Dave goes solo for this episode with a brief update on Country Music Dads’ plans in the coming months and with a brief rant about parental leave for dads.

Show Notes:

00:34: The Update Dave’s having a baby! He shares how that news will affect the timing of the podcast in the coming months as he takes Podcaster Parental Leave. The Country Cutler Takeover of Country Music Dads is underway….

03:53: A Brief Rant on Parental Leave for Dads: Dave encourages dads to take EVERY MINUTE of their paternity leave (especially if they get paid for it). It’s good for you, it’s good for the baby and it’s good for the women in your lives.

Thank you for listening. The best way to support us is to subscribe to the show on Spotify, Apple podcasts, or whatever podcast platform you use. If you want to see new episodes and more content delivered straight to your email inbox, please subscribe to our newsletter: countrymusicdads.substack.com. You can find everything we do on our website: countrymusicdads.com. And we’d love to hear what you think, so send us comments, suggestions, friendly banter on Instagram @countrymusicdads, or via email countrymusicdads@gmail.com.

Mentioned in This Episode:

• Article about paternity leave by Tulane University Law School

References

• Theme Music: “Dark Country Rock” by Moodmode

Transcript

This is Country Music Dads, the parenting podcast with a twang.

We’re driving a highly subjective, comically contrarian, often irreverent conversation about fatherhood and country music for people who have a passion for both.

My name is Dave, and I’m a country music dad.

And I’m solo this week to give you a little update about the show here and to talk a little about a topic that is near and dear to my heart.

Parental leave.

So first the update.

Instead of releasing a new show every two weeks, we will be releasing shows once a month for the time being.

The second Wednesday of every month is what we’ll shoot for through about the end of the year.

We still have new stuff primed and ready for you.

One we’re really excited about is an interview that we did with singer-songwriter Jeremy Pennell out of Northern Kentucky.

It was a really fun conversation, a lot of good insights.

Excited to share that with all of you.

We also recorded an episode about the power of the mustache in country music.

Another topic that is near and dear to my heart, if you know what I look like.

Just to be clear, the podcast isn’t going anywhere.

We’re just slowing things down a bit.

So if you are craving more Country Music Dads content, now is a good time to catch up on the back catalog from season one.

We had a lot of good stuff out there.

Or you can check out the episodes that you may have missed from earlier in this season.

The reason we’re slowing down a bit, I’m having a baby.

I’ve mentioned on the show before, Donnie mentioned on the newsletter, it’s our fourth child, our first daughter, and she’ll be born this month.

I am in the excited yet crushingly overwhelmed stage of new baby prep.

It doesn’t matter if it’s the first or the second or the fourth.

There’s just a lot to do.

So I’m in a place where I need to scale down my support of Country Music Dads for the time being.

This is a dad’s podcast.

After all, it’s a parenting podcast.

So I think it’s fitting that I practice what I preach and acknowledge when the workload at home outweighs what we’re trying to do on the podcast.

So you can say I’m taking a little bit of a podcaster parental leave from Country Music Dads.

That’s just me, by the way, because while I’m taking podcaster parental leave, Donnie C.

Cutler is taking over Country Music Dads.

That’s right, folks.

You have a front row seat to the Country Cutler Takeover.

So Donnie will be pulling double duty for us on the newsletter and the podcast until I’ve carved out enough time and space to jump back into the pod.

I’ll be in the shadows editing, proofreading, maybe writing a thing or two at 3 a.m.

after feeding the baby.

We’ll see what my sanity allows.

But for the most part, you’ll be hearing from Donnie, and you won’t miss a beat because he is 100% locked in on the rich intersection of country music and modern fatherhood.

His voice has been very important for growing our show this season, and I’m excited for you to hear and read what he has in store for you.

So if you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe on your podcast platform of choice.

Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Pandora, iHeartRadio, or any of those podcast players you might fire up in your headphones while knocking out the dishes.

You’ll find all the links on our website, countrymusictads.com.

We also have a weekly newsletter that’s still rolling out every week, countrymusictads.substack.com.

Please take a minute to subscribe to either or both, as we do our best to apply a more modern view of fatherhood to the country music that we love.

Lots more to come from me and Donnie on Country Music Dads, just a little bit less often.

But before I let you go, a little more on parental leave.

In the United States, new dads are eligible for 12 weeks of unpaid leave.

A handful of states, including California, where Donnie and I live, paid parental leave is available to dads for a certain period of time.

Many companies now offer paid parental leave to both moms and dads.

But in reality, most dads don’t take it.

According to an article from Tulane University Law School, only 25 percent of dads take more than a week off, and most take just one day.

Even in my experience talking with other dads here in California, even when employers offer paid parental leave, dads don’t take all of it.

They just take a portion of it.

And there’s lots of reasons that they do that.

Often the work environment and career pressures are the reason.

There’s kind of an expectation that dads traditionally don’t really need the parental leave.

It’s kind of a new phenomenon.

They weren’t the ones who gave birth, after all, so what’s so hard about being the dad?

Or what are they going to be doing at home when mom is doing most of the work with the new baby anyway?

They’re just going to sit around.

After my first was born, I took the first two weeks off.

I had more than that.

I ended up taking full eight weeks between vacation time and the state benefits and my employer’s benefit.

But right after my first was born, I took two weeks, went back to work after those two weeks.

And at the time, I mean, my wife and I were still trying to figure out exactly when and how and who would feed our newborn in the middle of the night.

We’re trying to balance it out so we can both get some sleep.

We’re sleep deprived, a little overwhelmed, just trying to figure out how to be a dad for the first time, how to take care of a baby for the first time.

But I showed up to work after those two weeks, and in my first meeting back, a coworker of mine, a fellow dad, no less, leans over and whispers, how is your vacation?

That two weeks was no vacation, by the way.

I was not at work, but I was doing work.

I was up in the middle of the night taking those late night feeding shifts.

I was driving to the doctor every other day for those early doctor’s appointments.

I was learning how to do all the things that come with having a newborn, swaddling, cleaning, buying stuff on Amazon in the middle of the night.

And of course, I was worried about what people would think at work when I took those two weeks off.

I was worried they’d think I was slacking off, that I was milking the system for more time off, that I wasn’t really serious, maybe that I wasn’t really necessary back at work.

And at least one guy did think that because he said so.

I think it makes any dad worry or mom worry that you won’t get picked for the best assignments for the promotions because you’re not there.

And that same stigma exists for women, but they just don’t have the option to come back to work a day or two or a week after the baby is born for obvious reasons.

So this is where men can help women in the workforce by taking their leave, by normalizing taking leave, especially if you get paid for it dads, take all of your leave.

Every last minute of it.

If there are consequences for you at work in your career, it’ll just be a blip in the long run.

And that blip could mean a lot to the women in your life, either your wife or the other women at the office.

Moms take the brunt of all the stressors and the changes and the professional repercussions that come with starting a family and growing a family.

They don’t have a choice because they’re the ones that physically give birth.

They’re also the ones that culturally are expected to carry most of that burden.

But dads can help balance that burden.

And part of the way they can do that is by freeing up time when baby is born and using that time to do the work.

By the way, it’s not just about supporting mom either.

That newborn phase is rough on dads, especially if you’re doing the work at home.

Sleep deprivation, the mental toll, the emotional toll, it all adds up.

It takes a toll on your work, your health.

Something’s got to give in those early weeks and months of raising a new baby.

So that is why I’m taking my unpaid parental leave from Country Music Dads.

Even though I love working on the podcast, it’s kind of a part-time job and I just don’t think I’ll have the capacity.

Fortunately, Donnie is not going to accuse me of being on vacation.

I trust.

I’ll be back though because as one of my friends told me recently, wow, four kids, you’re going to have a lot of good content.

To be clear, I didn’t have my fourth kid just for the content, but yeah, there’s going to be more content.

But for now, it’s baby time.

So until next time, whether you’re at the school yard, the playground or just taking care of a newborn baby.

Thank you for listening.

Donnie, we’ll talk to you soon.