My life as a Dad-Bod

My Definition of a Dad-Bod is Probably Not What You Think

It’s the total package that defines a Dad-Bod

It’s about 6:00 am, Saturday morning, the 14th of March, 2020. I am sitting at my desk, downstairs, as I write this. . .with trepidation. This is more personal than I ever thought I would get in my writing.

The house is a mess, as usual. There are boxes of things every where. Some are cardboard, most are expensive plastic storage boxes with snap-lock lids.

On the dining room table is an In-and-Out Bag, empty but for a few fries left on the bottom. It’s been there for 2 days, along with miscellaneous pieces of mail addressed to my wife and my oldest son.

In the hallway to the garage, there are piles of laundry left there from several days ago, when I ran out of time to finish. No one else seems to know how to do the laundry.

Multiple jackets hang from the backs of dining room chairs, making it look like more than four people actually live in this too-big 3300+ square foot house.

On the stove top in the kitchen are two pans with grease and food residue on them. My oldest son goes to his back-up pan when his first choice is dirty. I guess that’s easier than cleaning up after yourself. They’ve been there a few days as well.

There are other dirty dishes on the side of the sink, waiting for someone to acknowledge them and put them in the dishwasher. So far, everyone has pretended not to notice them, especially my fourteen year-old, whose job it is to do the dishes. It’s a battle to see who can resist the longest: him from doing the dishes, or me from lashing out and making him do them. I stopped caring and obsessing over the “little” things to save my sanity.

The kitchen island, a huge, granite covered thing, has its granite covered by food packages, used paper towels, and other detritus of cooking and making lunches and grocery shopping for items to hoard.

In the front living room, piles of clean laundry sit on the chairs and couches that no one uses like they are old friends sitting around talking about the good old days, when everyone put away the clean laundry.

My wife’s office is upstairs in our bedroom. It’s a mess of un-filed papers, office supplies, cabinets, and a huge desk covered with who knows what. It’s that way, in part, because she has made an attempt to pack it up for storage. But even before that, it was such a mess, she stopped using it.

Around the bed, and in a small bookshelf, I have dozens of books I have read, or saved for various reasons, left there from before I joined Kindle Unlimited. Many are stacked on the ground for lack of shelf space. Those, too, are en route to storage, or donation.

I won’t even mention the boys’ rooms, or the bonus room, or the master closet (to which I am relegated a small portion, like most men).

My wife is currently in the marital bed, watching Hulu or Netflix on her phone, her back to the place I was just lying in. No words were said when I got up and went downstairs.

My fourteen year-old is asleep in his room. My twenty-three year-old left at 1:00 am this morning to drive to Las Vegas, where he will pick up his friends from the airport and continue on to Zion National Park for a long-planned camping trip. He could not be dissuaded from the trip, despite the expected rain, and this virus thing.

I am, as usual at this time of day, alone downstairs, sitting at my computer, writing. I decided last night to write this story.

The New Year

On January 1st, 2020, sometime around 6:00 am, my wife and I were discussing the sale of our house. The night before, like many nights over the last several years, and more and more lately, we discussed divorce. Nothing was resolved.

At about 8:30 pm she rolled over with her back to me, put on her head phones, and started watching “her shows.” I put on my head phones, listened to meditative music, took my medication, and started to read. I was asleep by 9:00 pm. This has been the standard for many, many months.

While discussing the sale of the house in the morning, I resolved to finally settle this divorce issue. We both previously admitted we wanted it, but neither of us would commit to it. I couldn’t continue on like this. I finally had enough courage to force the resolution.

I finally asked her, “What are we going to do about living arrangements after the house is sold?” A brief discussion ensued about how, if we divorce and we live in the same rental, we’ll be stuck with a lease. So, I said we had to decide what we are going to do about our marriage before we sell.

Another brief, emotional discussion ensued where we repeated the same accusations of how the other made us unhappy, how long its been that way, and more.

I finally started to understand. I said, “If you want, you can blame me. I’ll take responsibility for making the divorce request.” After a moment, she said, “If you agree that it was a mutual decision. . .” I told her I would do whatever she wanted, but that we had to go our separate ways. She agreed, and we kissed on it. I apologized. Further, we agreed to do it without lawyers ( due to our careers, we know almost all of the divorce attorneys in town.)

We don’t have a lot of “unequal” assets; we have the house and a few retirement accounts that equaled out. At the time, she made more money than me, and could potentially owe me spousal and child support. I didn’t want it, and neither did she. We agreed to do whatever it took to help the other in this expensive Southern California area, so our son could finish his schooling with his friends.

I felt a huge weight lift from my shoulders. Little did I know, the hard work was just beginning. But I could handle that, now.

Why Divorce?

Why does anyone get divorced? There are so many reasons, each unique to the marriage in question. Some marriages are a combination of reasons. In fact, most are.

I can tell you two reasons, from my perspective, why ours failed. I got tired. I got tired of her constant work, where she would take over every room in the house with her work “stuff.” I firmly believed, and needed, to come home and leave work at work, especially hers.

There was no refuge in our house. Even our bedroom was for her work. Her office at the end of the room that the bed faced; every night bringing her work computer to bed; hours of stories from work, where she replayed every stressful word and moment just like it happened. This went on for years. Even the kids had to walk away when she started with her stories.

We had a sexless marriage. Not at first. At first it was fine. But soon, as she got busier with work, sex became a chore that was done as little as possible, farther apart in time, and then only to stop me from begging. As the years went by, she began to to tell me she needed more affection to want to have sex. I understood, and told her I needed more intimacy to provide her more affection. It was a vicious circle.

When I did try to show her more affection, she pushed me away and said I was only doing it to get sex. I would explain that was part of it, but I was also trying to be more demonstrative in my love for her. There was never a right answer or solution. I began to suspect she wasn’t interested in sex any more.

There were times we went as long as a year without sex. . .several times. In fact, since our anniversary in April last year (I had to talk her into “anniversary sex”), we’ve had sex once. . .10 months after our anniversary and one month after we decided to divorce. . .and she initiated it.

Initially, I resisted. In my mind, it was over. But knowing what it felt like to be rejected, and needing the intimacy, I accepted her invitation. We had sex three days in a row, probably for the first time in our over 25 year marriage. I once calculated that we had sex, on average, 4–6 times a year.

More and More

There is so much more I could talk about. The fights, the name-calling she directed at me, her emotional abuse, . . .and more. The problem with trying to describe to a stranger your reasons for divorce, which I know I don’t have to justify, is they have no perspective. The reasons sound. . .small. Unless you lived them for 25 years.

I want to leave this marriage without blaming my wife, and without being blamed. I take responsibility for the fact that I could have done better. And she could easily write a list of my deficiencies (and has). I definitely have them.

Two years ago, shortly after I had a gall-bladder attack and had to have it removed, I had a breakdown. I was crying all the time, was so tired I wanted to walk out into the ocean and never come back, and I was falling asleep on the way to and from, as well as at, work.

I thought I was dying. I had every medical test known, several different images of my body done. Ultimately, I accepted the diagnosis of severe depression, panic/anxiety disorder, PTSD, and exhaustion. I lost my job and went on disability for a year. I couldn’t believe this was happening to ME.

During that year, I went through several different medications before finding a combination that worked. I was able to begin exercising again, and lost weight and felt better physically and mentally. I started counseling, but didn’t find it was working for me. In fact, my first counselor fell asleep during one of my soliloquy’s about my life problems.

Unfortunately, during all of the testing, they discovered I had two more hernias, low testosterone, an enlarged prostate, and a bone disease (TMI? Sorry!). The bone disease required me to get a dose of chemo to stop the disease. The hernias required surgery, which I put off until the beginning of fall so I could keep swimming and get in the best shape possible before surgery. I haven’t been able to return to the pool, yet. And now it is shut down for two weeks for the COVID-19 quarantine.

In addition, the market has crashed,and we have no idea how that will affect sales of upscale homes like ours. We are trying like crazy to get the house ready, but something always gets in the way: I got a new job, my son took his truck on his trip, it’s raining cats and dogs for a week, I pulled a back muscle lifting boxes, etc.,.

What are Dad-Bods?

I am anxious to move on. My “brush with death” two years ago reminded me there is more to life than I Have been living, and I am anxious to get started. Dad-Bods is a way to help with that.

So, as far as my definition of Dad-Bods? It’s not just about a physical shape, it’s about a life experienced; it’s about changing for the good; it’s about re-charging and taking control of your life; it’s about re-discovering empathy and love; and, it’s about acceptance and mindfulness. Oh, and great barbecue!

I love writing on Medium and seeing responses (tho there are far too few of them). I love interacting on FB with the friends I have made on Medium. It’s been too long since I have felt “friended.” Most of my marriage, I lost contact with my friends. I focused on my family and jobs. In fact, my wife used to blame me for “us” not having friends. Later, I realized it was my social anxiety that kept me to myself at parties.

I cannot wait to begin making “live” friends again, talking about life, listening to music, writing a lot, visiting other places, and showing my sons what a good relationship looks like.

So, please. Write On! and submit your articles.

And can someone please tell me what a good dating profile looks like? After reading every “online dating profile mistakes, etc.” article, I cannot for the life of me figure out what women want.

In the meantime, I hope you got this far in the article.

Please leave a response. I’d love to hear from you.

And write an article. I know you have something positive to say.

Peace, love, and hope to you all.