Discipline in How to Be a Real Man

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Sit on your hands while your teenager learns to drive

The shouting isn't a discipline problem. It's a fear problem, and there are practical ways to keep it out of the car.

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20265 min

The year your son stops telling you things

He's not shutting you out on purpose. But the old ways of getting him to talk have stopped working, and the replacements aren't obvious.

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Plan a cook for eight people

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GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20266 min

What a kid can actually do at five, eight, eleven and fourteen

Handing over chores costs you time for about three weeks. After that, it pays you back for the next decade.

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Dads5 min read

The hardest player to coach will be your own kid

Playing time, the car ride home, and the handful of rules that stop one season from ending a sport your kid actually liked.

Poll

Where does your best time with your kids happen?

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20265 min

What to settle before you hand over the first phone

The rules that survive contact with a thirteen-year-old are the physical ones. Everything else gets negotiated away by February.

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20266 min

Don't go quiet when your daughter turns thirteen

She'll stop volunteering information somewhere around year nine. The lifts, the standards and the small habits that keep the line open.

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GuideDadsRay Okonkwo23 Sept 20265 min

Pay it on Fridays and don't ask what they spent it on

A pocket money system that survives contact with a real nine-year-old, including the part where he wastes it and you say nothing.

Quiz

Does your wardrobe actually fit you?

Five questions, honestly answered, and a plan for the next fortnight.

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20266 min

Outlasting a toddler tantrum without losing your temper

Get lower, get quieter, stop negotiating. The rest is timing, logistics, and not caring what the man by the freezers thinks.

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20265 min

Eight seconds at the school gate

The goodbye you do on the first morning is the one your child will expect on every morning after it. Make it short, and make it the same.

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Build me a 30-day training plan around two sessions a week

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GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20265 min

Keep reading to them long after they can read themselves

Ten minutes, the same chair, a book slightly too hard for them. The one habit that survives shift work, bad moods and teenagers.

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GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20266 min

Let the toddler carry the eggs

Putting the shopping away takes ten minutes alone and half an hour with a three-year-old. Do it the slow way anyway.

Poll

What was your first ever job?

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20266 min

What to do when the baby only wants his mother

The preference is real and it isn't a verdict on you. The way through it's taking full ownership of things nobody else touches.

GuideDadsCal Brennan23 Sept 20265 min

The bedtime routine that gives you your evening back

Bedtime takes ninety minutes in most houses. Forty is achievable, and the fix is boredom, not firmness.

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GuideDadsCal Brennan22 Sept 20265 min

Teaching a kid to work before they're old enough to be paid

Work is a habit, not a wage. The years between three and thirteen are where it gets built, and most of it happens standing next to you.

Quiz

Is your money actually in order?

Six questions. No email required, no sales pitch at the end.

Dads6 min

Most discipline problems are consistency problems

Dads6 min

What your kid actually needs from you on the sideline

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Rewrite my CV so it actually gets read

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GuideDadsCal Brennan22 Sept 20265 min

What actually reopens a teenager who has stopped talking

The dinner table is the worst place to do this. Side by side, late at night, and a flat reaction to the first hard thing they tell you.

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Dads6 min read

How to apologize to your child without losing authority

The apology most dads give is really a second lecture. Here's a version that works, and what it actually costs you.

Poll

How often do you see your closest friends?

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