I thought I’d stick with the religious theme that we’ve been looking at this week. It turns out the by far the largest population of Dad’s that have taken the survey are Christians and the next largest population is Jews. I’m not surprised by the numbers here although I wonder how they’ll play out in the end. I’ve received a few more responses this week that are not included in the data displayed here but a number of the respondents claimed not to believe in God at all. I happened to notice that one of the men lived in Californian and I decided to see if there was any correlation between where they live and their lack of belief in a God.

All the men who took the survey and responded with – “I don’t believe in God” live in the Canada, Georgia, California or Florida. It turns out I was wrong that they would all live in California. Another correlation I looked at was party affiliation. Interestingly the party affiliation seem to be entirely independent of religion.

Here is today’s graph:

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Yesterday we reviewed participant results thus far related to religion. After I finished the post a new question related to religion and belief systems hit me and I wanted to ask the community for their feedback. This question will likely be asked when we proceed to the interview phase of this project but I’d love to get some feedback now.

How is your belief system similar to your parents and How does it differ?

My personal belief system is similar in many ways to my parents but it differs significantly as well. Neither of my parents truly understand why I would blog and that is just the beginning. I believe in taking risks but both my parents fear risk. I like and embrace change my parents are less comfortable with it. Religiously and Politically I have similar beliefs to my parents. I also think I have more of a positive view of life than they do but I’m not sure if that is just a factor of age.

Please share your thoughts on the topic.

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Religion is supposed to be one of those topics you stay away from in public conversation but being a DADvocate isn’t public conversation. It’s about teaching your children your values and belief system. I’m sure there are folks out there who believe you shouldn’t teach your kids your own belief system but I have to say I’m not one of them.  I think eventually everyone goes through a personal introspection to decide what their own personal belief system is. But children need a belief system provided to them. At the very least the belief system provides them something to judge thoughts against. At it’s best a belief system helps them live a better life and provides direction in dark times. I personally fall into the largest category above. Religon services as a guide in our house for raising our children.

Since the picture is a little blurry here are at the categories from top to bottom.

We don’t believe in God

Religion and God rarely enter our parenting thought process

We teach our children to believe in God but don’t rely on religion

Our religion serves as our guide

Our parenting philosophy comes from religion.

So what do you think? Do you believe it’s good for a child to have a belief system?

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We just changed insurance providers again at work. This is both good and bad. Today we learned that Haley will receive 60 therapy visits per year which is awesome the previous provider only provided 24. But we also learned that the our in network co pay is $50 per visit. This isn’t a big deal when we have the supplemental insurance provided by Medicaid with the deeming waiver but if we were to lose the waiver we could have a mountain of expenses. I’m specifically concerned about this summer when we take on the operation and post op therapy. Haley will have daily therapy this summer after the operation. So we would owe $350/week if we lost the waiver. That would be scary. Hopefully the waiver will renew.

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We are going to start weekly contests for participants of the DADvocate survey. This week’s winner will receive a $10 Amazon Gift card. All participants that complete the survey this week will also be entered into the grand prize drawing for the iPad. Feel free to read more about the grand prize drawing.

The survey is a total of 60 questions that are asked over 9 pages. It takes about 15 minutes to complete the survey. We only accept one entrant per participant.

The DADvocate Project is and effort to define this generation of Dads and how we differ from our parents. Our experiences, our parent’s experiences, and the world have shaped who we are and how we approach parenting. The DADvocate project consists of three phases:

1. The Survey – this is an in-depth look at who you are and what you do. We discuss how much time you spend in the various areas of life including, family, finances, work, physical fitness and much more. We are publishing survey results as we go. You can read about the survey results in various posts on this blog.
2. Interviews – The interviews will be the second phase of the DADvocate project. Interviews will go in-depth with some of the participants of the DADvocate survey. We will talk about experiences growing up, College, and work. We will ask about the best moments you have had with your children and how you spend your time trying to be the best dad you can be.
3. Book – The final part of the DADvocate project will be a published book that tells the story of who we (dads) are and why we give all we give to being a parent, how that includes our work and our responsibilities to our wives and ourselves.

I hope you decide to join us. We certainly would love to have your input and can’t complete the project without you.

Best regards and go be the best DADvocate you can be,
Kevin

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It was family dance at Haley’s school tonight. So as soon as I got home from work it was time to go. We decided it would be too much to take Isaac with us so Mel stayed home with him and I took the girls. We had fun. They served the Varsity for dinner. If you’re from GA you know what the Varsity is. If you don’t live in GA the Varsity is basically your original fast food grease pit – they sell burgers, hot dogs, fries and ring. They also sell fried pies and an orange sherbet type slush. They are famous here in GA and if you eat that type of food you have to try it when you come to town.

The dance it self was fun until Abby decided it was too loud for her and wanted to leave. Haley showed some remarkable maturity and asked what we should do. A family friend was there and I asked her to watch Haley while I took Abby out. This doesn’t sound like much and for most kids it probably isn’t but Haley is always a bit concerned about those types of situations since she never knows who might bump into her and knock her over. She often would choose to stay with me instead of with her friends just so she doesn’t have to take that risk. Today she didn’t even think about it. She encouraged me to take Abby out and re-assured me that she would be okay. It made me happy to know she’s got it going on.

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Well I’m more amazed every day by how much dads do. I honestly have no idea how we fit it all in. We are one hustling bunch of guys and we are Crushing it in both our personal lives and work lives.

Today’s question is how much do dads read? Check out this graph. We read a lot and somehow find the time. I suspect this chart isn’t only relevant to dads I imagine it’s pretty reflective of all men in the population. As you can see we do spend time reading.

Any guesses as to where men are while reading? I’m betting the throne.

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Today was interesting. I got feedback from two locations about the DADvocate Survey. One of the folks was very helpful and offered a suggestion that I break out the survey so there is an initial short Survey and then a second longer survey. It is possible that I go this route but I have a number of factors that may prohibit that change in direction at this time.

The second piece of feed back I got was that the survey was Spamy. I suspect that I got that feedback because of the personal detail I ask on the Survey. I’m sorry if any of the personal detail offends your sensibilities. This survey is however intended to provide insight into who you are as a DAD and what you do, therefore we ask many personal questions. Almost all the questions give you the option to say I don’t care to answer.

Now that I’ve said all that I’ll be posting a video about the survey here in the morning.

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My daughter is in first grade and she is six turning seven. My first clear memories are of that age. I don’t remember much but I do have a number of vivid memories from my first grade year. Here are a few memories:

1) Jennifer Wolaver(SP) – Jennifer was the girl who chased all the boys around the playground. She was trying to kiss them. All the other boys ran, I didn’t!
2) Dyslexia – I really got that there was “something wrong with me” I couldn’t keep up with the other kids in class and I was being taken out of class for extra help. I remember feeling bad about these things.
3) Dominic Mastri – I was having such a hard time in school that my parents felt they should find a private school for me where the teachers could provide more direct attention to me. I went the visit the Children’s Learning Workshop, a Montessori school. While I was there I noticed a kid who walked on his toes and crossed his feet. I asked someone why the kid was walking that way to get attention. The other child explained that he couldn’t help it. I don’t think I was told that it was CP at the time. I became good friends with Dominic and we are still friendly today. He is a Public Defender in Scranton Pa.

I don’t remember too much else vividly but as I sit here writing these word I wonder what Haley will remember when she is 34 going on 35. I’m sure she’ll remember the book she wrote which will hopefully be available before the end of the school year. I think she’ll remember doing Saturday’s with Daddy and Haley which might become content for this blog. I hope she’ll remember this past weekend where we went to Snow Mountain in Ga and played all day.

What do you remember from when you were six? What do you hope your kids will remember?

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This is an interesting statistic. Nearly half of the dads that completed the survey have participated in personal development programs. Until a few years ago I would have answered no to this question. I never saw the need for personal development programs and did not believe that they could be successful. It was also my opinion that most people felt the way I did. It was at this point in my life that I was told about Anthony Robbins. If you haven’t read his stuff you can’t judge but the man is incredible.

I suggest that if you feel like you don’t have the time, don’t have motivation, don’t know what you want to do next or don’t know what you want out of your life then you need to check out some the personal development stuff. Check out the Brian Tracy link on the right hand side.

Have you taken the DADvocate Survey? Are you aware of the DADvocate Contest?

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