fatherhood

Seventeen Years: Preparing Myself for the Next Chapter

Lifestyle

I am notoriously nostalgic. At any given point in my day – I can be found reflecting on mistakes from yesterday, reviewing regrets from last month, or missing moments from years ago. It’s brutal. I’ll catch myself, snap out of it and somehow function throughout the day. The reel that so often plays in my head, it not only distracts and disables me from being in the present – but emotionally makes me relive times I have already endured. Some good, some bad, some even exaggerated from what actually truly transpired. Imagine doom-scrolling through memories in your head and you have a sense of what I go through daily.

My first-born son Ishaan is applying for colleges right now. He’s a senior in high school, already completed his college standardized admissions tests (SAT & ACT), and is essentially starting to work through the Common App, apply for scholarships, and narrow down some possible majors he may be interested in pursuing. Through hard work with some God-given intelligence and talent, he has accomplished being captain of his school’s tennis team, co-founded several clubs, kept his GPA up while taking (and passing) 13 AP courses, officially completed the math and reading Kumon curriculum, and was recently announced a National Merit semi-finalist.

I remember coming home from my residency program, and helping a kindergarten version of this same kid learn to write his letters. He had an imagination that had him being a school car-line attendant one day, and a Transformer the next. To this day, he still battles Beyblades with his younger brother, crushes his family at Catan, and plays pickleball and tennis every chance he gets. I cannot believe the same kid that (in his teens mind you) once left the house without shoes or sandals on, is well on his way to being a high school graduate!

Ishaan is seriously enthusiastic about everything. He never says “no” to anything or anyone. Except corn, he hates corn for some strange reason. I love that about him, he certainly squeezes every drop out of his life that he can. In a lot of respects, he is your typical teenager – consumed by his phone, horribly dietary choices and hygiene habits; but when he busts out a random ‘bagel’ or ‘boba’ dance, you often get to see that beautiful innocence and youthful spirit of his come through. I love that he lives his life with so much fervor, it makes him fun to be around and it is one of the qualities I’ll miss most when he goes!

You will never have this day with your children again. Tomorrow they’ll be a little older than they were today. This day is a gift.”
— Melia Keeton-Digby

When Ishaan was about a week old, I remember taking him to the OB/GYN’s office for a wellness check. As I was walking into the waiting area, I vividly remember a woman telling me to “cherish this time with him, they grow up so fast.” That really stuck with me! I am so blessed that, while I did (and still do) work a decent amount – I had ample time to watch both my kids grow up. The paradox though is why do I feel like it just happened so quickly? Time just flies when you’re a parent. Something that always wrecks me is the social media pages that remind you this may be the “one day you will pick up your child and set them down for the very last time without even realizing it.”

I do not know what the future has in store for Ishaan. As a family, we have to weigh tuition costs against name recognition of the school, and factor in that he still does not quite know what he wants to pursue. Our local university is ‘ick’ or ‘cringe’ as kids these days may say – so, hopefully he chooses to go somewhere else. Not that I wouldn’t miss him dearly, not that I wouldn’t love seeing four more years of his bagel dance; he’s just an amazingly awesome individual and I think he’s capable of something far better.

A side-by-side photo showing the same boy at two different ages. On the left, he is a young child with a broken arm, wearing a red polo shirt and smiling. On the right, he is a teenager holding a sign that says 'ISHHAAN, first day of 12th Grade, I am 16 years old, when I grow up I want to be a Doctor, Musician, DATE: 8/10/26,' standing outdoors.

Ishaan recently passed his driving test and drove himself to school for the very first time! Before that, I had the pleasure of dropping him off every morning. We listen to about 3 or 4 songs together, wish each other a good day, and I let him take his tennis bag and backpack out of the trunk and watch him make his way to his first period class. Now, that too may be a fleeting moment for me!

I find myself counting down the days until Ishaan’s graduation ceremony, until his college acceptance letter comes in, and until we drive him out to his dorm – wherever that may be. I feel like, rather than being melancholy and dreading those upcoming events, my time is probably better spent focusing on appreciating the moments I get to spend with him now. Who knows, maybe I’ll try and go lift him for the last time and pray that my back doesn’t give out on me!

Don’t get me wrong though, I have some serious concerns about Ishaan’s survival skills! So far, his idea of ‘cooking for himself’ constitutes him pulling and pouring a big bowl of cereal out of the pantry. He can solve complex Calculus problems, but somehow doing a load of laundry eludes him. Either he’s banking on Optimus or one of these other autonomous robots to do a lot of his daily chores, or he fully believes his mom is moving in to the dorms with him.

Thank you for reading this post! I need to write more often, it helps me unpack my emotions about things and I hope someone out there connects and relates to some of what I say! Be well, and be sure to enjoy the precious time with your kids and loved ones!

Figuring out Fatherhood

Dentistry, Lifestyle, Uncategorized

Colleagues in the dental field, upon discovering I do pediatrics, always squeeze in the phrase “it takes a special kind of person” somewhere into the conversation. I have also heard the words “thank God for people like you” on more than one occasion. If you have read any of my previous posts, I almost never miss an opportunity to gloat about how lucky I am to do what I do. Sure, there are stressful moments mixed into each work day – the deafening loud screamers, the biters, the pukers, and my personal favorite, the parents that tell me how to do my job. However, I would not trade my profession for any other, ever, period.

I imagine that the “special kind of person” comment implies there is a certain degree of patience and compassion for these little patients that those individuals maybe do not have a want or willingness to exert. Mind you, I do not say that judgmentally. I recognize that everyone on Earth has different skills, talents, and abilities – and what suits me may not befit someone else. I already established in my last post that I certainly do not have what it takes to be a Chippendales dancer.

Nevertheless, this notion that I may somehow possess a special amount of patience is an interesting one. At work, I am proud to say, I always try and maintain the utmost professionalism. I treat children with low-functioning autism, with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and with various other medical and behavioral conditions. The truth is, throughout most of my brief appointment – whenever I have an unruly child in the chair – I think to myself how demanding and taxing it must be for the parent to take this on day in and day out. Really, kudos to them.

At home however, unfortunately, my parenting style does not always feature that same calmness and composure.

When I was younger, well before my children were born, I was driving down the street, stopped at a traffic light, with my window rolled down. At the same street corner, waiting to cross, was a father and his young boy (probably no more than around 7 or 8 years old). I caught only a brief portion of their altercation before I had to resume driving, but the dad was berating his son about his bike, either ruining it…not riding it properly, something to that effect. I remember thinking to myself, how could any material object be worth laying into your kid like that?

Little did I know back then that I would have progeny of my own one day. As recently as yesterday, I chastised my younger son for 20 minutes about being too distracted/not concentrating and doing ‘poor quality work’ on his Kumon (a math and reading tutoring program) assignments. (Ironically, he’s eight.) It is a lecture I have given to him time and time again. A few months ago, at a park, he left his tennis racket unattended somewhere and it was stolen. The drive home was filled with my reprimanding him about being more responsible with his things. I guess, so much for my ‘material objects’ memory huh?

I wish every moment could be remembered like this one above.

For the record, I am not proud of these outbursts and punitive moments of mine. All too often, I ultimately regret the vehement way in which I handled the situation. My biggest fear is the emotional scar and substantiality of the memory it creates in their mind. Although for me, disciplinary moments like these seem infrequent and tend to occur far and few between; in the mind of a child, I imagine it carries immense weight and detracts from the many jocund times we share together. And that is sad to me; because I truly do make concerted efforts to play with them, talk with them, take them places, and provide them things that I was bereft of as a kid.

The reasons for (and root cause of) my overly aggressive outbursts are probably outside of the scope of this blog post. But like so many other things in my life, in an effort to right wrongs, I try and self-reflect on shortcomings and character flaws within myself. I need to work harder at managing my expectations for my kids. While (I think that) I am trying to instill a good work ethic in both of my boys; I feel I am also setting myself up for disappointment and frustration when they aren’t delivering on things I myself believe to be important. I have to learn to exercise more patience and tolerance to the simple fact that they are children; and mistakes, and messes, and imperfections in all forms will help them learn, cope, and even correct certain behavior in the future.

When I think about the miracle of childbirth; and how even from the point of conception, we need so so so many countless processes to go right before we’re given a beautiful, healthy baby – I almost feel ashamed of myself that I let petty things like messy handwriting or a stolen tennis racket ruin a moment and a memory in time I have with my two young boys. Don’t get me wrong, disciplining and punishments have their place. I am just going to make more of a conscious effort to handle their foibles and failures with a tad bit more of tranquility. Every child is a blessing; I have to work harder to appreciate that fact not only at work but within my own home.

Really, thanks for taking the time to visit this blog and read through some of these posts. I can always use help in the parenting space, so please feel free to send any comments and questions my way!