Issue #1: Embracing a New Era of Dads
Date: January 7th, 2025

In This Issue

• Dadding 101: Pack the Bags

• Radical Marriage: Big Shoulders for a Reason

• Radical Mental Health: The Dad Dilemma

• Radical Fitness: Down with Crossfit, Long live HYROX

• Radical Finances: Real Estate as an alternative to 529

• Radical Faith

• DAD Review: Lovevery

DADing 101: How to Pack Your Hospital Bag as a Dad

Fatherhood doesn’t come with a manual, but that doesn’t mean we can’t figure it out together. This section is all about navigating the joys, challenges, and daily adventures of being a dad, with tips to help you thrive - not just survive.

How to pack your bags for go time

You can NEVER pack your bags for the hospital to early. Once your wife enters the third trimester we highly recommend packing your hospital bags and staging them somewhere you can grab them quickly!

The MUST HAVES:

• Change of Clothes- think comfy clothes like sweats, hoodies, gym clothes, etc. NO one will be looking at you in the photos don’t worry.

• Comfortable footwear- Begin to embrace your newfound dadhood…comfort beats fashion. Especially if you’re at a birth center and not a hospital, you’ll want something waterproof. Crocs remain undefeated yet again.

• Phone and charger- Instagram isn’t going to mindlessly scroll itself.

• Toiletries - or not…again no one is going to be looking at you in the pics

• Car Seat - Make sure you know how to work it! Practice a few times with a stuffed animal or doll in the weeks leading up to the due date. Don’t worry though, the nurses will teach you how to use it in a pinch.

• Snacks (for you and your wife) - Focus on quick easy healthy snacks you’re actually going to want to eat. Or at least quick and easy. Now is not the time to pack the kale salad. Think protein bars, trail mix, cookies, etc. Coffee is a food group. (Zyn is not.)

• Pillow and blanket - Camping sleeping bag works well. Be sure to remind your wife often how uncomfortable the hospital chair is and how poorly you slept. Trust me.

• Birth Plan - What’s a birth plan? We’re not sure but it makes you sound like a super dad.

 Pack the Bags: Check out this article for a more indepth checklist on what to pack for the big day

What go to item of yours did we miss? Let us know here on our FB community page! Best answer will be featured in next week’s edition!

⭐️Thursdays Deep-dive: How do I make a birth plan as a first-time dad?⭐️

Radical Marriage: Supporting Your Partner To Prevent Post Partum Depression

Parenting starts with partnership. Whether you’re newly married, dating, or years into it, this section is here to help you strengthen your marriage and relationship, communicate effectively, and keep the spark alive - even when life gets messy.

Recognizing and reducing the risk of postpartum depression in your wife or partner

Postpartum Depression (PPD)

• You will recognize PPD symptoms in your wife before she sees it in herself

• Baby Blues, lasting for a couple of weeks after your little one is born is normal, ie no need to panic every time one of the three of you cry

• While there are many signs of PPD (click here for a full list), the main theme is an inability to resume some semblance of normal life due to a paralyzing fear that something will happen to your newborn.

• Be intentional about asking your wife how she’s doing…try and choose a time when the sun is up and baby is not crying…easier said than done we know.

It seems obvious right? The better relationship you have with your wife, the happier she will be. This study confirms it (click here for full study), the more supportive and involved of a husband you are, the lower the risk of PPD symptoms in your wife. It can be tempting to immediately let the baby take the #1 spot in your life BUT be intentional and reserve that spot for your wife. It will benefit the entire family in the long run.

Key Points:

• More husband involvement during pregnancy and leads to a better relationship with your wife…not groundbreaking but stick with us…

• A better relationship with your wife reduces the symptoms of PPD by 21%

• Higher-income also correlates with a better spousal relationship…Meaning (in crude terms for our Neanderthal brains) higher income = less symptoms of PPD.

Radical Mental Health: The Dad Dilemma

Taking care of your mind is just as important as taking care of your family. Here, we explore ways to manage stress, cultivate resilience, and find balance in the chaos of dad life.

Trying to be an involved dad and husband but also crushing your finances

The pressure of being a new dad and realizing you have another mouth to feed, another whole human being your are responsible for, can be enormous. I know we both felt the pressure to provide for our families go to another level when our girls were born.

The Crux of the Dad Dilemma:

• Similar to the article on marriage, you know you want and need to pour into your family with time and energy to be an involved husband and father.

• BUT work is calling…and you know you need to pour time and energy into your career to provide a good life for your family…

It can be exhausting and anxiety-inducing!

How to Manage:

To be honest….we have no idea. That’s why we started Radical Fatherhood. To invite others on our journey to dadlightenment. No seriously, we all want to be jacked millionaire dads who never think about work after 5pm and lead our family in the right direction 100% of the time.

1. Find resources: here are a few that we’ve enjoyed

   • Postpartum depression in men

   • First Baby Stress

2. Focus on presence over time…if you're rocking your newborn to sleep, that email can wait.

3. Have intentional conversations with both your wife and employer to set expectations, examples include:

   • Ex: If you message me past x time I will respond the next day

   • Ex: I will only take work calls at dinner if XYZ circumstances

   • Ex: Do your parents really need to see us 17 times in the month of December

4. Find community and pursue connection!

   • If your feeling some type of way, odds are there’s another dad out there who is also feeling a similar way…be intentional about finding a space for you to connect and grow with other dads. ChatGPT doesn’t count. Although it did replace my therapist.

Radical Fitness: Why HYROX is the New CrossFit for Dads

Fatherhood is a marathon, not a sprint, and your body needs to keep up. This section dives into how to stay strong, healthy, and energized—so you can chase both your goals and your kids with confidence.

The rise of Hyrox and decline of CrossFit 

If you’re involved in the fitness space at all, you’re probably feeling what we’re feeling…more and more people are ditching CrossFit in favor of HYROX. Ever since the tragic events of the 2024 Crossfit Games… CrossFit has left a bad taste in many people’s mouths.

The stats:

• 344,396 athletes competed in the 2024 Crossfit Open

• As of November 2024, HYROX was projecting over 425,000 total competitors…🧐 that’s over 75k more competitors worldwide

Why are dads enjoying it?

• HYROX is arguably more accessible to us weekend warriors than Crossfit (you don’t have to have a masters in physics to figure out the movements)

• HYROX is basically the woke non Dave Castro version of Crossfit (prove us wrong) but we’re here for it

• In general, the skew toward endurance rather than Olympic lifting has dads (ourselves included) feeling less anxious about potential injuries

Need to move? We got you. Here’s a 10 EMOMAMRAPWTF…kidding.

• 1 pullup, 2 pushups, 3 situps

• 2 pullups, 4 pushups, 6 situps

• Continue increasing by 1, 2, and 3 until you hit 10 pullups, 20 pushups, and 30 sit-ups

Radical Finances: Real Estate vs 529 Plans for Your Child’s Future

Money might not buy happiness, but managing it well can give your family peace and opportunity. Learn how to take control of your finances, plan for the future, and lead your family with financial wisdom.

Real estate as an alternative to a 529

When you have a kid there are many avenues to save money for their future…and yes everyone will have an opinion on what works the best. For starters, always do your research…I’ve already lost enough money on NFT rugpulls. Here’s one option if you prefer real estate over Bored Ape’s as an investment strategy:

• Buy a rental house (obviously a good cash-flowing deal in an appreciating market lol)

• Put the home on a 30 year mortgage to get lower monthly payments

• Create an 18-year payment plan, overpaying on the mortgage using any extra rental income or the money you would have put into a 529

• Wait 18 years then gift your 18 yr old a home with hundreds of thousands (maybe millions?) of dollars in equity to do whatever they want with…what could go wrong?

• Seriously though, you can handle the key handoff when they’re 18 however you want, but at least you know you have a large chunk of change dedicated to that child’s college (if they aren’t athletic), wedding, business venture, gap year, etc.

• If you’re outgrowing your house and looking to upgrade, run the numbers think about keeping your original home and doing this with it!

Radical Faith: Lessons on Obedience From Parenting

Life is full of questions, and faith can be a powerful foundation. This section encourages exploration, growth, and grounding—no matter where you are on your spiritual journey.

How children teach us more about what God wants for us

My 6ish-month-old has just reached the point where she’s getting into things she’s not supposed to be getting into. Specifically…the dog’s water bowl. In fairness, it’s the perfect height for her to practice her pull to stands. As a first time father, it’s been interesting to navigate how to teach a 6-month-old what the word “no” means. But to be honest, she knows what she’s doing. She gets a mischievous grin and half crawls half-inch worms over to the water bowl and looks back at me, waiting for me to snatch her up. If she actually did reach the water bowl here’s what would happen: she would grab it, try to pull up on it, and flip it over, spilling water all over herself. The end result is that she would fall over, be covered in gross dog water, and inevitably be screaming in a way that makes me worried our neighbors are going to call CPS…

I mean the allegory writes itself. I KNOW that God wants the best for me, and I KNOW that obedience in pursuit of Him results in what’s best for me. And I also KNOW that pursuing what I want outside of Him will only bring me harm. Seeing this play out in real time with my own child though, just makes me understand the Bible and what God wants for me as His son in such a deeper way. This really makes me think…what areas of my life am I chasing dog water?

DAD Review: Is Lovevery Worth the Price for New Dads?

Not all gear is created equal, and dads need tools that work as hard as they do. In this section, we break down products, gadgets, and services to help you make smart, dad-approved choices for your family.

These toys are on a subscription basis so every time your little one hits a new developmental phase, you get a new box of toys to help them with their skills!

What we love:

• Pediatric PT/OT/Speech recommended

• Helps develop new skills

• Good quality and aesthetically pleasing (ie you won’t have a ton of cheap plastic toys laying around and they will last for multiple kids)

• Montessori approved…IYKYK

What we don’t love:

• Can get pricey, each box is about 80 bucks and the first year there is 6 boxes…sometimes you can find them cheaper on FB marketplace

• You have to subscribe to at least 3 boxes

Check them out in the link above^ (Not a paid sponsorship….yet.)