 Michael Vance – Show Notes        Michael is a technical writer for a software company based in Houston, Texas, and he’s the dad of a 2.5 -year old boy who is the light of his life. Michael also volunteers with an afterschool program called Five Star Life, which teaches and encourages middle school students to embody the principles of courage, responsibility, integrity, sacrifice and respect. He is the co-host of the Better Father, Husband, Man podcast.         Michael says he volunteers with children in middle school because that’s often the age when they start going off track in terms of alcohol and drug use, among other problems.         “We want to encourage them to be leaders and examples in their homes”         The Five Star Life program has been in existence for about 10 years, beginning in Indiana.         Michael and his wife are intercultural, with her being from Nigeria, which he says in part makes him a Diversity Dad. They blend their cultures together and discuss how they want to raise their son.         “To take the best of both of these worlds and kind of meld them together”        As well, his life experiences of living in some unique places has giving him a unique perspective of the world.         He has his son interact with other people and his wife is teaching him her native language. Michael is a big believer of introducing his son to music from other cultures.         Seeing what his son is going to “latch on to” and become involved in is what has Michael most excited.        “I’m just excited to see him grow and take ownership of what he wants to do with his life”         He’s most proud of seeing his son play the drums and practice, as well as the first time he held his son.         “It was humbling to hold him and realize he was my responsibility”         As a father, Michael tries to stand up to the standard his father set for him.         His biggest obstacle has been learning to sacrifice things, which was difficult because there are certain things he still wants to do.         “He needs to interact with me. I need to interact with him.”        The bonding relationship between father and son actually starts right away and you can miss out on so much when you neglect your children.         One piece of advice Michael can give is to embrace the role of fatherhood.         “Fatherhood is an awesome responsibility, and we play a critical role in the lives of our children”         INTERVIEW LINKS:         www.BetterHFM.com         www.Twitter.com/Better_HFM        https://www.facebook.com/betterhfm/?fref=ts        BetterHFM@Gmail.com 

Episode #33 – Michael Vance | Better Father, Husband, Man

The Diversity Dad podcast showcases everyday dads with unique stories of triumph and overcoming life's challenges. We want to support dads regardless of their parenting situation whether dealing with toddlers, teens, divorce, separation, or adoption. Diversity Dad is focused to “buck conventionally” and celebrate doing fatherhood differently. We are all diversity dads.

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Kellen Coleman will share with us the amazing knowledge and wisdom he has been collecting through his fatherhood journey. Father of two little girls and owner of a PR and consulting firm and the publishing house known as Formenky Publishing, author of the LONDON & SYDNEY EXPLORE THE WORLD: TEXAS children’s book and co-author of other books, and being the primary caregiver to his kids Kellen will show us in a very practical way how to juggle so many hats and still do a great job.

Episode #53 - Kellen Coleman - How to juggle so many hats and still do a great job

Today we will learn a lot from Charles Jackson’s history. Learning how to put family first and how to deal with divorce and the distance from his kids. A big cautionary tale that will certainly make better fathers out of all of us diversity dads.  “I am involved in their social media that my kids are on, the Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat. I see those as the tools for me to keep a constant connection. It was a blended parenting watching because I wasn’t there every day, I’m not there to hear the small conversations but to really monitor what my children are posting, what are their thoughts, what are they responding to that may be an influence up there and try to understand that but to also pick up the habits of using these tools. I snapchat the goofy faces to my kids just to kind of keep that connection with them. It is constant communication.” From using social media to shorten the distance from our children to the importance of keeping in touch and keeping constant contact when we dads are far away, Charles will share some of his struggles and lessons learned from living far away from his children.  “For me is when I hear them overcome the objectives they have, I look at my youngest and right now the focus for her has been school. We will talk about her classes and she will talk about how hard her classes are but she will say “you know dad, I got flash cards” or “I put this app on my phone to overcome Spanish” or “Science is really difficult, but I am looking at some youtube videos to help me understand things”. I think that is the proudest moment because I feel like that is what we are here to do, we teach our kids how to deal with life as it comes. For her to have that smartness to say “I am going to go look at other resources” that is my chemistry, so I feel like that is my child right there.” We have had other divorced dads on our show and the message is still the same, a message that is still very powerful to any dad out there, make sure that the environment when things get bad don’t impact the kids in a negative way. Charles Jackson will reinforce that message from his very own perspective. “It was very challenging, divorces can be complicated. One of the things that we didn’t want to do was make sure that the kids were mixed into those complications. Being able to get up there and see them on a regular basis and going through some of the things at the time, financially it wasn’t permissible at times. A trip up there, gas, hotel, doing things with the kids because I wasn’t going go up there and just have them sit in a hotel room with me all day but to do things with them it took money that sometimes I didn’t have. It was difficult. It was difficult at the beginning to try to see my children on a regular basis as much as I wanted to.” We hope that Charles Jackson’s history teaches you as much or even more than it taught us. And inspires us to go to the next level and become better dads, and parents, tomorrow than we were yesterday.   OTHER QUOTES:  “I used to get those questions at the beginning. Probably the first couple of years after the divorce, you know “why am I away”. The situation was that my wife moved away and then it would be the question “why didn’t you follow” or I would get the comment from other men, black, white, other cultures, who would make comments about “I would always be by my children”, I mean, it was a hard pill for me to swallow at the time but I knew the environment that it would create, being as close as I was to my ex at the time and I didn’t want my children to be part of that environment. There was still a lot of negative feelings and negative impulses from the divorce that I didn’t want my children to be victim to. So I felt that the distance was something that was best suited and I would just have to put in a lot of the extra work to try and keep that connection with my kids.” “Probably the biggest one is just not putting work first for a lot of years in my daughters young age and during my first marriage, I put work first a lot because I felt that career an money was the foundation of stabilizing our family and making sure that the roof was over our heads and the lights were on and things of that nature. I took some real hard knocks in life to understand that it was more about me first. I had to learn to really balance that out. To make sure that the kids were taken care of first. I didn’t see that growing up. I didn’t have a family environment where I see God, Family, and Career in the household. So I didn’t know what that looked like. I missed a lot of opportunities with the kids, I was there for some key moments, the first bike ride, letting them go, watch them take those pedals, there is a lot of memories I cherish, but there was a lot of opportunities that I recognise I missed because I stayed in work late, or because I took shifts I didn’t need to take.” “I think you have to create a discipline. For me it was a discipline. I didn’t have the kind of job where I physically brought work home. I didn’t have to log into a computer when I got home and do extra work that way. That was definitely some saving grace, but I carried enough of a responsibility as a store manager to bring it mentally home and think about things that I needed to do tomorrow most of the night. So it was really messing me up. It was messing my whole family dynamics up. My children would have homework, I am helping them but they are not getting my full attention and I am not understanding where I am not being as helpful where I am so the minute the transition happens everything felt more in line. I was better at math and helping them with the math homework, my wife at the time, she was better at the grammar piece. I think when you let work be where it is at, being at home 100%, I mean 100%, can’t be 90%, can’t be 80%. It is very magical and you become a different kind of man, you become a better father at home.”       LINKS: FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/charles.m.jacksoniii INSTAGRAM @3cjackson https://www.instagram.com/3cjackson/     “Let’s learn together. Let’s grow together. Let’s be dads together. Peace.”  

Episode #52 - Charles Jackson | Learning how to put family first

We hope you get inspired to let it loose and have some fun after today’s episode with Robert Douglas. We hope you get inspired to slowly stop taking everything so seriously and focus on the present, focus on the good you have now, focus on being a fun parent and having fun. This is what Mr. Douglas will teach us on his interview today.    “Don’t take everything so seriously, that one piece of advice I would give because you will stress yourself out, being a parent is a big deal anyway, bringing a life into the world, being responsible for a life, it is a massive deal, but don’t think of that in that context because it will stress you out and you will not enjoy and not cherish the moments with your children. So don’t take everything so seriously is probably one of the best pieces of advice I could give.” His story and words are certain to bring out the fun inside ourselves once again and let it shine. Let it shine through the way we love our children and through the way we love our families. Robert will teach us how to ground ourselves on the present and enjoy the moments and the little things once again.    “We have talked about recognizing stages, recognize stages of your children and enjoy what they do when they do it. Don’t expect them to be someone else, don’t wish their life away by thinking “I wish they could hurry up and walk” or “I wish they could grow up and move out” or whatever it might be, don’t wish that time away, cherish it, express your love because that is all that they will see.” Most importantly the constant reminder we keep getting on this show to be there and be present. To spend the time to not only raise but also grow with our children. We hope that today’s episode change yours, your children’s and your family life for the better just as it did with us despite all of the obstacles and challenges that will keep showing up on every moment but that will cat as reminders that it was worth it.  OTHER QUOTES: “When we had our son, 4 years ago, we brought him into a home which was filled of laughter and filled of fun. We made sure that we took that time with him, that we were always laughing around him, that he saw that life isn’t so serious. (…) We make sure my son is laughing all the time, we make sure that he is having fun because you mentioned earlier that they pick up on everything that you do so if they see us having fun, if they see us laughing, if they see us not putting barriers in the way all the time then that is how they are kind of grow up.” “I think the most exciting thing for me is living life through their eyes. Seeing that amazement at things, the simple things that now I take for granted. Just recently we went to a safari park and we saw animals and to me animals are animals, I have seen them many times but to him, to see his amazement when he saw the lions or when he saw all the penguins, or when he got to hold a snake. Seeing his amazement, his wide eyes and his big smile, that is what is most exciting for me.” “It goes so quickly, especially, I found, in the first few years of their life, they go from crying and sleeping to walking and talking in what feels like days. It is a few years but they go so quickly and you forget those times and like you say, you need to stop him and cherish those times.”  “The biggest obstacle that I have is actually dealing with the various stages of childhood and dealing with my son in the situation that he is in or the stage that he is going through because what went from an always cute little toddler and baby has grown into a 4 years old boy with his own, his own will, his strong will pushing boundaries.”  “Quite often there was a story behind the pictures and over time I used to forget what went behind the picture and it used to just become a picture. So I would have thousands of pictures on my iPhone and I got to the stage where my iPhone kept telling me that there was not enough storage on my phone so I had to delete some pictures.”   LINKS: http://thisfatherlife.com/ INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/this_father_life/ @this_father_life     “Let’s learn together. Let’s grow together. Let’s be dads together. Peace.”  

Episode #51 - Robert Douglas | How to ground ourselves on the present

Billy Yalowitz will share some of his great insight and vision on fatherhood. Became a father at 55 years old Billy leads workshops on parenting and fatherhood, helping parents from all around to network and connect, helping break the age old culture that fathers and men in general have no feelings or deep connections especially with other men and fathers. “I love introducing Zevi to the world. I love being with her. She discovers it on her own and I come with her. I love the parts and the ideas that I can show to her. But it is the relationship and the unfolding of the relationship. I like to think of Zevi as my contemporary.” From his inspiring and beautiful relationship with his daughter we learn once again that fatherhood is much more than just providing and protecting. It is also exposing and guiding, it is an active role in the family and in the raising of the children.   “Find another father and get really close to him. Find another father, or two or three other fathers that you can create regular play dates with and that you can turn to for support, that you can listen to each other about what is going well and what is hard about fathering and develop your network of other fathers to be close to.” He made his mission to teach parents through his workshops that networking and connecting with other parents is a key point in learning and growing as people and parents. He takes to heart the old saying that it takes a village to raise a child and takes it to another level from all of his own experience with his fathering project. It is amazing to listen how this project came together and the great things they have achieved so far. “It is like a daily practice that is a kind of a recovery practice. Any parent knows it is physically taxing work. Whether you are in the paid labor force or not. And for stay at home parents, stay at home moms and stay at home dads that is very physically and emotionally and intellectually challenging work. So how do we recover? How do we do that?” Tighten your seat belts and prepare for an amazing interview that will take your fathering skills to a whole new level and change yours and your family life for the better.     OTHER QUOTES: “There is this daily struggle at the society that does not recognize parenting as such an important job. I see it as a job. Some of the women who ave been my mentors for decades have for a long time said that the work of giving care, parenting, teaching, the maintenance of the home, domestic work are all kinds of labor that are completely undervalued in the society.” “It is like a daily practice that is a kind of a recovery practice. Any parent knows it is physically taxing work. Whether you are in the paid labor force or not. And for stay at home parents, stay at home moms and stay at home dads that is very physically and emotionally and intellectually challenging work. So how do we recover? How do we do that?”  “If you are on a heterosexual relationship particularly, notice the effect of the difficulty of parenting on you and your co parent, you and your female partner. Because I have noticed for me for sure and around the dads that I am close to that with the challenges of parenting the relationship with our female partners takes a really hard hit and we are more apt to act out in ways towards them in the moments of stress and challenge and fear than we might have been before.” “For a while I didn’t know what to do as an artist. I really wanted to keep Zevi, that is my daughter, central in my life and I was aware that work and specially the kind of work I do which is very encompassing and could take me away for periods of time, I wanted to change that, I wanted to keep my family and my daughter really central.” “Virtually all men I know in this society and other societies that I am familiar with that we are systematically separated from our children and that process of our socialization as males I think begins at birth, in the uterus. We get treated differently. I think males get dehumanized in how we grow up as boys. We are kept from our own feelings, we are kept from really close affectionate contact with other boys and with everybody.” “For me part of the work of fathering, apart of the opportunity there is I need to keep up with myself and I need to draw in further support from other adults whether they are parents, whether they are female or male. I have to challenge my own isolation every step of the way because when I am in close contact in good relationships where I can really talk and feel what I need to feel and have people listen to me and I listen to them then I show up in much better shape for Zevi.”     LINKS: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/billy.yalowitz   “Let’s learn together. Let’s grow together. Let’s be dads together. Peace.”  

Episode #50 - Billy Yalowitz | Great insight and Vision on Fatherhood

Jeffrey Cheatham, single father and kids books author will share some of the life lessons about fatherhood he has learned the hard way and has been sharing through his books on today’s episode of the Diversity Dad Podcast. From finding his passion and calling on authoring books for children to raising his young girl the best he can we will go through some of the challenges and beautiful moments that Jeffrey has to share with us today. “My daughter teaches me things. As a parent we all go through things where we get super upset with our kid because they keep forgetting to twist on a cap of a drink in the refrigerator and it keeps spilling over, and then we learn a lesson of patience. Or the lessons of comunication. The lessons of understanding, because this is a child that we have to guide in the world.” From many things we will be reminded that fatherhood is something that we learn and not something that we should be good at straight from the start. Being humble and patient is a big part of that big learning process. “You got to make sure that your foundation is strong enough so that way you can help someone else. This kinda goes in anything where you can’t help people if you can’t help yourself. It doesn’t do any good for your child if you are not okay but you are trying to make sure that your child is okay. It means digging a bigger hole than the one you started with.” Jeffrey will also teach us a lot from his humility. About being humble enough to admit our flaws and mistakes, learn from them and move on. Something we need to be reminded of sometimes on an hourly basis. “It is all about growing. And also from my perspective living life and making mistakes, the journey in that is fun because you get to learn something new, and I really enjoy learning new things all the time.” Most important of all, Jeffrey will teach us to have fun on this long and difficult journey that fatherhood is. He will inspire us with his joy for challenging himself and for learning new things whenever possible and taking the best of it. “Make fatherhood fun.” We hope that you get out of this episode feeling the passion and strengh towards the betterment of yourself and  achievement of your goals, inspired by Jeffrey’s journey just as we did. OTHER QUOTES: “What makes me a diversity dad is the fact that I am not too proud to admit my mistakes as far as when it comes to raising my kid. Because my whole purpose in life right now is to make sure that my daughter becomes the best person that she can be.” “I’m not afraid to admit my flaws, but I am willing to give 100% to life in order to develop something greater for my kid to grow up in. And also, I am not afraid to work with others if the common objective is to create a better way of living for our kids and our kids kids, if that makes any sense.” “The thing that stands out to me the most is the fact that my daughter always asks questions about everything. And that makes me proud because that means she wants to learn. And that does my heart good.” “She will ask me what’s the next story is going to be about or who is going to be the next character of the story and then I explain it to her in a way and stuff like that. It just depends on what she is curious about. She will ask me because I always tell her always ask questions, if you don’t know, ask.”   LINKS: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jlcheatham2/ INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/jay_elcheatham2/     “Let’s learn together. Let’s grow together. Let’s be dads together. Peace.”

Episode #33 – Michael Vance | Better Father, Husband, Man

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