Category Archives: parenting

February 10, 2012

Help Me Feed My Son!!

Okay…the title of this post really looks bad, doesn’t it. Eeesh.

First off, my son isn’t starving and I’m not looking for any hand-outs. No, my issue is my inability to make my way around the kitchen. I’m a nearly 40-year-old man who somehow finds a way to burn water, so my cooking skills are not the greatest in the world.

To make things more fun, my son has inherited my palette…meaning he’s fussier than I am when it comes to food. He’s only five and yet hasn’t tried a ton of things because he refuses to try them.

Yes…I know…it sounds very familiar.

So I end up having to cook hot dogs, hamburgers, chicken nuggets, fries, chicken breasts, bacon, and the occasional pork chop as primary meals. On one hand, that’s not such a bad thing for a single dad to cook up…easy, quick, and fairly tasty. On the other hand, those are certainly not the most healthy choices in the world and I don’t want him to grow up like me…addicted to junk, overweight, and unhappy.

On the plus side of things, he loves a few healthy choices that even I won’t touch like strawberries and grapes. He also likes potatoes, carrots, and peas…so I suppose that’s better than nothing and opens up a few options for me.

But where he won’t try new things, it makes it even more difficult to come up with options for him to eat. And that brings me to wondering what I can do on a go-forward basis.

I should be happy, though, that he won’t eat JUNK junk food. For example, not only does he never want to drink soda (although his grandfather tries to get him to taste it every time he visits), but he doesn’t eat candy. The only chocolate he likes is plain chocolate either in a bar or in an egg shape. He eats plain potato chips occasionally but won’t eat cake. He enjoys popcorn but hates licorice. He’ll eat vanilla ice cream, but don’t you dare give him ice cream with a flavour attached to it.

He’s an usual kid. His aversion to even trying pizza has me wondering where I went wrong, actually. So I guess this brings me back to wondering what I can do to feed my son.

Is having a fussy child normal? Can I expect his taste buds to change with time? If so, how do I help that progression along?

Sigh…

23 comments | tags: eating, food, life, parenting, single dad, single father, single parent | posted in parenting

January 27, 2012

My daughter’s now a teenager

By Canadian Bald Guy

My daughter celebrated her 13th birthday this week. She’s now officially a teenager.

Ugh.

I knew this day would come eventually. To me, this is almost as big a deal as it’s going to be when I turn 40 later this year.

UGH.

I guess it’s just one more sign that I’m getting old…and that, quite frankly, sucks. I’m not ready to turn 40 yet. I’m not ready to mature yet. I’m not ready to worry about the clothes my daughter will wear out in public because they show off too much skin. I’m not ready to tell her that she can’t litter her body with tattoos until she’s 18 and it’s out of my control.

On the other hand, I’m really looking forward to watching my little girl mature. Teenage years seem to rush on by so fast…she’ll be off to university before you know it.

On the other hand, I still want my little girl to remain a little girl.

Sigh.

So happy birthday, Rugrat. Even though we’re not as close as we’d like to be and we don’t talk as often as we’d like, we both know that we love each other…and when looking at life’s simple pleasures, that’s one of the greatest gifts that we share.

7 comments | tags: age, life, long-distance relationship, parenting, relationships, single dad, single father, single parent | posted in parenting

December 14, 2011

The Bad Parenting Night

By Canadian Bald Guy

Ever have one of those nights where everything involving your parenting skills seems to go wrong? Yeah…I had one of those nights last night. It was absolutely brutal.

I was late to pick up Ankle Biter for supper.
I didn’t have anything to eat in the house (or anything that he wanted, anyway).
He wanted to watch a movie but my dvd decided to stop working.
He was excited to play a new XBox game that I got at work from a “Secret Santa”, but as soon as I turned it on it froze and didn’t work.

It just seemed like it was one thing after another. None of the items were any big deal on their own, but it just seemed like it was one thing after another.

Where I’ve been battling some inner demons lately, I’m constantly questioning my relationship with my son and his feelings towards me. I’m financially unable to provide him with all of the things that his mom is able to, and at the age of five those shiny little toys can make one home a bit more appealing than the other.

She’s also got a dog that Ankle Biter has had since Easter. If you’ve got a kid and a pet, you can totally understand and appreciate the bond that they have. Needless to say, after he’s picked up from the babysitter he’s not quite overjoyed to come to dad’s house when he’d rather play with his best friend.

So anyway, to see him lay on the couch…tired and bored…and having to apologize for how the evening visit was going was just a big kick to the gut. I felt like I had failed him.

I realize that I’m too quick to find a reason to hate myself, but last night was brutal for me. I should have been better prepared for a visit and I wasn’t. I need to not be so hard on myself, but it’s situations like last night that make it all too easy.

It was just a bad night that I’m sure every parent has. It just seems exponentially worse because I’m a single dad who only wants to make his son happy when they’re together. It’s really tough when that doesn’t happen.

7 comments | tags: life, parenting, relationships, single dad, single father, single parent | posted in parenting

November 10, 2011

My First Parent Teacher

By Canadian Bald Guy

There are a lot of “firsts” over the course of a child’s lifetime that parents get to enjoy. With my daughter living so far away from me, I missed out on many of those firsts. I’m sure as time goes on, some of these events won’t seem like such a big deal…but for right now, it was pretty special.

Last night I got to attend my first parent-teacher for my son, Ankle Biter. I had spoken with his mom a couple of weeks ago and she seemed surprised that I wanted to go. She had initially thought to schedule a time where I had him for supper so she could go. I expressed my feelings on going, too, and she re-arranged the meeting.

I met up with her and Ankle Biter last night five minutes before our scheduled time with his teacher. Other than the first day, I hadn’t met his teacher before…but she seemed very nice.

She first wanted to let us know that AB’s personality is second-to-none. He’s very independent, without having the need to constantly ask questions or be around an adult in order to feel safe. When it’s recess, he’s not asking when is it time to come back inside. If there are other kids around, he’ll talk to them. If there are adults in the room, he’ll talk to them. He’s not shy (I wonder where he gets THAT from?). In addition, he’s also quite independent…so if he’s working at a table by himself, he’s perfectly fine. The teacher explained that it was a really good blend of personality traits.

When he first was “tested” in the class, he could only recognize one capital letter out of the alphabet. She thought that he knew more, but he only came out and said one letter. Now he’s up to 18 and is retaining new information like a sponge. So she has been really impressed with his progression.

At this point, we explained to her that AB had to get tubes put into his ears a couple of years ago and that he has been in speech therapy for almost three years now. The teacher lit up…her daughter had experienced the same thing and Ankle Biter’s progression and current communication ability made perfect sense to her now. She seemed to immediately see him in a different light and almost appeared to be MORE impressed with how far he has come.

She then explained that with this information, she’ll better know how to interact with Ankle Biter and maybe help him along just that much more. She gave us some websites to visit and said that they’re informational AND fun. Now we can both continue to help in his learning process and be interactive parents, which is something I’ve never done before and am really looking forward to.

The one real concern for the teacher was AB’s inability to hold a pen or pencil correctly…his fingers just had a difficult time grasping objects that small. We were asked to start making sure his markers and crayons at home were the “normal” sized ones and gave us a couple of exercises for him to do that should help eliminate the problem.

Finally, the kid just LOVES his Star Wars…and at this point, I actually became MORE proud of him (lol). In the things he builds with blocks and lego to the pictures he draws of things that he’s thankful for (seriously), he’s all about stormtroopers and good guys vs bad guys. I quickly explained that it was my fault for introducing him to Star Wars at a pretty early age. But then I looked over at Ankle Biter (sitting quietly on a chair waiting for us to finish our meeting) and gave him a thumbs-up and a big smile. He gave the same thing back to me, and that was icing on the cake of a great experience.

Now I just need him to do this for the next 10 years or so until he graduates and it’ll all be good.

6 comments | tags: co-parenting, education, life, parenting, school | posted in parenting, The Ankle Biter

November 1, 2011

So much to talk about…so little time.

By Canadian Bald Guy

Normally I find myself having a difficult time trying to find topics to blog about. Today, though, I’ve got three separate topics that could each be a post…but I think I’ll combine them into one just because I need to get these ramblings out of my head!

1. My fantasy football team blew chunks this past weekend. Okay…that’s a bit harsh, but I was really disappointed in the stats from some of my players. I mean, the Eagles have had no defense all year long but all of a sudden they shut down a potent Dallas offense?? Miles Austin (again) got horrible numbers. Not only that, but all of my running backs totally under-performed this weekend.

Darren Sproles has been a great sleeper pick for me, but he had a rough time against the pitiful Rams (as did the entire Saints team, apparently). Ahmad Bradshaw had a difficult time against the woeful Dolphins. And honestly…Bernard Scott performed as well as I expected for a one-week fill-in for Cedric Benson against a tough-against-the-run Seattle team.

Tom Brady…well, I don’t know what to say about Brady. It seems that ever since he cut his hair, his performance has gone downhill fast. He needs to pick it up and deliver like he did at the beginning of the season.

Thank goodness for my Detroit pick-up. They did exactly what I hoped they would do while my Jets were on a bye. In fact, if it wasn’t for them this weekend wouldn’t have at least been as respectable as it ended up being.

4-4…yeesh.

2. I got to take my son out for Halloween. I wanted The Ex to bring Ankle Biter over my place so I could see him dressed-up for Halloween. Turns out that she wasn’t going to be able to get off work early enough to make it happen. So she asked me if I wanted to come with them trick-or-treating.

I really wanted to see Ankle Biter and the thought of being with him on Halloween night seemed like fun. So I showed up just as he was dressed and ready to hit some houses. The Ex and I get along pretty decently 99% of the time, and this was a fun experience…watching him go from house to house and getting excited about the candy. Mind you, he was done after about 10 houses…but that was fine. I got to experience trick-or-treating with him and he really enjoyed having the both of us there.

I think this may become a tradition for the next few years…both parents taking him out for Halloween. As long as we can continue to get along, this should be a regular event.

Oh…and Ankle Biter was Bumblebee for the night. He couldn’t have been more excited.

3. I’m participating in Movember this year. I had thought about doing it in previous years, but didn’t know the reasons or rationale behind it all. After reading up on it (and after a suggestion by Sunshine), I decided to do it this year.

But I’m not just about growing a moustache, but also about the message behind it. I have joined “the movement” and will be donating my upper lip to the cause for 30 days. My Mo will spark conversations, and no doubt generate some laughs; all in the name of raising vital awareness and funds the battle against prostate cancer.

So why am I now so passionate about men’s health?

On average men live 4-5 years less than women
1 in 7 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime
25,500 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer this year in Canada

I invite you to support me by donating to me http://mobro.co/toddiscanadian

You can even go old school and write a cheque payable to “Movember Canada”, reference my name and Registration Number 1912536 and send it to: Movember Canada, 119 Spadina Avenue, PO Box 65, Toronto, ON M5T 2T2

All donations are tax deductible.

We only have a month to grow Mos and raise awareness and fund, so please come along for the ride. Funds raised will help make a tangible difference to the lives of others. Through the Movember Foundation and their men’s health partner, the Prostate Cancer Canada, Movember is funding world class awareness, research, educational and support programs which would otherwise not be possible.

For more details on how the funds raised from previous campaigns have been used and the impact Movember is having please click on the links below:

About Movember
Prostate Cancer Foundation research
Global Action Plan

Please donate here – http://mobro.co/toddiscanadian

Thank you in advance for helping me change the face of men’s health. Go the Mo!

Moustache Season. Now Open.
Obviously, I’ll update throughout the month with new pictures and I’d love to have you join me in my journey!