Fatherhood – Page 7 – Serenity Through Sweat

The Toddler Immune System

Cold and flu season is here in full swing, and my family is feeling the effects. Watching my son actively leave the playground so I can help him with is snot bubbles got me thinking about the toddler immune system, and then as my peculiar brain works, training.

I don’t care who you are, snot bubbles are funny, but they do lose some of their humor when your toddler’s mood and ability to listen to you start going down the drain. That said, he has been in good spirits and is soldiering through this iteration of the cold pretty well.

As I watched him play in the sand in between running over to me to wipe his nose on my sleeve (obviously the only place he doesn’t freak out to wipe his nose) I thought about how this is ultimately a good thing for him and will make him stronger.

Babies inherit certain immune protections from their mothers both in utero and through breast milk. After that, they are a relatively blank canvas and they need to build up their immunity through exposure. They are exposed to some sort of ailment, their body learns how to fight it, and then that knowledge and ability stays with them. So, in order to build a strong and robust immune system, they have to be exposed to a lot of things.

Building yourself as an athlete and as a person is really the same idea. You need to be exposed to a lot of different things in order to be strong and robust. This can mean trying new positions or techniques in BJJ or wrestling. Trying new lifts or lift variations when in the gym. Trying new activities that require a different skill set. Maybe you have a background in football and want to try archery. Maybe you have a background in power lifting and want to try yoga. The point is exposure to new activities, just like new germs, provides new opportunity to sure up our weaknesses and promote growth.

As we approach election season, the same idea applies emotionally and intellectually. Honestly and openly exposing yourself to new ideas is the only way to grow as a person. Even if you come out with the same opinion afterwards, you will have grown stronger from the exposure.

So try that new technique, read that new book, talk to that person from the other political party, because ultimately we are all better through exposure.

Thanks for joining me, and stay sweaty my friends.

Yesterday’s serenity through sweat, lift run shoot while El Duderino was down for his nap

Performing for the Family

The main focus behind this blog has been a mix of fitness and fatherhood, and how those two intertwine and intersect for me. Writing about fitness and fatherhood is something that I’m passionate about, but there are so many different approaches and levels, it’s sometimes difficult to know where to start. I hope that you can find similar intersections in your own lives regardless of your athletic pursuits or family situation.

Aragorn’s famous speech before the battle at the black gate. “I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me. A day may come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and break all bonds of fellowship, but it is not this day”.

First of all, if that doesn’t get you all jacked up to train I don’t know what will. Second, I can’t think of anything more motivating to be a better person than to be able to meet your family challenges head on and say “it is not this day that my strength gives out”

This week everyone in the house has been down with some sort of bug. El Duderino had a stomach bug and was vomiting all day Monday. My wife and I are both fighting colds, and with her being 32 weeks pregnant, no one is sleeping.

My wife got up early with El Duderino so that I could have some more melatonin assisted sleep this morning. Then he and I went to the library so that she could get a mid morning nap in.

It’s days like this where I appreciate my first and foremost athletic goal: be able to perform for the family. Being a father and a husband is its own ultra endurance event, and it requires lots of training. Every long run, every bike ride, every Jiu Jitsu roll, all of them have a specific purpose, but they also all serve the same global purpose.

From wrangling a squirming toddler, completing construction projects around the house, or even just soldiering through a day with a cold, performing for the family is an athletic event with constantly changing demands. This is always on the forefront of my mindset when I’m training (or working out). Everything I do should be making me better for my family, and I need to have enough left in the tank to perform for the family when I’m done.

The day will come when we are all tested by the rigors of our everyday lives. Getting into a regular training habit is crucial knowing these test days come around without notice.

Build yourselves a healthy routine of mind and body so that the next time you are struggling through a training session, struggling through a rough family day, or just plain struggling, you can find in yourself the courage and strength to say “not this day” and perform for your family.

Thanks for joining me and stay sweaty my friends.

Yesterday’s Serenity through Sweat a low impact ride and some long overdue time with my Tri bike Layla

Internal Dialogue

Thanks for joining me for another edition of the Serenity Through Sweat blog. Today I want to talk about our internal dialogue, or the types of messages we tell ourselves repeatedly.

I remember as a really young kid the toy that almost everyone had, or had used, was the Fisher Price See n Say. You pull the handle, the farmer spins around eventually landing on an animal, and says “the cow says… moo” or whatever animal it lands on.

This is a great toy for children’s early development. They can associate sights and sounds that go together, and there is some randomness as well as repetition.

Eventually children can remember the sounds that various animals make and reproduce them on command. After a few months my 2 year old son was able to list off the sounds of most common barnyard animals and that is pretty age appropriate and common.

As someone who works on the road, my family and I spend a lot of time on the phone. While this isn’t ideal it is far easier to have a relationship with your family while being away through things like cell phones and FaceTime than it was even a decade ago. Young children tend to model the behavior they see, and even before cell phones were around children have been pretending to answer the phone.

My son pretending the remote is a phone and answering it

To my son anything with buttons is a phone and can be held against his ear and he can have a conversation. I asked who he was talking to and he replied “Daddy”. It was now my picture up on the proverbial See N Say and I was curious what he would come up with when I asked, “what is daddy saying”. His response was “I love you”.

Now besides melting my heart a little bit and being absolutely adorable, this isn’t really a surprise. One of the most important things we can tell those close to us and especially our children is “I love you”. There are no guarantees in life and we only get one time around so I try to use the phrase early and often.

Now in his slightly more than two years on this planet, and slightly more than one of them being verbal, he has figured out that mommy and daddy’s message is “I love you”. That’s what he hears the most (despite the many repetions of “we get down feet first” and “we put our pee-pee on the potty”.

If you had to spin the See n Say and it landed on your picture, what would it say. What is the message that you tell yourself the most, your internal dialogue. For most of us, especially as we get older, I think it is easier and easier for that message to slip away from something positive.

Part of the journey towards Serenity is how we talk to ourselves. Are you encouraging yourself through one more set, one more roll, one last interval? Are you making yourself and your well being a priority? Or are you telling yourself that your diet isn’t important, your sleep isn’t important, your feelings aren’t important, or your time isn’t important.

This internal dialogue can be obvious and loud, even audible (if your a little zany and talk to yourself like me). But it can also be insidious and hide behind the scenes. Our internal dialogue reinforces the habits in our lives whether they are positive or negative.

Next time you spin the wheel and it lands on your picture, what are you going to tell yourself?

Thanks for joining me and stay sweaty my friends.

Today’s Serenity through Sweat, 5k stroller run ending with a trip to the playground

What I’m thankful for

Sometimes the things we are thankful for are hiding in the background, to be discovered and appreciated years later

With thanksgiving here I’m thinking about what I’m thankful for. I’m extremely blessed with a happy healthy family, friends that enrich my life, a job I enjoy, and hobbies I’m passionate about. There are other things in my life that I am grateful for that are less obvious that I maybe took for granted because they are in the background.

My son was playing with toolbox in my garage and I remembered where that toolbox came from. It was Christmas gift from my father when I was about eleven or twelve. As an eleven or twelve year old I wasn’t particularly enthused with a toolbox as a Christmas gift. In fact I wasn’t very enthused with it for a number of years. But when I moved off to college and had a decent tool set I was very grateful and realized the true value of that gift.

Likewise my parents gave me the tools as a young child to lead an active lifestyle, and for that I am eternally thankful. There were lots of outdoor activities, sports, hobbies, etc and none was ever pushed more than another, just the idea of being active. This mindset as a child and as I continued to grow has led me to a number of adventures that wouldn’t have been possible without a basic level of fitness. That mindset of an active lifestyle has always been in the background, and like the toolbox, it has taken me years to appreciate what a special gift it was.

Throwback Thursday to 1992 wrestling practice

Camping and trekking in Philmont New Mexico with my father and brother. Biking along the Alsace wine route after getting engaged to my wife. Exploring temples and hiking in Thailand and Cambodia on my honeymoon, training for and completing an Ironman with a good friend. These experiences have all helped shape me as a person, a father, and a husband, and are all rooted in interpersonal relationships and athletic adventure.

A hilly day on the bike with my wife between Riquewihr and Ribeauvillé enroute to Obernai

Lots of steps on the way to this gorgeous view with my wife in Angthong National Marine Park Thialand

There are so many life changing experiences out there, but a lot of them require you to walk, climb, swim or sweat to reap the rewards. This is a gift I’m grateful for, and a gift I hope to pass on to my children, even if it takes them many years to appreciate it. What are you thankful for that’s hiding in the background?

Thanks for joining me on the journey towards Serenity. Stay sweaty my friends.

Father son Thanksgiving turkey trot 5k on the way to the playground

Today’s journey towards Serenity through Sweat

Pushing with purpose

The development and progression of my two year old son fascinates me and forces me to reexamine my understanding of behavior. He has developed a keen liking to the word “show”, and a habit of pushing on the baby gate that safe guards my TV and sound system. When pushing doesn’t work he stomps his feet and pulls. Until recently this was nothing a little talking and explaining couldn’t solve. And then he got big enough and strong enough to pull the gate down.

Watching this was a validation to me that the gate should be there, if it wasn’t, he would have unfettered access to all those buttons and knobs that toddlers love to play with, and would certainly wreak some sort of havoc and destruction on my sound system. But, as is often the case, the wisdom of my better half prevailed and the gate stayed down.

The impressive thing was my son didn’t go turn every knob to eleven, but sat back (further away from the TV than normal) and watched his show. He was pushing on the baby gate because that is the natural reaction to the barrier, and once it was down there was no more need to push. He was pushing without a purpose.

In a grappling context often times we push our opponent to set up a reaction. For most people if you push them, they push back, and we are counting on that reaction to set up a technique. However, if you’ve trained BJJ or wrestling for any length of time you have probably found yourself in a glorified shoving match rather than a productive training roll. I push you, so you push back. You push me, so I push back. We do this dance, reacting to each other for five minutes or so and then change partners without any knowledge gained or technique applied. It’s easy to find ourselves in the same situation as my son, pushing without a purpose.

Next time you train and you find yourself in a grappling shoving match try to visualize your technique beyond the push. The same goes for training in any sport, hammering out reps or pounding the pavement without an endgame is pushing yourself without a purpose. Keeping the goal in mind be it short term or long term is crucial to success. The purpose could be your first takedown on a tough opponent, finishing a triangle choke, or getting on the podium at a tournament. It might be your first 5k or it might be an ironman PR. It might even be just to feel a little bit better after a workout you didn’t want to do. Whatever it is, pushing with a purpose in mind will always yield better results.

Thanks for joining me on the journey towards Serenity, stay sweaty my friends.