The Father Factor Podcast
The Father Factor Podcast
with Byron Ricks, Joshua Warmbrodt, and Brandon Ricks
What happens when fatherhood leaves a void—or when it shows up with strength, wisdom, and love?
Join Byron Ricks, author of Searching for Dad: The Nine Side Effects of Growing Up Fatherless and How to Overcome Them, alongside co-hosts Joshua Warmbrodt and Brandon Ricks, for honest, transformative conversations about fatherhood, identity, healing, and legacy.
Whether you’re navigating life without a father, striving to become the father you never had, or raising a child impacted by fatherlessness—this podcast is for you.
With real stories, research-backed insight, and heartfelt wisdom, The Father Factor Podcast creates space for growth, understanding, and redemption. Because no matter where you start, healing is possible—and legacy can be rewritten.
The Father Factor Podcast
Being a Stay-at-Home Dad STILL TABOO? The Unspoken Truth About Modern Fatherhood
In this powerful episode of The Father Factor, host Byron Ricks is joined by Josh Warmbrodt and Brandon C. Ricks to unpack the often-ignored stigma surrounding stay-at-home dads. Through personal stories, statistics, and cultural critique, the conversation challenges traditional gender roles, dives deep into fatherhood, and redefines what it truly means to provide and be present. Whether you're a full-time working dad or considering staying home, this discussion is for you. Discover the emotional, social, and developmental benefits of involved fatherhood, and how proximity, presence, and purpose redefine masculinity.
#father #stayathomedads #modernfatherhood #masculinityredefined #fatherhood #parenting #dadwork #fatherscount #parenting
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And even now, with my wife and my son and my daughter, I always see us as a team. Maybe I should have saw myself more as a breadwinner, if you will, but I never saw myself as a breadwinner. I saw my wife and I as two people on a team that had roles to play. All right, hello everyone, welcome to the Father Factor. Why? Because fathers count. Remember dads. All your the Father Factor. Why? Because fathers count, remember dads. All your kids are equally yours. You may be divorced, you may have remarried. If you have four kids by two different women, all four of those kids are equally yours. Today on the Father Factor, riding with me is my co-host, josh Wombrot, and my son, brandon. No B, b, Just B.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we can just be B. Yeah, well, you know my face is all over the internet now, so you might as well just go ahead and say who I am. A quick Google image search will just reveal that Brandon Christopher Ricks. If I'm your son, and see, why do you have to say my middle name?
Speaker 1:all out loud like that the full government name.
Speaker 2:I mean, goodness, gracious man, you're going to say the whole government name.
Speaker 1:I think that's a beautiful name. You know what I mean. Goodness gracious.
Speaker 2:But if you're Byron Ricks and I'm your son, I mean they're going to figure out who I am.
Speaker 1:So I can't really hide from them. A guy in the office building that I office out of his daughter just had and she named his baby Chosen Chosen Knight. Yeah, chosen Knight, is that the middle name or the last name? Knight is the middle name. I can't remember the last name. I'm glad I can't, because I don't want to put it out there like that yeah, yeah, yeah Well you put my name out there, so why not the kid?
Speaker 2:Well, your face is out there, the kid's only when we go, let that kid be out Today, though.
Speaker 1:we have an interesting topic today, gentlemen, because this topic goes against the grain of the norm, ie father working, mom staying at home, and I don't think that's just in America, I think that's worldwide.
Speaker 3:right Goes against the grain.
Speaker 1:Well, I don't know.
Speaker 2:That's a good question, right? No, I would say so. You think so. Yeah, well, you're probably right.
Speaker 1:I mean a lot of those other countries, right the father is, traditionally the father works, right, you know, and mom stays home, takes care of the house, takes care of kids and that, whereas today we're going to talk about stay-at-home dads and the stigma that that carries. I didn't realize until we did the research on this subject that that carries that kind of stigma. Realize until we did the research on this subject that that carries that kind of stigma. Oh, big stigma. But I do remember this when we lived in the big house, I always called it. We used to live in the big house before we downsized.
Speaker 2:It sounded like it was like a plantation or something. Let's just say we lived in the big house when we were living in we done got to move on out. We had to move on down to that big house down there. I never thought about it like that. Yeah, that's all right, I don't know man.
Speaker 1:Because it's bigger than the house we are in now, because we downsized and some people might think prison you know, oh yeah, no, no, the big house is not prison. What's wrong with you people? What kind of? What's your mindset? Well you know, prison before really your cousin's up okay prison.
Speaker 3:You tell me about the plantation, plantation, what's wrong? Hey, man, we got a lot of okay, okay, a lot of pain.
Speaker 1:Okay, the house we used to live in was a larger home and we had no kids. We downsized. But when we first moved there we met a couple and this couple, she was a doctor and he was a stay-at-home dad, and he and I connected because I thought nothing of it in that we talked about building a house. It was a neighborhood of custom homes and we commented them on their home and he was the general contractor. He found the builder and he did all the general contracting, the layout, the blueprints. I mean he was involved in the whole process and he did a great job and he helped his wife go back to school and she finished medical school and became a doctor and he said it was better for her to finish and me to stay at home and keep the kids and she had a medical practice that was thriving, you know, and I thought it was fine. I mean I thought nothing of it.
Speaker 1:But other husbands in the neighborhood would tease him and I thought that was odd that they teased him, because in my world, growing up, even though I grew up without a father in my life, I grew up with my mom and I grew up with this team aspect. Does that make sense. And even now, with my wife and my son and my daughter, I always see us as a team. I never saw and this might be some of the problems I've had too I'm not in my marriage in that maybe I should have saw myself more as a breadwinner, if you will, but I never saw myself as a breadwinner. I saw my wife and I as two people on a team that had roles to play. Yeah Right, and so I think that's what's happening here. When men stay at home, I think that that's a role to play, and they graciously step into it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, I think it's a tough role to step into because I know it's not something I would choose. Well, I can't, and I guess Well, it's easy.
Speaker 1:All you got to do is wash clothes and.
Speaker 3:Well, no doubt, no doubt.
Speaker 1:Like deal with the kids. You don't have to play politics.
Speaker 3:But Well, I don't know. But at the same time, the real question I would myself is if money wasn't a factor, okay, how many more stay-at-home fathers would?
Speaker 1:there be, you know, if they had more than enough. You know, I don't think that has anything to do with it.
Speaker 3:But that's my point is, is that a lot of times people, the stigma is you're letting your wife take care of you right, and that's what a lot of people hear so you're just gonna let your wife take care of you. You're not going to provide for your family. That's one of the things is. I talked to a guy recently who was a stay at home father as well. He was moving up doing well in the construction industry, but his wife was in the military. They met while she's in military. She well, she ended up getting stationed elsewhere. They had to move, so he had to leave his job. They had a young child that has special needs and then they end up getting pregnant again. So, her being active in the military, they've left him at home with the kids. That was their choice. He says it brings him so much joy and purpose and so much.
Speaker 1:Well, what are the advantages of staying at home as a dad?
Speaker 2:I don't know. Well, hold on. I think that we first have to break down the stigma. First, what's associated with the stigma. That's what we need to address, and then we can kind of dive into, you know, what are the practical applications of it. Does it make sense?
Speaker 2:But the stigma I think is associated with what Josh is alluding to is the idea that has been, you know, across all cultures and society, that the man is responsible for you know, you mentioned it being the breadwinner. What that essentially means is being the primary provider of sustenance, home, you know, nutrition, all those things. That is what the man is responsible Anything that has to do with resources. The man is responsible for acquiring those things. The man is responsible for acquiring those things. So the stigma exists around the fact that, if the roles are reversed, it is now the woman who is in the primary role of providing all of the resources from a financial perspective, and the man is now taking care of what is associated with nurturing and caregiving, which has always been a female's role.
Speaker 2:That's where the stigma exists. The reason why the guys in your neighborhood were teasing him was for that reason, no other reason than that, because if you look at where you lived in the big house. Okay, that is a certain socioeconomic area, all right of a certain you know median household income upper middle class area area where the predominant majority of individuals in that subdivision, in that environment, are high net worth men. They are high net worth, high profile. You know the top, you know 10 percent of men in terms of income earners, 10% of men in terms of income earners. And so seeing a man in that environment who's allowing their wife to be, that is what is the genesis of the teasing.
Speaker 1:That's the reality. But I think you see that in lower socioeconomic neighborhoods If the man is at home and the wife is working.
Speaker 2:I would beg to differ. I think that you're predominantly going to see that dynamic in more middle class affluent environments where the wife is able to earn. Because let's just be, let's just the economics of it. The economics of it suggest that in order for a man to stay home, the wife has to be generating enough revenue to to to cover the overhead and the expenses of the household. So that this, I don't know how we can even debate that.
Speaker 1:Well, we can, because a man could be at home or a woman could be working. She could be a nurse and she could still be making $80,000 or $50,000 a year, and they'd just be getting by If she's making $80,000 to $85,000 a year.
Speaker 2:That is considered middle class in American society. She could be making $50,000.
Speaker 1:She could have four kids. They could have five kids.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's not a lot of money, but those are outliers If we're looking at— I looked at the stats on some of this right.
Speaker 3:They say 40% of stay-at-home dad households are within poverty.
Speaker 1:Okay, so that's what I'm saying.
Speaker 3:Only 40%.
Speaker 2:Only 40%. Okay, so that means the majority of them are not Right.
Speaker 1:OK, but my argument was simply that they're they're looked at the same way.
Speaker 2:Whether they are or not, they still will be teased by other men yeah, and my premise is still the same is that the reason they're being teased is because the stigma about provision of resources Right, but you also.
Speaker 1:you, but you predicated that on the upper middle class. It's because they were in that class.
Speaker 2:I was providing an example of why the men in that neighborhood were teasing him, okay.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, no, I'm just saying that 40%, so 60% don't. So 40%. I guess are struggling Question. Could you be a?
Speaker 1:stay-at-home dad. Could I be Right or would I want to be? No, no, no. Could you be a stay-at-home dad? Could I be Right or would I want to be? No, no, no. Could you be? Well, of course I could Well of course you could, I'm capable.
Speaker 3:Okay, but what would be the challenge for you? The challenge for me would be boredom. I enjoy producing and working, so wives get bored.
Speaker 1:Do stay-at-home moms. They don't get bored.
Speaker 3:I think that there's different interests and I think it also depends on the level of affluence, Because a stay-at-home mom that has more than enough to go to spin class the mommy in class, all of that stuff.
Speaker 1:Okay, so if you could do those things, if you could go work out, you can go to the gym, you can go play golf. So you mean, I just live my life and I'm just Well, you should not take care of the kids.
Speaker 3:You're staying on bed.
Speaker 1:Can you do that?
Speaker 3:Could I? Yes, I could.
Speaker 2:How about you, brandon? No, not at all, because I don't you could not do that. No, absolutely not, Because Because my purpose for existing on the earth is not rooted in comfort and pleasure. My purpose is rooted in skills and abilities that God has given me and I'm tasked to use those gifts and talents, but as a stay-at-home father you couldn't do those things.
Speaker 1:Once you took care of the kids in the house.
Speaker 2:Well then, that would mean that I would be then having a job. What job? Well because if my gifts and talents are to lead, teach and build, then I would be leading, which is work. I'd be teaching, which is work I'd be building, which is work, but you wouldn't. Okay, so in what scenario can I even envision where I would be leading a team or teaching?
Speaker 1:or building A non-profit situation, so it could be volunteers.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but even in non-profits at a 501c3, if you're working 20, 30, 40 hours, you're going to be compensated for the work that you're doing, unless you're only doing volunteer work. Well, that's what I said. You volunteer, yeah, but in the capacity for me personally, ok, my purpose is is rooted in a lot more than volunteer work.
Speaker 2:So it would be impossible for me to to live out my purpose on the earth while I'm as a stay at home. Yeah, that would. That would not work for my dynamic Right now. For Josh's friend, that may work very well. I have, I have a colleague of mine on the topic. We all seem to have different examples work very well. I have a colleague of mine since we're on the topic, we all seem to have different examples.
Speaker 2:I have a colleague and friend of mine, phenomenal writer, phenomenal author. He and I worked together at a previous organization and he just kind of talked about this issue that we are talking about now that he felt that the Lord was telling him to go back to school and he struggled with that because that means and his wife's agency is doing well, she's making money, things are going well in that regard and he was really having a hard time with what do you mean go back to school? Like I have to take care of financial resources and for my family, and he was wrestling with that and he really felt like God was telling him no, you need to go back to school because I want you to do some certain things. And he did not want to do that. And then he had a discussion with his wife. His wife was like no, you should. You should do this. We're fine economically. But he struggled with that and it's because it is innate in us to be providers, right? So I think that the reason why your friend feels a sense of fulfillment is because he's still providing. Yeah, right, his purpose now, especially if he's got a special needs child, is that that is a full time job unto itself, you know.
Speaker 2:So the question is can you set aside your individual ambition as a man in favor of your wife's goals and aspirations? That's really where the pride thing comes in, that most men are either going to be chastised for or they're going to struggle themselves with saying my wife's job, her goals and career aspirations are advancing and progressing in a way that is providing our family with a sense of economic stability. That is providing our family with a sense of economic stability, and I am willing to make a sacrifice for my own career goals and progressions in order so that she can advance and I'll take care of the kids. Well, see, I had to do that. So my question I had to do that? Well, yeah, so then why don't you talk about your experience then?
Speaker 3:No, but go ahead, you got something. No, I'm just saying my question with that is like when you say, can you be a stay-at-home dad, right, I mean, there's no rules, I'll circle back to that. Right, there's no rules If I can handle what I need to handle and still be me right, which means that I'm going to accomplish something I want to. But the other thing I ask is what happens after the kids hit school age? Does dad go back to work? Because a lot of times moms don't, right, they're just ready to prepare the house for the kids. So that's really for me it's another piece of it.
Speaker 3:You stay at home down with little littles, or you stay at home dad, you know you got middle school and high schoolers right. So I think it also has that as a perspective, because when you say, could I? Yeah, I could. I probably wouldn't want to, though I have acted as such in essence and I don't want to take away from my wife, but meaning summer times, with the career I had, I was able to office from home, I could set my schedule in a way that I could still be tending to the kids around the kids, but I still was accomplishing my goals, my revenue, all the things that I needed All right.
Speaker 1:So stay-at-home dad takes on a different multiple meanings.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:You could be a working dad Right a working stay-at-home dad. Working from home.
Speaker 3:Working from home. Maybe he has a business that's passive. You've got people that have YouTube channels, right. So if he puts in 10 hours of work a week and still can provide, but he gets to spend that other 30 hours that he would be in the office otherwise, how does that fit into the stigma? Because, going back to the stigma, one of the things that I pulled up men say that they're often approached and say, oh, are you babysitting for today? And it's not called parenting for a dad, it's called babysitting. And then they find out, oh, you're, oh, and even women, you can't babysit your own child.
Speaker 2:That's crazy.
Speaker 3:Oh, that's what my wife tries to tell me but I've done it. You know what I'm saying. I babysit my children all the time.
Speaker 2:No, like I can't babysit my own, it's my child.
Speaker 3:Like what are you talking about.
Speaker 2:That's crazy, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:That's crazy. Something about a man giving up his no, I said.
Speaker 2:You are choosing to relinquish your career goals and aspirations in favor of your wives, for whatever period of time.
Speaker 1:If they're like you mentioned.
Speaker 2:If they're small children in the house, right well right, and I did that.
Speaker 1:When, when uh flo and I got married at the time I didn't have a degree, she did I went back to school. She was working, she had advanced in her career. Brandon came along, you know, we couldn't find a babysitter. It was tough. We had Kenya and she was advanced Again in her career. She kept getting promotions and it caused her to have to travel. And so we sat down and said, well, wait a minute, somebody got to keep these kids, yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:And I ended up getting a job, going to school in Irvine, where we lived at the time Irvine, california and I had to get off at a certain time because I had to go get Brandon. I had to be there. When he got home, I had to be there. When Kenyon got home, I had to go get Brandon. I had to be there. When he got home, I had to be there. When Kenyon got home, I had to cook dinner. Sometimes my wife would be in New York, sometimes she'd be here, sometimes she'd be there. But she and I did sit down and say what's best for this family? Yeah, you know, yeah, yeah, and what was best for the family at that time was for me to take on a stay-at-home well more active role with the kids, even though I worked full-time. Right, right, right.
Speaker 3:And.
Speaker 1:I went to school full-time. But you had to make it work within the schedule, but I had to make it work within that schedule.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I remember that I spent far more time with my father than my mother in early childhood, for sure, and that, honestly, I think slowed even some of my mother and I's relationship in terms of that bonding, because I spent far more time with my dad than I did with my mom. And it speaks to one of the stats here that we have. Yeah, go ahead, in married couple households with children, 31% have a stay-at-home parent. Of those, roughly 5.6 million are moms and 1.6 million are dads. Right, so there's still even this one stat here from as of 2023, 18% of stay-at-home parents in the US are dads, up from 10% in 1989. That's a very slow progression. That's not a very large jump.
Speaker 2:Again, what that tells me is that, innately okay, men are going to be inclined to be the primary financial providers of the household and they are expected to do so. And even in situations where the man is not married to a wife, the courts always put the man on child support almost 85 to 90 percent of the time. You never see a woman be put on child support, hardly ever. Okay, even when a man is broke broke, he's still paying child support. They make a work at mcdonald's and it is assumed that the woman is going to be the nurturer of that child and the man is going to go to work quote unquote and provide.
Speaker 2:And I and I think what you're speaking to alludes to the team dynamic aspect that you mentioned earlier is that when you have a strong team dynamic and there's camaraderie, you're on the same page. Then you can have that kind of environment. What I see happens in modern society is that women are insulting men that have more of a nurturing bent to them or have a desire, or they're more capable or able to do some of those day-to-day tasks and functions that a woman would be more inclined to do. They tend to be looked down upon because they are not quote-unquote career earners.
Speaker 3:Well, you saying that? Here's a stat off of that it says because of what you're saying, it says 57% of stay-at-home dads report feeling societal pressures or judgment.
Speaker 1:because of that Exactly, but also what you said. You think that you were closer to me than your mom or your relationship with her. I think it was Okay, Because she wasn't there as often as I was. Well, it says here that fathers that chose to stay at home intentionally had a much better bonding experience with the kids reshaping their view of masculinity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think so, and so you know from what I saw you talk about this, right, like there are fathers in the household when there are active fathers in the household, right, and so I had a good example of that, so I was able to model that. So you know, I'm with my kids all the time. I'm. I'm at all of their events, predominantly all of them, unless I have to travel or something like that. I'm with them in the morning, I'm with them in the evening. In fact, when I go out of town, they're bothered by it. They're like how long are you going to be gone? When are you, when are you coming back? Right, they don't even like me to be gone for extended periods of time, because I've already set a precedent that I'm going to be there, and you know. So I do think that that is a positive aspect of quote unquote, the stay at home, dad.
Speaker 2:But you know, from as we kind of go into the kind of the cultural bias and misunderstanding here, for me I don't think there's ever going to be a time where you're going to see it flip to where it's majority.
Speaker 2:You know, in that regard, that's never going to be the case. I think that, again, we are intrinsically wired and designed to build things and to provide wired and designed to build things and to provide. So even in the seasons where you chose to say, okay, I'm going to let my wife advance her career, there was still, from my vantage point, a passion that I saw that was suppressed Okay, that you chose to suppress for a period of time in order for the greater good of the family. And when you were able, when I got older and you were able to actually have the time to do that and I didn't require the same care and attention you did that and then you excelled in that right. So I think that men are designed to live out their calling and purpose and I don't, I don't believe that that is in the primary role of a nurturer in perpetuity.
Speaker 3:No, I get that. One thing I want to point or just say right is, if we go all the way back when before, society is what it is, Right, let's use the farm example, Family farm. Let's use the farm example, family farm. Dad is working on his land, which means he is in proximity of the home to an extent, Though mom might be inside with the kids. Primarily right that dad is still accessible. That's a good point, actually. And so when we got to the place where dad was being removed from the property, that's good. We got to the place where dad was being removed from the property, that's good. Then we started to see more. I think mom take on even more nurturing.
Speaker 2:That's good actually.
Speaker 3:I think that, realistically, at a certain age, mom's going to be like alright, go out there and help your father, and so they're going to get some of that man time, right they're going to get some of that, and when the kid's like man, I guess you won't be holding the flashlight back then. Well you're holding the flashlight right. Go in there and get your mother right. There's probably some sort of volleying between parents within that.
Speaker 1:That's good.
Speaker 3:So nowadays we're going against. We don't know what the true percentages are, the natural nature of how the dynamic is supposed to be.
Speaker 2:You know, percentages are the natural nature of of how the dynamics supposed to be. You know, it's interesting that you say that that's actually a good point. I, I didn't consider that there. You saw this. Uh, also too.
Speaker 2:Environment you can probably speak to this from the let's call the 40s through the 70s, that time period where you had, you know, black women were essentially raising white children, yeah, right, okay, husbands were leaving the house.
Speaker 2:The Western European descendant white women, okay, were going out into the city doing whatever they were going to do, being socialites, okay, exactly, and the black mothers were raising white children, okay, in that household and having that kind of that cover there, and you had a lot of different society in those times.
Speaker 2:Well, unfortunately, those black mothers were not present with their black children, right, so they're raising white children while not present in the home. So now you have the father and the mother leaving the house and the black kids are by themselves, right, and it creates the latchkey kid, you know, kind of dynamic, right? And so I do think that we talked about it in our earlier podcast the importance of presence, right, okay, being present, not just being productive, and I think that's the same thing is that we have chosen economic gain, yeah, okay, over family growth. Yep, and that's a part of the problem where we've had to have the stay-at-home dad because both parents both want their career goals and aspirations, both parents want to be top earners and now we leave daycares and babysitters to raise our children. So now we have the necessity of fathers now to have to stay at home.
Speaker 3:Well, add in the cost of child care nowadays. I remember talking to a guy where they had to make the decision. His wife made slightly more than him, similar, but they were putting all of their money into childcare. They were literally just paying for the kids to be raised by somebody else. So they decided all right, you need to come home for now, try to find something better than I have. Right, and I'll come home and try to find. So it's the team effort of what we see. But the other part of this is, in this economic system that we're in, it's not the same as going out and killing a buffalo right yeah so, and when you talk about lower economic classes, right, you know you're told where to be and what to do.
Speaker 3:And so your kids. I remember when, when we were young professionals so we had kids young my daughter's first day of school it's still a contention point which my wife told me to take a picture. I said okay, and I forgot, until she's running up the steps of the bus, so I got like part of her backpack and her turning and uh, because I had to get to work, the bus was late. I'm stressing'm stressing out like, oh my God, I'm going to get fired. So I didn't have the time to enjoy my child by the fear of losing what was going to pay for me to take care of the house, right, and how many parents are in that situation because they're stuck in survival in the system, right?
Speaker 1:Right. I think that's where the idea of work-life home balance came from. Right, like when I was working back in the day, you couldn't use your kid as an excuse for anything. You know that would be a reason to be written up or lose your job, whereas today in the workplace, you can say hey, my kid has X, y and Z and a lot of companies will allow you time to go do whatever that is you need to do.
Speaker 3:I would say it really depends on what your role is in the company, because if you're a customer service rep and you've got to man those phones, you're going to have to find something to cover.
Speaker 2:That's what you're saying to an extent. But if you are in sales or something you have more.
Speaker 3:But if you are, in sales or something you have more.
Speaker 1:And that's what I say is that if you're going to be a competitive employer in this workplace and work-life balance is what's important then you're going to have to conform?
Speaker 2:I do think, yeah, the trajectory is changing. I see what you're saying. There are certain roles. There are certain roles but yes, if you're looking at things on a curve right then we have. We have kind of course corrected more towards prioritizing family priorities as as opposed to, you know, three or four decades ago right you know, in the 70s and 80s, when when Byron is referring to in that time period you could get fired. You know, you had to just figure it out which is.
Speaker 3:That said, the question is what was the stay-at-home mother rate to working father? Right, I guess a better way to say that. What was the rate the stats of? Was it two parents working back then, or was it one parent? Because if dad's going to work and mom is at home the majority of the time, right then, that would be a terrible excuse my kid needs something. Isn't your wife at home?
Speaker 1:Well, if the wife was at home, that's true. That mostly came about when wives went into the workplace.
Speaker 2:Yes, exactly Okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, and in fact Flo can speak to this. I mean, she has talked about this many times when she was a single mom with Kenya, mm-hmm, and she was just terrified of what in fact our relationship blossomed because I filled that void for her when she needed somebody to pick up Kenya.
Speaker 3:So I guess, I want to clarify with this question. So back then, when you say there was less grace for a single mother than there is now, yes, because nowadays my perspective is I see, single mothers being glorified.
Speaker 2:Oh, it is being glorified. No, no, no, he's 100% right. Nowadays he's saying Nowadays are glorified.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying you guys are wrong or right and I've heard this from a single dad too. This is just new to me.
Speaker 3:That's all.
Speaker 1:I've heard a single dad say this Single moms being glorified is new to me, Though I've seen that oh yeah. Because, it's like I have to do this myself.
Speaker 3:Who's?
Speaker 2:glorifying this Media society culture I mean how many it has gotten so bad To my kids and I. Now we'll sit down and watch movies or show and 90% of the content that we watch has some situation where the father is incompetent, he's divorced, not with the kids. The mother has the kids, she's raising kids by herself. It's like the majority of the shows. It's like a badge of honor to be a single mother, to be this independent woman. I don't need no man kind of mentality. I'm raising my kids by myself. I gotta stop watching game shows, that's a sign of age.
Speaker 1:You know what?
Speaker 2:Listen you just should be glad that you've been married for 47 years and you're not out here having to deal with this.
Speaker 3:The timing right before. So look at TV, let's just look at TV, and I'll go to like the 90s. Let's just use the 90s, like you had quality tv programming, family matters right. They had even step by step talking about blended families. Uh, boy meets world. Most of those shows had a two-parent household other than step by step brought that in right. So you're talking about these, but then you insert the simpsons family guy, guy Malcolm, in the Middle. Any of these shows where the dad's just a babbling idiot or a drunk Married with children, married with children, all of a sudden they started like let's make fun of dad, make him look incompetent, and those shows exploded.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then it became now dad is not even there, At least it was. You know, Al Bunny was still there all the time, Hand in pants, and then it was like there's no dad even there now.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know. So now you have this environment to where women are being honestly bamboozled and hoodwinked by feminism to believe that they don't need a man for anything. That, as we, as we kind of circle back to the subject matter of fathers in the home and stay at home dads, this stigma that's on these men that are making this decision. They are not being praised and rewarded for choosing the growth and progression of their family over career goals. They're being chastised for being beta males and that is a part of what contributes to the shame that you mentioned in terms of the stats that you read that 50% of the stay-at-home dads report feeling societal pressure or judgment as a result. But Byron can we.
Speaker 1:I want to read this one passage in the research that we've done. It says being present in the home doesn't diminish a father's strength. It demonstrates it. Masculinity is not measured by income alone, but by time invested Right.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, 100%, absolutely. I mean. Again, I had the opportunity, and you know privilege, of growing up in the burbs and I saw a lot of men from friends and associates, kids that I grew up around who lived in really big houses and I would go to their houses and I would always be like where's your dad? And he was never there. He was always on a business trip, always working somewhere. Dad was never around. And those kids, man, they had a bunch of stuff, you know. The dad gave them things. I would go, I like going to their house because they had everything you know, but they were unhappy, see, my daughter said something to me about that.
Speaker 3:She brought this up to me. This is when she was going to Westlake, which you know, like minimum it's two mil, I think to buy a house there. So these kids is balling Well the parents are balling Kids is balling too, because they ain't never home.
Speaker 3:So, here, kid, but anyway, anyway she'd go there. And one of her friends, she said that you never see the dad. And if you did see the dad, you see him passing through, right, just you know, walk through, hey, and go on to his own. And then she also said that, um, not just that, right, dad, dad's here. But one of her good friends was jealous because, dang, your dad takes you to school, he picks you up, he's around, you talk to your dad about everything. And that's all she wanted was just I just want to work out with my dad, because he likes to work out alone. So you wanted to work out with him was the only thing she wanted. But then the other part was other than those kids was, and I think let's go back to another episode we did too is when you have that level of affluence and you can have somebody to watch after the kid with no problem.
Speaker 1:It's not just dad that's not at home. My daughter said Mom and dad are out together. Yeah, that speaks to what Brandon was saying earlier about having our kids raised by others, others TV.
Speaker 1:But I have a friend in New York whose daughter is doing well and her husband have two kids and this boy was just. They was having all kind of problems with him. And I was talking to her and I said, well, what does the father say? She said, oh, you know, he's never home. I said, well, that's the problem, yep. And she said what do you think? I said, no, I'm telling you that that's the problem. And then you know and I'm not talking about your, your, I'm not talking about your daughter but if the boy's father is never home, and then she says, well, they provide everything for him, he has to. No, no, no, no, no, it doesn't have his father at home.
Speaker 1:And when I wrote the book, I gave her the book, she read the book, she gave the book to her daughter. Her daughter said, wow, I never thought that he was missing his father. We thought all is acting out. And guess what? When the father got back into that boy's life, guess what happened? He straightened out. Yeah, he calmed down. He calmed down absolutely. But he wasn't able to articulate let's not talk about that in my book. Uh, the nine sound effects growing up fatherless. One of them is the void that void you feel inside you don't? It's not talk about that in my book, the Nine Side Effects of Growing Up Fawful it's. One of them is the void that void you feel inside.
Speaker 1:You don't really know what it is.
Speaker 3:sometimes or you can't articulate what it is, because it's not our role as a child to know what the void is. It's the dad's role, the father's role to be in that void, or really not even that void to be there. So there is no void, exactly. And so if he's not there and the child is used to that, they're not going to know that they're in a deficit.
Speaker 1:They're going to fill that void Drugs, pornography, alcohol, rage, rage. It's going to be filled.
Speaker 3:There was a person you're talking about, who you told me that their child, even as an adult, has struggled this life. Anger can't get right whatever, and they have both parents, they had both parents Right. So when we look at what you're saying because a lot of times if you do have a I know who, we know who the dad is right, oh, dad's dad. In that case, the dad lived there. Right, the dad lived there but was traveling all the time. Right, because, well, he lives here, we're together, we're a family, but if dad's never physically, there, then he's not invested.
Speaker 3:Yeah it's like you said, if you could have a dad that, like al bundy, he comes home after selling shoes all day and sits on the couch and doesn't want to be bothered, so he's emotionally unavailable. So there's still going to be some sort of lack for a child.
Speaker 1:Another thing on these TV shows. I guess the reason I started watching game shows I didn't pay as much attention to the dad factor as I did to the smart-ass kid factor.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know all these kids pop off to their parents. You know they need laughter. I don't know if it's a laugh track or what have you, but then you get the laugh track.
Speaker 3:Yeah, bart Simpson tells his daddy eat my shorts.
Speaker 1:You know, it's like it just bothers me.
Speaker 2:So, as we kind of transition now into this impact on the children right, as we kind of transition now into this impact on the children right, as we go back to this stay-at-home dad and I think that we got into this we talked about the negative impact of the father not being present, but the positive side of it we talked about that presence is so important and there's one of the stats here that we have you know from. The impact on children is that children with involved fathers are two times more likely to attend college and 75 percent less likely to experience teen pregnancy. These children also show stronger language skills, better emotional regulation and higher confidence. So I think that you know the benefit of having a father that's more present and active, whether they're I think that the point is whether they're a stay-at-home dad.
Speaker 3:quote quote, unquote or however you want to define that I think what you're saying is stay at home dad or not, but stay at home dad just gives proximity, right? Yeah, exactly, so that's easier to see, I think, the impact it has because he's always there.
Speaker 2:So I think the lesson for those that are listening and watching is that if you're a man listening to this, that you know, if you are in a dynamic where you are having to make a decision based on economics and there's an opportunity for your, for your wife, and you have a you know, a dual household income, find ways to be more present. You know, prioritize the growth of the family, because one of the things that I think that we don't think about is that your children are our legacy. You know there's there's a weird thing to where I feel like there's a competition that happens between parents and children, like I want my kids to be greater than me.
Speaker 1:Yeah for sure.
Speaker 2:I think there's parents out there that don't actually want that Like they. They want their kids to be maybe as good as them, but they don't want them to be greater. And if you want their kids to be maybe as good as them, but they don't want them to be greater, and if you want your kids to be greater than you, then you have to spend time and pour into them, right? But all you're thinking about is your own goals, your own aspirations, your own career, your own growth, and you want to mask and disguise the outdoing for the family. You're lying to yourself. You are just making excuses because you don't want to do the hard thing, and the hard thing sometimes is having less money and having less disposable discretionary income and spending more time, because the kids don't care about the money. As you mentioned, you know, the young boy right Is that you got these kids that? Yeah, well, I provided all these things. I provided vacations, I provided clothes and cars. The kids. I want time.
Speaker 3:We've done everything for you. I just want to work out with you.
Speaker 2:I just want to spend time with you. We could be broke, okay, and have time, and the kid would have been the wiser.
Speaker 1:Right, You've got to bond with your kid, Because I mean think about that.
Speaker 3:If dad died, regardless of what the money was, the child's impacted.
Speaker 1:Right, of course, but if dad's there and the book, and we talked about the bond and I was asking the question of people what was your favorite or most fondest memory of your dad? I was talking to mostly men then again, because I was focused on boys growing up with our fathers. Again, today we focus on girls and boys, but then it was boy research and what do you think the number one thing boys see that they enjoy doing with their fathers?
Speaker 3:Just riding with them.
Speaker 1:Playing catch, playing catch, playing catch, whether it be the baseball or football, throwing it back and forth.
Speaker 3:They said that was just so much fun. It's interaction.
Speaker 1:I thought, wow, and I remember Brendan and I used to play catch all the time. And I remember Brendan and I used to play catch all the time, right, and I would throw the ball way up in the air, but I want to.
Speaker 3:I think you said something a minute ago that ties right into this is that we talk a lot about the stigma. You know, 57% of men are stay-at-home. Dads are feeling depressed, isolated, falling into corporate not corporate, just people's stigma.
Speaker 1:57% of stay-at-home dads report feeling societal pressure or judgment Right.
Speaker 3:Right. So but think about the backing, because I talked to this guy, adam, and hopefully we can have Adam as a guest on this TV because he's in another state but he talked about what he gets to do with his kids with such passion. Who Now they such passion? Who Now they're little? Who, adam, he's a stay-at-home dad. Okay Now, I did a lot of research trying to find this and I primarily found negativity about this. However, I found a couple things out there. One a mom said you know, you say what you want, but when I come home and see this, my heart melts. You know you say what you want, but when I come home and see this, my heart melts. Dad had created a whole what do you call it? A tunnel, like a blanket fort, all the way around, the whole kitchen you could crawl around, and all that stuff, because Dad had time to kick with the kids. So they built a big blanket fort.
Speaker 1:Dad, uh, also, mom wouldn't tend to do that anyway.
Speaker 2:No, oh no, they're thinking about the mess. Yeah, exactly, the other part is is dad.
Speaker 3:A stay-at-home dad said well, you know, if I was working full-time, I don't have time to build this. It was a treehouse, right. So there are different levels, like you said a stay-at-home dad and impact. But you think about the fun, the catch. How many times do you have to pay catch? You know the sleepovers and the what you call it, the treehouse that they get to think for the rest of their life. My dad built me this. There's so many amazing things about dad being in proximity, whether you stay at home or not stay at home or how you define stay at home, but there's so many great things that a lot of kids miss out on, including what they say spontaneity. Moms are less spontaneous with that stuff, whereas dads will likely let you make a chocolate mud cake or build a fort.
Speaker 2:So there are good things as well. It's a sense of adventure, adventure.
Speaker 1:There's a word A couple quotes I want to read here. It says a dad shared this is a quote. Well, I'm making it not a quote, but a dad shared how his daily rhythm packing lunches, doing crafts, showing up made his daughter feel seen and safe. One father said I've learned more about my kids in these quiet days than I ever knew. Working 60 hours a week yeah, you get to bond with your kids and it's Absolutely.
Speaker 3:When I took Jelena to school, because when she was going there, it was a few years where there was no bus service, nothing you had to pick up, drop off, and it was beyond frustrating for me because I was in outside sales and I had to completely restructure my entire day to ensure that I could still hit numbers, really exceed numbers and be there. And I remember at first I had such a bad attitude about it, like, this is not productive, I could be making more money, I'm limiting my earnings. All of that, however, my daughter started to share, just because she was so used to me being there that it took a while. But then on the way to school, it's either we listen to music, we're talking, or she's letting it all happen. Vroom, pick her up. How was school? Fine, or well, actually.
Speaker 3:Then it led from that to remember how I told you about this. This is what's going on. What are your thoughts on this? How should I handle that? Or how should my friend handle this? Oh, wow, so it started with fine and now I have credibility, right. Oh wow, so it started with fine and now I have credibility. And so I could look at the earnings and, oh, I could have set extra amount of appointments or whatever. However, I couldn't go back and re-raise my daughter and to this day we have an unspoken closeness, even though we might butt heads and all that. But there's a level of authenticity. If I say, just tell me what's really real, she's going to let me know it's good, and I think that came from proximity or bond or time, which is this teaching point?
Speaker 1:Children don't need perfection, they need proximity. A father's day-to-day involvement shapes their confidence and character. Yep, and that's what you just talked about, right?
Speaker 3:I'm doing that with my son. No, I don't take him to school. He has to go with me to Lowe's or Ace Hardware or to Leslie's, you know, for some you know salt for the pool or whatever, because I want him to go with me. So he's in proximity of me and as he's getting older he sees how me as a man interact with other men, women, just people, right. How do I talk to the wait staff? How do I deal with the shopkeeper? He's seeing how men interact, just like if he goes with his mom. He can see how women interact. But oftentimes we send the kids with Mom. Just go to the store with your mom, go do this. But how often do we take them to the hardware store? Because they're going to slow us down. They're going to ask for a hundred thousand things.
Speaker 1:I used to love taking my kids with me, though.
Speaker 3:See.
Speaker 1:I do too, everywhere. To an extent I used to love doing them. In fact I had to my grandkids. Let's go they don't want to go though. Unless, I'm going to take them to get something to eat.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and they got expensive taste.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you gotta go with your kids, man. If we're gonna eat there, they're gonna go. They're a true suburbanite Home.
Speaker 1:Depot or Lowe's? Oh, no, what you mean? They got a hot dog vendor right outside the back door. Oh, no.
Speaker 2:So, byron, I think that what I've learned first of all, this is great. I think what I've really learned from this is that the presence of the father is penultimate. Whether they're classified or categorized as a stay-at-home dad or not to me is not what's relevant. It's in the understanding that, as men, we have to be actively participating in the rearing of the children. Absolutely, that's not solely a female responsibility. No, that's not solely a female responsibility. The nurture aspect of it may lean more towards the mother, but we are an important part of the growth and maturation of a child and for us to be more actively involved, no matter where we are in our career, growth and path, is extremely important and we have to prioritize that over economic gain, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I would venture out to say a father's role is more important.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:I just upset some people, but I've had more people talk about challenges with their father than their mother. I've seen people don't like their mother. That happens, don't get me wrong, but you know four or five out of six people.
Speaker 1:Well, there's a lot of grace from mom there is. But even fathers who people who grew up with their father in the household somehow don't connect with the father like they do with the mom. So the father has to be intentional about connecting. But sometimes fathers have these prima donna, kingly attitudes in the house. They are the man of the house and they're the king. How many times have you heard people say I've never heard my father say I love you.
Speaker 2:That's an odd thing to me, I'll be honest. We had one guest that talked about that he'd never heard Harvey. That's an odd thing. I asked my son the other day. I said do you know I love you? He said absolutely. I said why do you know that? He said you tell me every day. So that's a drastic difference between a man who grew up his entire life and heard his father say I love you once. Yeah, getting rid of not just stigmas around masculinity well, no, I would say getting rid of stigmas around masculinity includes things like expressions of love, verbal expressions and also time and attention, see my son left to go to the park yesterday I'm talking about walked across the street to the park to play basketball and he said I love you bye.
Speaker 3:You're not leaving the neighborhood. I didn't say that, but if I could think about like, you ain't even leaving the neighborhood, you're basically going to the front yard. What do you mean? Love you bye.
Speaker 1:But you raised him.
Speaker 2:But that's because that's so present.
Speaker 1:He knows it and he feels it. It's funny I had Azariah in the car once and he was getting on my nerves and I said you know what I'm going to put you out and make you walk home? He said no, you're not. I said what makes you think I'm going to put you out? He said because you love me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's already ingrained, he already knows, he knows that I can identify the calf. But if you said that to a child.
Speaker 3:Let's use a kid that may have been tossed around from foster homes or whatever, and you said something like that he might be like oh dang, okay, I might get put out. Because they don't have that reassurance that information? It wasn't ingrained. What was ingrained was different. So it really does show what you pour into your kids, especially very young, right. And then fathers are are nurturing too right. And I'll use an example.
Speaker 3:Um, because we as people overreact, underreact I've seen my wife get so mad that she gives the most unrealistic consequence and I'm like really, like you know, you can't ground him for a year, right, for that, Like you know, you'd lose your phone for a whole year. Maybe let's bring it back to reality, right? And he's all oh, because she's saying what she feels, not what she means. So I can go in there when she may overreact. I'm just using it as an example and build him up, because if he's been basically undressed, beat down, told about himself but wasn't affirmed, then I got to go in there and affirm him because I recognize okay, you just took a big L and maybe a little bit larger than you should have, so let me come and love you and nurture you back, in the same way that my wife will have to do that with me at times because, like you said, sometimes they get on our nerves. But I think that's the thing is. A misconception is that fathers don't nurture.
Speaker 1:Which brings us to my next point. Actually, stay-at-home fathering, when intentional and engaged, helps children learn both structure and softness, preparing them for real life. If you're at home, own it with pride. If you're working, don't outsource presence. Wow, how about that? Don't outsource presence right. One meaningful moment a day can change your child's life. A concluding statement Stay-at-home dads are not less, they are more present. They are challenging tradition and modeling that fatherhood is a calling, not just a contribution. That's good.
Speaker 3:No, that's good. So in the reverse of that, right. So we've talked about the father. That's there with what you just said. But if he's not, how would this play into the side effects? What a side effect of the coming up fatherless or having an absentee father does this fall into? Because I know that it's OK. What do you ask? The side effects? Right, you say delayed maturity. Ok, so those that may have less presence or proximity excuse the word proximity, less proximity to dad? In essence, your book is saying that there could be a delayed level of maturity, correct?
Speaker 1:Well, yeah, yeah, I had a delayed level of maturity because I didn't have access to a man and what men did and how men interacted every day. You know, I remember my oldest grandson, my oldest grandson. He said I don't know if I want to tell that story, but let me just say it like this If you have a dog, an old dog, and you get a puppy and you raise that old dog and that puppy together, what happens to that puppy? How does it mature?
Speaker 2:Oh, it matures faster because it learns from the old dog. It learns from the old dog.
Speaker 1:So when you don't have that parent, there could be a mother as well. I got a niece who doesn't have a mother. I remember when my daughter became of age, my wife was in New York and she became of age and she said, Dad, thank God she had a mother, but what if she had not had a mother? And she asked me what would I do with this? Oh Lord, how do I handle that?
Speaker 3:So yeah, I want to recover myself. Huh, I have a great parenting fail with that that I'll share another time.
Speaker 1:Right, but I'm just saying so, yes, without that other parent, maturity can be delayed because you don't have the experiential fact there. Right, yeah, that's good. Okay, all right, all right, you've been listening to the Father Factor why? Because fathers count. I'm your host, byron Ricks. Thank you, josh, thank you, brandon, for the day. I appreciate you guys. Both you helped make it happen. Remember, all of you are listening to all dads.
