EP104: What's To Be Learned From One Dad's Diaper Fame?

Interview with Barney Banks / Tik Tok's IAmMrBanks, Diaper Dude

HOSTED BY PAUL SULLIVAN

Barney Banks' fatherhood fame started humbly: he was trying to entertain his son while changing his diaper. He showed the video to his mother-in-law who suggested he post it to Tik Tok. It resonated - to the tune of millions of views. What's happened in the year since shows what we fathers are craving: connection. Listen to Barney talk about the broader message of his family content.

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Transcript

00;00;05;09 - 00;00;24;05
Paul Sullivan
Welcome to the Company of Dads podcast, where we explore the sweet, silly, strange and sublime aspects of being a dad in a world where men who are the go to parent aren't always accepted at work, among their friends or in the community or what they're doing. I'm your host, Paul Sullivan. Our podcast is just one of the many things we produce each week at the Company of Dads.

00;00;24;06 - 00;00;49;03
Paul Sullivan
We have various features, including the lead dad of the week. We have our community both online and in person. We have a new resource library for all dads called the Lead Dad Library. The one stop shop for all of this is our newsletter, The Dad. So sign up today at the Company of dads.com backslash. The dad. Today our guest is Barney Banks who is many things including being way more interesting than me.

00;00;49;06 - 00;01;17;23
Paul Sullivan
Barney has always been an outfront public guy, and these days he's a UK super dad at a university. He is a professional dancer, including stints on Britain's Got Talent. He's done modeling and he's a commentator for EA sports, which takes him all over the world. But we're talking to him today for his TikTok persona of I Am Mr. Banks, which has amassed 48.6 million likes on his parenting and fatherhood posts.

00;01;17;26 - 00;01;29;29
Paul Sullivan
And it all began when he did something every father has done thousands of times changed his son's diaper. Barney. Welcome to the company, dads podcast.

00;01;30;02 - 00;01;31;28
Barney Banks
Thank you very much for having me. How's it going?

00;01;32;04 - 00;01;45;16
Paul Sullivan
It's going great. How does it all get started? How do you. You know, most people leave university and they get, you know, a pretty boring job, an internship job. You leave university and say, screw it. I'm going to become a professional dancer. Tell us. Give us that back story first.

00;01;45;18 - 00;02;06;22
Barney Banks
Well, I guess that that story kind of began when I was 17, actually. So, in the kind of latter years of secondary school, I, a guy joined my school, one of my peers, who then I found out halfway through the year that he was going to dance classes on the weekends while all of us were competing in sports, whether it be football season or rugby season.

00;02;06;24 - 00;02;24;20
Barney Banks
And, I caught wind of this, and I'd always been interested, but never had an introduction into the world of dancing. And, he invited me to tag along to go to a dance class at a very famous dance studio in central London called Pineapple Studios. And after my first class, I was hooked. I was like, yeah, that's it.

00;02;24;21 - 00;02;47;09
Barney Banks
So I'd make up every excuse in the book to get out of doing sports on the weekends so that I could go and, well, you know, take dance classes. And then from that I, I kind of led into this. I think I want to do this for my job. I guess there was an element of going to university to kind of please my parents, to kind of completely education journey.

00;02;47;11 - 00;03;09;21
Barney Banks
And then I can, if I still want to, you know, embark on a journey as a, as a, as a dancer. Then I can then I can do that. So yeah, I trained as a dancer along the same pathway of, you know, a university degree in film. Yeah. So when I left university, I was like, cool, let's do this dancing thing for real now.

00;03;09;23 - 00;03;10;23
Paul Sullivan
And you did.

00;03;10;26 - 00;03;30;22
Barney Banks
And I did. Yeah. And then that turned into, a six year career as a professional dancer from the age of 21. When I graduated from university, I moved moved to LA for a few months so that I could train amongst, you know, the best dance teachers that there are because you're you're training with Justin Bieber's choreographer and Usher's choreographer and Justin Timberlake's choreography.

00;03;30;22 - 00;03;56;14
Barney Banks
You're just, you know, you're in that mix of people because the one of the great worth of work ethics in the dance industry is that in LA, all the people that are the top dancers, they all still take class all the time. And that's why they're the top dancers. So the actual, the kind of the training that you're getting by going to these, these studios in LA is second to none.

00;03;56;17 - 00;04;01;22
Paul Sullivan
Now, Barney, you and I met through your brother Ollie. Who is? Yeah. First rate. Great guy.

00;04;01;24 - 00;04;02;08
Barney Banks
Yeah.

00;04;02;10 - 00;04;24;24
Paul Sullivan
Golfer, golf agent. I played golf with him. He has exhibited no talent whatsoever. That would lead me to believe dancing runs in the family. So when you think about making this move. And it worked, I mean, this is, you know, where we're going to get to fatherhood. This is fatherhood is to is literally taking a leap. Was there ever I mean, when you did this, what did your parents say?

00;04;24;25 - 00;04;33;16
Paul Sullivan
What did your older brother say? How did that, you know, was it when you first started to take off that they said, okay, I guess Barney's not insane. You know what? How did that work?

00;04;33;18 - 00;04;58;14
Barney Banks
You can imagine the the barrage of of insults and jokes that were made at family gatherings. Yeah. Of course. So, I guess the the first time my parents, not necessarily my parents, my mom had always had, like a level of understanding of just follow your dreams. My dad had his head screwed on a little bit more in terms of just make sure you're financially okay and then I don't care what you do, honestly.

00;04;58;14 - 00;05;15;22
Barney Banks
So just be like, go for what you want to do. And then obviously with my brother as a as I was kind of saying to him, I wanted to pursue the dancing side of things, he was like, well, I'm still going to make fun of you. But ultimately, if it works, it works. So I guess we were all pretty open minded about it.

00;05;15;28 - 00;05;34;09
Barney Banks
And then when people sort of realized, I think it's when I, when I booked the job, it was one of two. It was either when I took the job to be a, on site dancer for Britain's Got Talent, meaning that you dance for any of the contestants that the competing that year, you are one of the dancers they have readily available for them.

00;05;34;09 - 00;05;54;14
Barney Banks
So if they decide they want backup dancers for that show, then you're brought into that and then you have to learn choreography and etc., etc. it was either that because that was a longer contract, you got to remember, in the commercial world, dance and dance contracts are very short. There was less than a week long unless you do a show in the West End, which is years long.

00;05;54;17 - 00;06;16;26
Barney Banks
So you know, every time you do a music video, it's only three days work, two days of rehearsals, one shoot day done. So with Britain's Got Talent, it was like a six week job. And so that was a really big deal. And then, you know, I guess when I told them the financial, benefits of doing a job that was that length, they, they kind of were like, okay, this sounds like this could be something that has legs.

00;06;16;29 - 00;06;33;14
Barney Banks
And I guess that was one. Or it was, you know, the stature of the job, which was I danced for Elton John at the O2 arena, for the Brit Awards. And that was, you know, that was a big deal. Like, as a, as a dancer, to be able to say that you shared a stage with someone like Elton John was pretty cool.

00;06;33;16 - 00;06;52;02
Paul Sullivan
That is a very big deal. You know, when we when we think about fatherhood, we think about, you know, juggling a lot of things. We think about being able to make decisions on the fly. When you and I have talked in the past, you've told both about your career as a commentator for EA sports and also your previous dance career and things that stuck out to me that may be related.

00;06;52;02 - 00;07;07;29
Paul Sullivan
Maybe not. It could be making this up, but that when you were a dancer that you had to learn all kinds of routines very quickly. You had to get it down and get it down right, or else obviously somebody else would fill your spot. Same thing with with esports. You know, when you got into this, you have to learn all of the top players.

00;07;07;29 - 00;07;19;24
Paul Sullivan
You have to know about them. You have to know what they're doing about how you developed those skills in your professional life. And if you think that they carried over into your your parenting life.

00;07;19;26 - 00;07;42;20
Barney Banks
Yeah, I believe that, especially when it comes to esports, like hosting, the, the additional pressure of having to remember all the ins and outs of the game to a high level aren't as high pressure as being a host. That I guess for a commentator, you need to know absolutely everything, the whole game inside out. But as a host, you can dabble.

00;07;42;22 - 00;08;12;06
Barney Banks
And as long as your conversational skills and interview skills are up to scratch, then you know there is an element of you can write that wave. So I guess it's been more about in improving my capability to interview anyone under any circumstance, rather than knowing each and every game that I work on back to front, because there's so much information, there's so much history in these esports, especially the esports that have been going on for longer than 3 or 4 years.

00;08;12;08 - 00;08;32;17
Barney Banks
And, you know, you have all these transfers, you have players. They that the gossip about salaries and the the kind of the interactions between each of these players at different tournaments all over the world. It's so hard to stay on top of absolutely everything that you, you, you try to cherry pick everything. And the fortunate thing about the host is I don't get quizzed on stuff.

00;08;32;17 - 00;08;56;12
Barney Banks
I quiz people on stuff. So I can kind of again ride that way. So in terms of carrying over these sets of skills, of being able to juggle. Yeah, thinking on the fly definitely. I guess for me, everything that's fallen on my career path, whether it be dancing, whether it be hosting, radio, etc., has given me this ability, I guess, to just entertain.

00;08;56;14 - 00;09;32;20
Barney Banks
And so hence why this social media side of my life has, you know, improved and you know, gathered some sort of momentum is because I love to entertain. So I love to entertain my son and being able to get him to, to laugh and play along with the silly games that I play. And all of that does track back to, you know, being creative as a dancer, as a host, you know, as a radio presenter, all of the the creative juices that need to flow in order for you to actually be successful in your job, apply to that element of fatherhood, of being able to entertain your kids, which is half the battle most of

00;09;32;20 - 00;09;41;16
Barney Banks
the time, especially as he's a toddler right now and requires so much more attention than what I'm used to every day. It's kind of entertain me and do it now.

00;09;41;18 - 00;10;05;13
Paul Sullivan
All right. You know, the listeners are following along that they were buying what you were selling until you got to the sort of entertainment value of changing a baby's diaper or nappy. You're trying to say. I mean, it is the most mundane thing that parents do. Generations past, men would brag about never having changed a diaper, which is, of course, nonsense and ridiculous because it's really just technical.

00;10;05;13 - 00;10;24;01
Paul Sullivan
And it's not like diapers are terribly difficult to operate these days. How does something that mundane that but also that relatable? Because we've all done it thousands and thousands of times. How does that become, you know, the idea for the first piece of D&D content you posted?

00;10;24;03 - 00;10;44;15
Barney Banks
Well, it's I guess there's two parts to it. The first part being that it was kind of, totally off the cuff thing that my mother in law had noticed me singing, dancing, behaving stupidly in order to distract my son so that I could quickly change his diaper and that he wouldn't try. And, you know, alligator roll off the off the table or kick his legs or anything.

00;10;44;15 - 00;11;09;17
Barney Banks
So trying to kind of lock in his focus. He was obviously very little at the time. I think he was only three weeks old when I did the first video. So it was he was extremely small and I guess it was just me being silly. She said, that's hilarious. You should record that and then post it somewhere and then that's I had a tick tock account and I decided to go, okay, well, instead of posting the usual stuff that I post on Instagram, why don't I just try posting a dad video?

00;11;09;17 - 00;11;13;29
Barney Banks
And then that's kind of that was the beginning of this whole tidal wave.

00;11;14;01 - 00;11;19;23
Paul Sullivan
And then what happened though, like, but what happened was I could tell the story of how, like the next day or 24 hours later. Yeah.

00;11;19;24 - 00;11;38;05
Barney Banks
Oh, well, so I basically posted this video and it obviously resonated with a lot of people, a lot of parents. And then the following day, you know, I didn't think about it. I left it on TikTok and was like, cool. I went back to Instagram because that was the kind of the social media platform I was most, I don't know, using the most at the time.

00;11;38;08 - 00;11;54;20
Barney Banks
And the following days, it must have been about 24 hours later, it's early afternoon. My my partner said, oh, how's your TikTok video doing, by the way? You posted one yesterday and I said, oh yeah, I did, and I clicked on my account. This had 100,000 followers and I was like, I've definitely clicked on the wrong account. What's going on?

00;11;54;20 - 00;12;13;00
Barney Banks
And I surfed through the app, going, what kind of mistake is this? And I eventually got to the video and I clicked on it and the video had 5 million views and I was like, oh, so I have 100,000 followers now. I guess I have some sort of responsibility. I mean, what do I do? And then Jamie just said to me, make another one.

00;12;13;02 - 00;12;21;27
Barney Banks
So it became this snowball of, you know, at this point in time, like I said, he's three weeks old, so we're changing about five diapers a day.

00;12;21;29 - 00;12;22;08
Paul Sullivan
Yeah.

00;12;22;08 - 00;12;41;01
Barney Banks
So I thought, well, then why don't I just film one of those each day and then do a little bit of editing to it and see how it goes? And then, yeah, the snowball effect kept happening. And within about I think it was about five months. We started in April, and by August we had a million followers on TikTok, which is crazy.

00;12;41;01 - 00;13;07;24
Barney Banks
But the thing oh, the thing I was going to say about it is that not only was it because the I think the success of this has kind of bled into TikTok is obviously because the entertainment value, like we've already spoken about I behaving silly and, you know, it's, it's a it's entertainment value. The other side of it is also that we've surpassed this point in social media where glamorizing your life is no longer believable, but also be.

00;13;07;25 - 00;13;24;16
Barney Banks
People don't want to see that anymore. We've got to a point where you know, with the with the kind of nudge of reality TV as well. The that's the way we like to consume social media is what we want to see. Real things, real people doing real things. And yeah, okay, maybe a bit of entertainment sprinkled in there as well.

00;13;24;16 - 00;13;44;17
Barney Banks
But no one I don't feel like people resonate as much with someone laying on a beach and saying how great their life is. I mean, we're in the trenches, we're parents, we're changing diapers, we're doing feeding time, and there's baked beans going up the walls. And people want to see that because it's what resonates with them and makes people feel like they're not alone in their journey of the same thing.

00;13;44;19 - 00;13;57;24
Paul Sullivan
I don't know, Barney. You got this figured out more than I do, but I could imagine a video of your partner Jamie, like, on the beach. And then it pans to you in, like, a tropical outfit doing some sort of jazz hands type routine as you change it up. Now. Yeah.

00;13;57;26 - 00;14;00;19
Barney Banks
I mean, it's definitely possible. We did, do it. You can.

00;14;00;26 - 00;14;02;13
Paul Sullivan
You can take that idea. You can have it.

00;14;02;13 - 00;14;24;21
Barney Banks
I will, I'll run with it. And why not? We we, we basically did our first long haul trip on a flight with rocket when he was just before he was one. We went to Bali and it took 23.5 hours to get there. But with a kids, that's not walking yet, it's actually not that bad. But I guess with a toddler it would be an absolute nightmare.

00;14;24;21 - 00;14;33;13
Barney Banks
So yeah, we did that and we actually managed to do some fun videos with him while we were in Bali as well. And that was quite a nice change of pace and change of scenery.

00;14;33;13 - 00;14;54;22
Paul Sullivan
At least you know any TikTok video. An attitude, any TikTok video is going to be by design, short, and obviously takes longer to film it. But what is the behind the scenes? What is the behind the scenes when you and your partner thinking, okay, is this something that is cute and funny that's appropriate for us to put out there, or is this something that's cute and funny?

00;14;54;22 - 00;15;06;04
Paul Sullivan
But maybe we should keep it private because, you know, you are a very successful influencer. But but first, you're a dad. So what does that, you know, conversation, internal dialog look like?

00;15;06;07 - 00;15;34;05
Barney Banks
You know, this is actually like quite a, you know, an important topic that's being spoken about, I think quite a lot on social media, especially surrounding family content creators that are on YouTube at the moment. Because, you know, the word like exploitation is kind of being thrown around a lot. When it comes to family content creators, I guess the way that I've always kind of looked at it is from the direction of this is content.

00;15;34;07 - 00;15;54;11
Barney Banks
That's I would still be doing the exact same thing if it wasn't if the if the camera wasn't there, I don't none of this content is forced. Not all of this content is just stuff that we do on a day to day basis as parents. I guess that's how this how I justify it, the kind of the content that I make, it's all feeding time.

00;15;54;11 - 00;16;22;13
Barney Banks
It's it's, you know, diaper changing, it's whatever. And I guess the primary focus of these videos, I guess I try to try to like, over 90% of the time, have the focal points of the content as being myself rather than my son. So it's like, I'm the entertainer. He's a byproduct of it. So it's like, yeah, I'm changing your diaper, but the entertainment factor is coming from me, and it's not just me filming him and going do something funny.

00;16;22;15 - 00;16;44;10
Barney Banks
I guess that for me, makes it makes the kind of the focal points of the content not all about, you know, my son and I want to protect him as much as I can anyway, like within his like in his early years. So we just try to make the content as much about us as opposed to just being singularly about him.

00;16;44;12 - 00;16;45;17
Barney Banks
Which caused me to say.

00;16;45;19 - 00;16;53;23
Paul Sullivan
Yeah, it makes sense because it makes sense because your audience is parents, your audience is not toddlers. You're not. Of course you want to relate to what you're doing.

00;16;53;26 - 00;17;14;04
Barney Banks
Yeah. And I feel like we we do a good job of that. And it also allows for the fact that, you know, maybe when he's older and if he just goes, you know what, I'm actually kind of sick and tired of recording stuff or like, I don't want to do any of this or something, then it's not going to be like, okay, we'll just cut everything out, or we'll just remove everything or the channel will just disappear.

00;17;14;04 - 00;17;22;15
Barney Banks
It's still just about me and Jamie because we, you know, agree that we'd like to continue making, like, parenting content with or without our kids.

00;17;22;17 - 00;17;25;15
Paul Sullivan
Yeah, but let's be honest, Brandon, I know you've got a.

00;17;25;18 - 00;17;26;15
Barney Banks
He's the star of the show.

00;17;26;15 - 00;17;29;27
Paul Sullivan
I know one of your one of your sponsors is Pampers, right?

00;17;29;29 - 00;17;30;24
Barney Banks
Yeah, yeah.

00;17;30;24 - 00;17;40;09
Paul Sullivan
That was a good mindset. I mean, what happens when like, or rocket is, like seven years old and he says, dad, for the love of God, will you potty train me? Come on, get it.

00;17;40;12 - 00;17;40;19
Barney Banks
Get it.

00;17;40;19 - 00;17;43;08
Paul Sullivan
Different sponsor. Dad. Come on.

00;17;43;10 - 00;18;02;03
Barney Banks
Tell me about it. It's very it's very interesting having, you know, a brand that has like a lifespan. Like there is a lifespan to it there. There is a cutoff point. Of course. And I think that for us, we're open with communication with everyone that we work with that, you know, there are boundaries that will be set to a degree.

00;18;02;09 - 00;18;22;28
Barney Banks
And then also, I think that the funny thing is, is we we have conversations with them and say, you know, what does the future look like? Because obviously you have, you know, night time diapers for kids who are potty trained but maybe still wet the bed. And then further beyond that, you've got wipes. And, you know, they're kind of they're well aware of it.

00;18;22;28 - 00;18;42;25
Barney Banks
And we are too. So I guess it's there is an element of future proofing that we try to do in terms of like, what does the future look like for this? But at the moment, you know, every everything is still fairly early stages. I would say we're only like, he's not even two years old. So we're just kind of rolling with it, to be honest, because, sponsors will come and go.

00;18;42;27 - 00;18;44;17
Barney Banks
I'm just kind of this is what it is.

00;18;44;23 - 00;18;59;04
Paul Sullivan
I'm having this picture in my mind. You know, every parent in the world, in the Western world uses Eminem's to potty train their child. They're small. They're really interesting. You're going to be give it, you're going to give this poor kid. Here are some brussel sprouts. How would you like some? Like, I'll give you a leaf of spinach.

00;18;59;05 - 00;19;00;08
Paul Sullivan
Oh, you don't want to go.

00;19;00;08 - 00;19;19;16
Barney Banks
Okay, let's back to the trip. Yeah, exactly. Yeah I see, funnily enough, you say that my mum helped potty train my my, my brother's kids and they were having, like, I wouldn't say difficulty with it, but, you know, it can be a bit of a battle to do it. And so my mum was like, are you going to let me do it my way?

00;19;19;18 - 00;19;29;29
Barney Banks
And my brother was like, okay, fine. And it was once a week for a number one, two weeks for a number two. And she was like, had them trained in three days done. I was like, okay, I might take that.

00;19;30;01 - 00;19;47;06
Paul Sullivan
I want to pause it here for people. I've been listening since the beginning because, we're talking about potty training. We're talking about changing diapers from a man who danced with Sir Elton John to this. For every parent out there, every dad out there, like, you know, we all go through changes in our lives, right? You know, we.

00;19;47;06 - 00;20;08;18
Barney Banks
Have all the time. Yeah. It's crazy, isn't it, like to think that, you know, one of my last ever dance jobs, I was dancing for Katy Perry and and then to think that only because I was 20, I think that, you know, six years later, my, my life career completely changed. Like at that point in my life, I didn't even know about esports either.

00;20;08;18 - 00;20;23;20
Barney Banks
When I was like 25, it was. And so but from the age of 26, 27 to kind of go, oh, that sounds fun, I'll go and do that. It's hilarious. If you have told 25 year old me what I'm doing right now, he'd go, you've been smoking something.

00;20;23;23 - 00;20;42;21
Paul Sullivan
You know, I think I I've got three kids, you know, three daughters. They're way past this stage. But each one was so very different. And I remember putting them to bed at night and, you know, one was, good sleeper, the other was the worst sleeper ever. And the other, the last one, I think, put herself to sleep on her own when she was like three weeks old.

00;20;42;21 - 00;20;59;16
Paul Sullivan
She just had this. But there'd be these moments when you're trying to get your child to sleep and you. You can't make any noise, you can't really listen to anything, but you can watch stuff and you can watch it on your phone and you can watch, you know, videos, like you're making a TikTok. And obviously lots of parents are doing that.

00;20;59;19 - 00;21;09;06
Paul Sullivan
What are the comments that you get from from people who are engaging with your, your content, you know, supportive ones obviously, but also, yeah, take it easy. I mean.

00;21;09;06 - 00;21;13;12
Barney Banks
I well, yeah, I mean, of course you want to hear about the bad ones. Of course we do.

00;21;13;14 - 00;21;17;22
Paul Sullivan
Bernie, you call that a diaper change? You know, what do you do? You don't know shit, man.

00;21;17;25 - 00;21;41;20
Barney Banks
Exactly. No, I will say 95% of the comments are always positive because ultimately, the goal of this content anyways is to just be positive and be entertaining and have fun. The 5% that aren't so much typically is just someone trying to get your attention or just, you know, pee on your parade. Essentially.

00;21;41;22 - 00;21;45;15
Paul Sullivan
Someone would not happy, which would not happen if they're wearing a diaper. They would not be.

00;21;45;17 - 00;22;06;16
Barney Banks
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I'll send some you away. Don't worry. On the house. Yeah. So some of them, we call them Karens in the comments. They, you know, it'll be you didn't pick them up correctly, or you shouldn't be feeding him that. You should have cut his food up small. And it's just all stuff like that.

00;22;06;16 - 00;22;36;02
Barney Banks
It's just people, you know, either deflecting onto you or just ultimately trying to get your attention. So it's not. I'd never take it seriously. I don't really get affected by the comments my partner gets affected by the more and so I just say to just stop reading them then because it's not going to matter. I do read the comments because I actually do like the constructive criticism that you have very occasionally get, which will be, oh, I'm the midwife, I've done this, this and this.

00;22;36;07 - 00;22;52;22
Barney Banks
I've noticed this. Have you checked this out? You know, whether or not if he has like a little rash on his leg or, you know, maybe you should try doing this when you do a diaper change. Because we found that using this ointment prevents x, Y, and Z. Yeah, I've, I found those comments really helpful. And I reply to them and say, thank you so much.

00;22;52;22 - 00;23;10;22
Barney Banks
We'll try it. So you find that, you know, parents are very vocal online, very vocal, because, you know, you're the I guess there is a supportive element to it. And there's also a bit of a know it all element to it of people going, oh, I've done this three times and I've got three daughters and I can tell you what to how to do it.

00;23;10;28 - 00;23;12;05
Paul Sullivan
Listen to me, Barney, I got to.

00;23;12;09 - 00;23;37;28
Barney Banks
Yeah, I know what, I know what I'm talking about. So yeah, that ultimately majority positive couple of negative one starting in the mix, of course. But nothing like the scary ones are the people that recognize us when we're on the streets or in the shops and go, I saw you at the supermarket today, and then you go, if you do come and say hi.

00;23;37;28 - 00;23;40;13
Barney Banks
Otherwise, I'm going to think this is really creepy next time.

00;23;40;13 - 00;23;41;27
Paul Sullivan
Yeah, just. Hey, how you doing?

00;23;42;00 - 00;23;45;00
Barney Banks
Yeah, just something.

00;23;45;02 - 00;24;09;23
Paul Sullivan
So good. Barney Banks, thank you for being my guest on the Company of Dads podcast. One final question for you. You know, as you do this, you've created a community. You're building something that's connecting with with parents. I don't wanna put too much pressure on you, but if you were, you know, those early years can be stressful.

00;24;09;23 - 00;24;24;02
Paul Sullivan
You know, you you found a way to bring humor and entertainment to it. What is what some bits of advice would you share, with our listeners who who maybe, you know, are having a little tougher go of it getting through this those early years.

00;24;24;04 - 00;24;51;24
Barney Banks
I think that, more and more often at the moment, I'm seeing, you know, how on social media some people have quotes or they have videos that are narrated by someone, you know, saying an inspirational, piece of text. And I think that so much that I come across is always about embracing the moments when your children are the youngest and, you know, they always end up saying something along the lines of, you know, you don't get those moments back.

00;24;51;27 - 00;25;14;04
Barney Banks
And then there will be a time when it is the last time you pick your kid up like there is a time and that time is on its way. And so for me, I know that humor and entertainment not only not only as a, you know, a career path. For myself, let's say it's also a coping mechanism for me.

00;25;14;07 - 00;25;38;18
Barney Banks
If I'm having a rough go at it or there's a rough few days, humor and detainment kind of picks me up out of that, out of that pocket. And I think that if you can find that and just don't take everything so seriously, we're in an age where everything online is taken extremely seriously and for the most part, for good cause.

00;25;38;20 - 00;26;04;05
Barney Banks
But I feel like we're losing, we're losing, kind of we're getting a bit out of touch with the entertaining, the humor and the enjoyment that comes with young kids. Don't fight against it. Like, go with it, because, yeah, you don't want to have an eight year old or a ten year old and think, oh, we should have.

00;26;04;05 - 00;26;27;15
Barney Banks
I wish I'd had more fun or, you know, had more of those good times when when we were younger. So I guess for me, I'm embracing as much of it as I can. It doesn't make it easy. It's there's still really tough moments, but, yeah, I'm I'm learning as well as everyone else. People turn to me like I'm an expert and honestly, I'm just trying to have fun as a dad.

00;26;27;17 - 00;26;33;26
Barney Banks
So, yeah, I guess don't take yourself too seriously and just enjoy these moments while you still can.

00;26;33;29 - 00;26;43;26
Paul Sullivan
That's a perfect last line. Just try to have fun as a dad on TikTok. I am Mr. Banks. Barney banks, thank you again for joining us on the Company of Dads podcast.

00;26;43;28 - 00;26;47;04
Barney Banks
Thanks so much for.

00;26;47;07 - 00;27;16;00
Paul Sullivan
Thank you for listening to the Company of Dad podcast. I also want to thank the people who make this podcast and everything else that we do with the company of dads. Possible hell, they're mirror, who is our audio producer. Lindsay Decker handles all of our social media. Terry Brennan, who's helping us with the newsletter and audience acquisition, Emily Servin, who is our web maestro, and of course, Evan Roosevelt, who is working side by side with me on many of the things that we do here at The Company of Dads.

00;27;16;00 - 00;27;30;08
Paul Sullivan
It's a great team. And we're we're just trying to bring you the best in fatherhood. Remember, the one stop shop for everything is our newsletter, the dad. Sign up at the Company of dads.com backslash. The dad. Thank you again for listening.