in a productive way. Two, to make sure that they have tools to co-parent effectively, kind of reduce the intensity of whatever conflict exists. And three, that they have the, the tools and the motivation and the sense of kind of deserving it to rebuild their own lives, just into a life that they love, as opposed to being call this a jack-in-the-box.
Speaker 2:Dad, where you're, you know, when your kid come visit, let's say and like you, become this, like happy, active person, and then they leave and you're like yeah.
Speaker 2:Exactly, as opposed to just building a life that you love and you enjoy and you know with your kids, awesome, and when you're not with them, awesome, like, like great Either way. So you were asking before about the work that I do with parents going through divorce. So I work with the parents, not with the kids right, by and large, not with the kids by and large, but a good deal of the work is about remembering that the kids do not need to play a role here. The kids have no job other than to be a kid. Right, they can't be the messenger.
Speaker 1:Exactly, they shouldn't be involved with adult stuff. You know, let them be a kid, yeah.
Speaker 2:Not messengers, not spies, not judges. Parents often want kids to say that they're right and the other parent is wrong.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:For the kids, amy, there's this common rotating factoid that divorce is bad for the kids, that life outcomes become worse for the kids. Not so. What's bad for kids is conflict between parents, whether or not, they're married is being exposed to parental conflict.
Speaker 1:That really derails kids.
Speaker 2:And so if you're together and there's conflict between you, don't be together. If your faith and morals allow it, separate. By all means, more power to you.
Speaker 2:But, once you're separated. Do not expose kids to the conflict. Do everything you can to not separated. Do not expose kids to the conflict. Do everything you can to not, and ideally just reduce the conflict between you anyway, because conflict is not good for your cardiovascular health. So why do that? But during the initial months, years that it takes to reduce that like, just pay extra special attention to not exposing your kid to any kind of conflict. No backhanded comments, no n being or criticism, no, nothing. Just be with your kids, let them be a kid.
Speaker 1:Regardless of what's going on with you and your significant other husband, wife or whatever. Let the kids be kids period, aaron. Where can people find if they're looking for you, you know if there's a divorced dad that's going through something, or you know they want information about Parenting for Humans, where can people find you?
Speaker 2:Well, I have a knack for coming up with long and unwieldy domain names that just describe the thing. So the parenting work is at parentingforhumanscom. That has recordings from different workshops and you can sign up for, you know, blog posts and ask to host a workshop if you want in your community Like I'm happy to do that kind of stuff. And then for the work with divorcing dads it's at divorcingdadsorg, and same stuff. You know it'll have recorded materials and there's a link to the podcast there and blog posts and things like that.
Speaker 2:So yeah, if you are a divorcing dad or if you know, somebody who's a divorcing dad, or if you're a divorcing mom and you're interested. You know all are welcome and that's all at DIVORCINGDADSORG.
Speaker 1:I'll make sure all three of those are in the show notes. One last question what are some strategies or tips you can share with our listeners, you know, to help them? Maybe it's parenting I think you've dropped a few golden nuggets, but is there anything in particular, that a question you get all the time, or just some information you'd like to share?
Speaker 2:For parenting in general.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So the first principle is if you're not well, it's going to be hard for you to treat people well, right, and so there are a few basic things we can all do to be weller. One, and I think the most important by far personally, is get enough sleep. It's a small thing. We don't talk about it so much, but I am a raging beast. When I don't get enough sleep, the world is a bad place.
Speaker 1:Yes, everything sucks, everybody sucks.
Speaker 2:Everybody's mean stupid and annoying when I don't get enough sleep. And then I get my eight hours and I wake up and the birds are chirping, just like they did yesterday, and the weather is decent, just like it was yesterday.
Speaker 1:Beautiful, yeah, just like they were yesterday Right with the world.
Speaker 2:So getting enough sleep huge, hugely important um there. There are generally like a few different kind of mega nutrients in life in my opinion. So there's sleep, there's fun, there's community or social connections, food, exercise, learning, like these kinds of things. So the more we can give ourselves on these, the better. But sleep is a hugely important one, yeah, and then when we have our own energy, we're able to be more like the parents that we want to be. So that's point number one. Just really prioritize taking care of ourselves over most other things. And then the second point is with kids. I mean honestly with anyone, but definitely with kids. The better the relationship, the easier everything is. Like you just don't argue so much with people. When you have a good relationship with them. There's not like a sense of like having to pull out teeth to do stuff, and so investing in the relationship is so important rather than investing in like specific goals that you're trying to achieve with your kids, just investing in the relationship as a whole.
Speaker 2:And the way to do that big, big picture is to building into our daily routines, into our our habits of relating to our kids, things that improve the relationship learning to put the phone aside and connecting with them as people, saying thank you, saying well done, remembering stuff that they're going through and asking them about it. Right, if they told us about their friend Jamie and how you know Jamie is upset because her hamster died on Monday. Then on Wednesday we say how's Jamie doing now? And it's such a big deal when you remember and you ask them about it.
Speaker 2:So just investing in the relationships in small ways throughout the day and eventually the cup overfloweth and you have this great relationship and you can sort of work out and figure out anything. It's just a lot less friction when the relationship is good. So focus on the relationship, not on tactical goals.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I think when I was, I was a single parent in the military and realizing that I had a huge job, okay, as a parent. And so my son would come home from school and my mom would say how was school? I go, fine, that was the end of the conversation. So if I said that to my son, how was school? Fine, Well, what was fun at school? Now, and I kept asking what, what was interesting, what was funny, what was you know? Stuff like that. So he goes oh, yeah, exactly. He said oh, this happened, you know.
Speaker 1:And I remember the first time we were watching a movie and it had come to the end of the movie and I turned to my son I said what did? What did you think of? Whatever somebody did in the movie? What'd you think about that? And the first time I asked him, his eyes got all big and I said there's no right or wrong answer, it's your opinion. And once I said that, he was like oh well, blah, blah, blah. And I would I'm like okay, well, why do you think that way? You know what if you had gone the other way?
Speaker 1:So I got him to really think about things and as it, because as an adult. That's what you have to do. You have to dig through the stuff, you know, to say do I want this or this, Is it this way or that way? What do they call it? Critical thinking or something like that, where you have to really cause kids don't on a norm. They're like oh, that looks like fun. Oh crap, I broke my leg, you know.
Speaker 1:But I think, you know, my parents never did that. You know, they never asked my opinion or anything like that. And I thought, you know, I wanted to be a different parent than my parents and I'm I'm hoping that I was. I'm very proud of my son today. He's he's a, he's a nice person and that's probably the best thing I can say as as a mom, because you don't know how good a parent you are until your child is an adult, and then you go, oh God, I screwed up. Or oh, my gosh, he's such a great human, you know yeah yeah, well, it's been a pleasure yeah, all right, just one more.
Speaker 2:It's a great example what you gave, because when you ask him for his opinion about things, you're not just training him to think in a certain way. Like I think about it totally from a relationship perspective. You're saying your opinion matters to me. I'm curious about what you think. I respect your way of thinking that that's a huge relational deposit, right? It makes the relationship stronger when you say I care about what you think, I respect what you think. It's a big deal.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I'm glad I tried to be a different kind of parent with my son and I have to say that to this day, being a single parent is the hardest job I've ever had in my life. I'm just going to put it out there To the recording of this podcast. It's the hardest thing I've ever done and it will always be that, because it's all encompassing, right when you have two parents, but it's even more so when you have one parent and paying attention and everything. So I'm glad I did it that way. That's why I only have one child. I gave everything I had to that one child and I had nothing else to give after that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you squeezed everything, exactly, aram. Thank you so much for being a guest today and you know I learned a couple things today. It's been a banner day for me. And just explaining what it is you do, how you help veterans, how you help parents, how you help dads who are going through divorce, I just think it's interesting to keep those channels open and people. The more we can talk to each other and be nice to each other, I think the better off we'll be.
Speaker 2:What do you think? Amen.
Speaker 1:So, everyone who is listening, I hope you learned a little something I know I did and, as always, please stay safe, take care of each other until next time and please remember it's never too late to start your impossible. Thank you.