Big 21st Century Daddy Moment

by Duane Sharrock

 

Being a dad gets harder as the kids age, especially as I age. The kids get smarter and put ideas together. They have questions and make mistakes. It gets hard to like my answers and the ways I respond to those mistakes, bad choices, challenges to my authority. It’s harder to be sure I am right to be firm and stand my ground, to raise my voice, to threaten timeout, to give spankings, so certainty of proud moments gets more difficult to remember. There are so few moments I am proud of.

I have one though.

My proudest moment was when my daughter was just turned two years old. She needed a “procedure”, surgery. Her tonsils were swollen to a point that she had trouble breathing when she slept and eating foods were difficult as well. She needed them out.

I wasn’t worried about the operation itself. I knew she would be okay. Instead, I worried about side effects. What would anesthesia do to her developing brain? Also, I dreaded the duration of her recovery and healing. It would take days for her to heal. Her throat would be raw. I knew that even with the pain-relief medicines, she would hurt. It would not be easy.

She was never easy.

She had been born 10 weeks early. She spent days in the NICU, being fed her mother’s milk through a syringe. We had been so scared to handle her; she was so small. A premie. She weighed less than 3 pounds, and the doctors would not release her until she gained more weight.

I cringed the first time I saw them handle her. I thought she was a little twig doll that would snap in two. The nurses bathed her, changed her, burped her with an ease that didn’t seem right for this delicate little thing. We both doubted we would ever be able to handle her carefully enough.

However, we had no time to doubt ourselves for very long. The nurses taught us how to feed her, to change her, bathe her. They told us about the kangaroo technique where she would be held skin against skin. It was supposed to be therapeutic. There is power in touch. I had read that, but it helped to hear it. A fleeting thought flashed through my mind, wondering about the mechanisms that clearly communicated skin was touching skin. All of those little nerve endings, sweat glands, body hairs, oils, air. How? I hoped it would work, even if it did seem magical and undefined.

There were so many developmental milestones she needed to pass like tests and challenges. Medicine had come so far, but I work in special education. I knew there were so many things that could go wrong in her development. Most errors and defects would not be seen and barely suspected, until she was three or four. Others could appear much later. There were no guarantees.

But she was alive. She had already beaten the odds. She was our miracle baby.

We sat with the doctor, and he prepared us again for what to expect, but he had more detail. The doctor talked with us about the procedure. Then he said that only one of us could go into the ready room with her. Neither of us could go in with her to the operating room.

She chose me, her daddy.

In the hospital bed, she was laying down, nervous. She asked me what was happening and I told her the doctor was going to fix her. I smiled at her and touched that space inside that generated calm that was empty of fear and anxiety. It was analytical and observant. It was the place I touched when approaching a violent teen in crisis from the days I worked in a non-secure detention. It was the place I drew from when leading mediation between two students who hated each other, but had agreed to mediation by their peers. It’s my superpower.

In a few minutes, she would go in without me. I imagined her going inside, surrounded by strangers with wearing masks. I didn’t want her traumatized and I didn’t even want her to be afraid. How could I keep her happy and calm? What could I do for her if I cna’t be in there with her? I imagined the faces of doctors and nurses around her. Strangers in masks. Then, they would place a plastic mask on her face. I knew the sudden rush of terror as the simulation ran in my mind, and in a flash, I realized what I could do.

I asked the anesthesiologist for the plastic mask. “Just the mask.” I explained.

“Sure,” he said. He looked at me, surprised.  He produced the mask.

I directed my daughter to watch me. She would wear it like this. I demonstrated.  I said she would breathe in this. Remembering my own operations in high school where I was told to breathe deeply and to count backwards, I told her to breathe deeply. “Like this.”  I put it to my own face and breathed in and out, loudly and slowly. Then I put it on her face. She didn’t even think to reject it, but something flashed through her eyes. I put it back on my face then I put it on her face. “See?” I said. “You are going to wear this for a little while. “

And she was calm. She breathed in the mask. She didn’t look worried at all. I could see so much trust in me in her eyes. But of course she trusted me. I had caught her at the bottom of the sliding boards at the parks. I had carried her in the water during swim classes kept her from going too deep when she blew bubbles.

It was such a simple procedure to desensitize her to the clear plastic mask. After the nurses carted her into the operating room, the doctor said that it was a great idea. I imagined, judging from that fleeting moment of surprise, that the anesthesiologist had never done this before, had never thought of it. I imagined the anesthesiologist would suggest this activity to parents he would meet in the future.

Which makes me Superdad!

This was my proudest moment.

Connecting to “The Power of Leisure: How to Wisely Spend Your Free Time”

 

 

Like any literacy-minded family, we have oodles of picture books. A few of these books are “interactive,” in that you can press illustrated tiles to hear brief audio clips—animal sounds, children’s songs, sound effects, even belches and sneezes. One of the books, which my son has asked for often, lets you hear sound clips from the movie “The Cat in the Hat” starring Michael Myers as The Cat.

One audio clip asks, “What do you want to do for fun?”  I think back to that clip, as well as certain PG-13 scenes from the movie itself, but I also recall the animated television short which follows the original Dr. Seuss book much more closely (i.e., Rated-G). 
The Cat in the Hat book and movies deal with the same topic though, and that topic is:

Kids get bored.

As a kid, I learned not to say that I was bored…ever! Whenever I did say “I’m bored,” my mother would say, “I have a lot of things for you to do if you’re so bored!” She then offered a laundry list of suggestions: I could do my laundry, I could help clean the house; I could vacuum the floor; I could wash the dishes; I could clean my room; I could clean the windows, I could dust the furniture, etc. Rarely, after hearing the list could I escape from being forced to complete at least one of her suggestions. It took a few times, but she effectively conditioned the saying-I’m-bored impulse right out of me. I also learned to keep a low profile and to keep my big fat mouth shut!

That’s a lesson I’m itching to teach my own kids, but I have never followed through on this parenting responsibility, basically because I’m still much more enlightened than my parents, so I suffer for it (my kids are also picky eaters and refuse to eat their vegetables!). As a result of this enlightenment, my kids occasionally complain that there’s nothing to do, and usually, this happens when I am at my computer, composing my thoughts and typing.

Some readers, my age or younger, might suggest that this is a cry for help, and that this complaining indicates a need for parental interaction which would make my kids feel loved and appreciated and supported, and that serving this need for interaction builds relationships and social skills besides. But I am trained as an educator in the USA (in New York State), so I also know that kids need to learn how to play on their own.  So, despite the urge— as a “Cats In The Cradle” singing, guilt-ridden, hard-working dad— to play with my kids or to engage them with some kind of impromptu arts and craft-y diy project, I suggest to them to go play, find something to do, and to leave me alone. I bark, therapeutically, “You need to play on your own!”

This enlightened response is supported by research, of course, in The Power of Leisure: How to Wisely Spend Your Free Time.

But I knew this stuff already. After all, as I might have mentioned earlier, I am a trained educator. I should also add that I am an experienced and reflective educator.

In today’s world of public education, especially in the world of special education, the pursuit of appropriate recreation during “unstructured time” has often come up when discussing students with disabilities, but have also come up in discussion about (and sometimes, with) at-risk students. In various settings and placements, we educators have discussed goals for students on the spectrum to socialize or for students with intellectual challenges to become (more) independent. There are places in individual education plan documents for describing the student’s hobbies, skills, or interests.

Although it is rewarding to find that there are researchers in the social sciences exploring leisure/recreation/unstructured time again, it is inspiring that researchers have developed a taxonomy for leisure activities and experiences. Such taxonomies aid educators in discussing their student needs but these taxonomies also help to analyze and address our own needs and wants. Recreation is what we need to fight burnout and helps us to persist in our various roles, jobs, and careers, but recreation also facilitates mental health and hygiene.

Recreation is a factor (or facet) of resilience. Recognizing these factors of recreation helps us understand that the ability to re-create, or to re-energize, is made up of experiences and skills. Breaking down the 5 factors can help you discern what you should do in order to achieve your recreation goals.

Practicing a musical instrument towards accomplishment and mastery.

The 5 factors of recreation  via The Power of Leisure: How to Wisely Spend Your Free Time are:

Detachment-Recovery where “Leisure can provide a way to relax and recover after working”;

Autonomy;

Mastery where “Leisure can provide a sense of accomplishment”;

Meaning where “Leisure can provide a sense of meaning and purpose”;

and Affiliation.

The big takeaway from the article (and the study it is based on) is that there are choices that must be made and reflective self-assessments that you should do (informally). We have different needs at different times. We need to be more self-aware and more conscious of our recreational choices. It adds new meaning to the suggestion: “Have fun responsibly.”

 

 

“Leisure and Subjective Well-Being: A Model of Psychological Mechanisms as Mediating Factors” http://link.springer.com.sci-hub.org/article/10.1007/s10902-013-9435-x

 

The Great Lego Conspiracy Against Creativity!

The Great Lego Conspiracy Against Creativity!

by Duane Sharrock

I love Legos. Don’t you? Well, about three or four years ago, I first logged on to a few professional networking sites, like Facebook and LinkedIn, and encountered the alarming belief among some participants that Legos are killing creativity!

The participants, some considered influencers and were prominent at the time, said that providing explicit instructions for building Legos was an underlying destroyer of creativity as well as an indicator that creativity was dying.

Which—I just knew—was crazy-talk!

I was born in the late sixties, so as a 70s kid, I grew up with Micronauts, Legos, Tinkertoys, Erector sets, and Log-thingies (that I can’t recall their names right now). Erector sets had instructions. Tinkertoys had instructions. Micronauts had instructions. Even the Log-thingies had instructions. As a kid, these instructions were only suggestions and were often ignored. Instructions were for people who didn’t already have plans. And I always had plans. I had my epic battles with Evel Knievel, Derry Daring (my sister’s toy, I swear!), my half chewed up GI Joe (who was white yet had kinky, bristly hair), Micronauts, and other toys.

I was definitely like that kid, Andy, in Toy Story 3.

Playing with my toys was a highly energetic experience. Like, Andy, I wrote, filmed, directed full length movies in my mind! Evil plots, intense rescue sequences, phenomenally heroic acts of daring, romance, and cliff hangers–these livened up my days. I “borrowed” spools of thread from my mom’s sewing box and used masking tape to string up giant spider webs (these were actually defensive “energy fields” to defend an army base). I took the cardboard boxes from the toys and taped them together into cliff-side “bases” resembling high-tech Pueblo Mesa Dwellings. Sometimes, I could combine Tinkertoys to raise the army constructions. Micronaut toys combined into robotic, armored weapons. If one of my Evel Knievel motorcycles survived, it might ram a base or two (often in high-definition slow motion).

These were some of my best memories of childhood (okay, I also played with the toys as a preteen).

These memories came back to me when watching the Toy Story movies, but came back more vividly when watching The Lego Movie yesterday. You see, just like Andy did in Toy Story, I took my various toys from different companies and makers, and combined them for the action movie sets in my imagination. They didn’t have to engage their agents to battle for contracts and licensing. They collaborated freely to make the explosive, suspenseful stories that filled my life.

The Lego Movie indicted the so-called education and creativity experts that claimed Legos, or any of the toys from the 70s, killed creativity. And although, people might argue that the new Legos were awful for having instructions in them, as a special educator, I call the instructions scaffolding now, but this was basically the central message of The Lego Movie!

Which leads me to another big lie that (almost) every education reformer tells—at some point or another—about education: schools kill creativity!

For another time.