It’s been four years since I left The New York Times to start The Company of Dads. Last week I had my proudest moment. It’s not something most people put on their LinkedIn profiles.
Yes, we’ve had success bringing together Lead Dads who are working to help their families fulfill their full potential at home and at work. Miles to go, but I’ve been gratified by the community we’ve created and the audience we’ve built.
Yes, I’ve been heartened by the companies that have brought me in to speak – shoutout to Seramount for being such a consistent supporter – and disappointed by the ones that have ghosted me.
(Rejection is fine, like this one from a Blue Cross Blue Shield Association Shield executive: “thank you for considering me, but I’m going to decline.” Rejection is 1,000 times better than being ghosted!)
Yes, this work has yielded broad recognition. I’ve appeared on The Today Show and ABC News Nightline. The Wall Street Journal has written about me twice, once on the front page. And I’ve been a guest on some incredible podcasts, including LinkedIn’s Hello Monday!
And yes, I’ve got an agent who is out selling a proposal for a book that mixes stories and prescriptive advice to help Lead Dads and Working Moms at home and changes the conversation for them at work (and with their managers).
All great braggy, braggy, braggy stuff.
But none is my proudest moment. They’re proof that we’re moving the conversation forward around Lead Dads – and having some success in changing the assumptions around who is a caregiver in the office, hopefully to the relief of Working Moms who have been the default parent for too long.
No, my proudest moment happened when my youngest daughter went for an eye exam. In the spring, her vision tracking – think, your eyes’ ability to follow words across a page – was in the 3rd percentile.
This is a correctible problem, if detected. If not, it adds to a kid’s reading struggles.
Here’s the rub: it’s not correctible with surgery or medication. It’s correctible only with eye exercises that take a lot of time.
So, from her diagnosis until last week, we did what we were told to do. We went every week to vision therapy and we did her vision homework three to four times a week. We didn’t skip. We didn’t slack. We made it fun. We did it.
When she went back, her vision tracking was at 77 percent. In six months.
I’m so proud of the work my daughter put in. I’m also grateful that I’m able to live and work in a way that I could be the one to consistently do this with her.
When the doctor told us the new results, I thought of my friend Eve Rodsky who talks about all time being created equal. She says that an hour in a boardroom is equal to an hour at your child’s doctor. I couldn’t agree more. The hours I spent with my daughter doing vision tracking exercises were the best hours I’ve spent in a year with plenty of work validation.
