Hello everybody! I’m back in Sausalito and the beautiful fall weather has arrived. Please join me here for an open conversation—what are you learning, what books or films have you read or watched, where have you been lately?
I’m in the middle of editing three podcast episodes—which is sort of like being deep in this crack in the earth. I’ll be publishing those over the next few weeks. Audio editing takes a ton of time, but do I love doing interviews as another way of working with my material. Is there anyone that you think would make for a great guest for the Decide Nothing podcast?
I launched this Substack just a couple of months ago, and we already have more than two hundred subscribers! Thank you all for being here and for supporting my work.
A few questions that I’d love to hear your take on:
What was your own journey to parenthood—or not being a parent—like? What’s your view of the other side? (I wrote about this in The Man Pays)
What does masculinity, or femininity, or some other gender expression mean to you, and what part of you would you assign to gender, as opposed to your own individuality and personality?
Or—anything else that’s come up for you in reading or thinking about what I’ve published…
My dear old friend John, wrote in to say this about his experience of becoming a father:
"I knew before I even met my wife that I wanted children. I'm 12 years older than her so that might have something to do with it. She didn't want kids for a long time, even after we were married, but then she hit her early 30s and she wanted kids NOW!!! We tried for a few years to no avail, so we went in for tests. I was thinking it was me, but it turned out to be something with her ovaries, not enough eggs, I don't remember the exact diagnosis but it had a name. I do remember the meeting we had with the doctor when we found this out and treatment was discussed. After everything was discussed, options given, and the doctor was about to leave, I asked "Uh, about that test I took??"
"Oh yes, we forgot about you didn't we?", in a jocular manner I found off putting. I was still thinking that this could all be my fault with old faulty balls!
"This is the best sperm count I'll probably see this month. You have super sperm!"
My wife laughed while emotion washed over me and I cried. I'm still not sure why exactly. Relief? Pride? These emotions revisit me now as I write. My best guess is that never having been the alpha male or what I felt was the toughest guy in the room, that this was a late-in-life vindication of my perceived second class status all through my youth as it related to women and social ranking within my group of male friends. There's a lot to unpack there but I now have two amazing perfect daughters so it's old news now and not that relevant to my new status as a Daddy.
The two years that followed of three failed IVF treatments and the ones they make you do first that never work, then a natural pregnancy noticed just days before a third egg extraction belong to a much longer story, replete with much grinding and gnashing of teeth, but it all goes away as soon as that baby pops out and everything changes. I'm just grateful we didn't get stuck there, it could have gone another way. But I'm a father now and that keeps me busy."
...and I know firsthand from watching him run around after his two young daughters—the older of which I am god-father to, and the younger of which I am just lucky to know—that it does indeed keep him _very_ busy.
My dear old friend John, wrote in to say this about his experience of becoming a father:
"I knew before I even met my wife that I wanted children. I'm 12 years older than her so that might have something to do with it. She didn't want kids for a long time, even after we were married, but then she hit her early 30s and she wanted kids NOW!!! We tried for a few years to no avail, so we went in for tests. I was thinking it was me, but it turned out to be something with her ovaries, not enough eggs, I don't remember the exact diagnosis but it had a name. I do remember the meeting we had with the doctor when we found this out and treatment was discussed. After everything was discussed, options given, and the doctor was about to leave, I asked "Uh, about that test I took??"
"Oh yes, we forgot about you didn't we?", in a jocular manner I found off putting. I was still thinking that this could all be my fault with old faulty balls!
"This is the best sperm count I'll probably see this month. You have super sperm!"
My wife laughed while emotion washed over me and I cried. I'm still not sure why exactly. Relief? Pride? These emotions revisit me now as I write. My best guess is that never having been the alpha male or what I felt was the toughest guy in the room, that this was a late-in-life vindication of my perceived second class status all through my youth as it related to women and social ranking within my group of male friends. There's a lot to unpack there but I now have two amazing perfect daughters so it's old news now and not that relevant to my new status as a Daddy.
The two years that followed of three failed IVF treatments and the ones they make you do first that never work, then a natural pregnancy noticed just days before a third egg extraction belong to a much longer story, replete with much grinding and gnashing of teeth, but it all goes away as soon as that baby pops out and everything changes. I'm just grateful we didn't get stuck there, it could have gone another way. But I'm a father now and that keeps me busy."
...and I know firsthand from watching him run around after his two young daughters—the older of which I am god-father to, and the younger of which I am just lucky to know—that it does indeed keep him _very_ busy.
I'd love to hear from others of you out there on any of the above. Cheers and enjoy the weekend, along with this new episode that I published yesterday: Psychosis, Diagnosis and Gnosis with Anthony David Adams → https://decidenothing.substack.com/p/ep06-psychosis-diagnosis-and-gnosis
-- Bowen