Call it Thursdays with Aquil.
Ali Knott, our Lead Dad of the Week from Stamford, Conn., loved every minute of parental leave. He was grateful that the state of Connecticut offered paid leave for fathers so he could take time away from his job as a personal trainer to be with his wife and newborn son.
When it was time to return to work after two months, he wanted to figure out a way to preserve that connection he had with his wife Cherrell Parker around their son, Aquil. He didn’t want to fall back into his old way of working.
“When I started thinking about going back to work, I know how I get – I get caught up in the hours of my job,” said Ali, who in addition to being a personal trainer is a high school football and track coach. “Cherrell and I balance that. But now with Aquil, I didn’t want Cherrell to feel like she was the mother working and then doing all the stuff for him afterwards.”
So he began thinking of what he could do differently with his schedule – which often stretches from 7 am to 7pm with bits of dead time in the middle of the day. His goal was to have time with their son Aquil, help Cherrell and continue to build his personal training business.
Since Thursday was already his slowest day, he decided to take it off – every week. And he’s continued to do so two years into fatherhood. It’s a solution that’s worked well.
“I don’t create boundaries enough for myself, but I wanted to create a boundary for him,” Ali said. “My father always worked his butt off for me, but he said he wishes he could have taken me more to practices and spent more time with me. He did his best.”
In a client-facing business like personal training, Ali worried about what his clients might say – and also if the day off would impact his income.
“There was no pushback from my clients – and that was my biggest fear,” he said. “I was worried I’d lose people or sessions or not be able to satisfy the demand. The more transparent I was with clients the more they respected me for that decision. There are times I think I could take two to three people that day and it would make the schedule easier the rest of the week. But I owe it to him to give him the focus.”
And his business has grown since he started taking Thursday to be with Aquil. Not every job allows you to be the Lead Dad in every moment. But when we’re intentional with our choices, we can figure out a plan, just like Ali did.
Welcome, Ali, to The Company of Dads!
