The Dad You Deserve

The ask box is open for suggestions of the fatherly content. I'm also open to giving advice and being proud of any achievements. Feel free to call me dad, papi, daddy, father, etc. Anti DDLG Blog

[not-straight-cubed]

friendly reminder that you don't need any diagnosis or disorder to adapt your routine to accommodate you! sit down in the shower. brush your teeth and wash your face in the shower. bring a chair to the kitchen while you cook. use unscented products. your routine should be built for you.

[shianu]

Can i add? You also don't need any diagnosis or disorder to use things that will improve your life. Use a cane, install a shower chair, use a kid app for brushing your teeth if it helps to maintain your attention. You don't need permission to make your own life better.

[mollyjames]

It's really important when you're at work to go out there and really give it your 60%. Maybe 35%.

[jourrdane]

One time my boss told a whole story about how if a person who made parachutes didn't give their job 100%, people would die.

I made the point that

There's probably a whole quality and compliance process for parachute assembly and it's not just one bloke in a factory making and distributing them.

We get a 30 minute lunch break and no company benefits.

We don't make parachutes.

I had a disciplinary meeting and then went back to giving them as much as they gave me.

No one died.

[crazy-pages]

Actually, this is a really good point about how corporations shirk good safety principles by shifting blame onto their workers too!

Because good safety protocols aren't designed for everything being safe when everyone does everything right, but for things still being safe when things goes wrong. If someone stops giving everything 100% at the parachute factory and someone dies because of that, that's because management fucked up.

It should not be possible for one person fucking up on the parachute manufacturing line to kill someone. It should be caught, every single time, that someone fucks up, with procedures for people fucking up more than is reasonable to be moved to another position or fired. It should be possible for the plant to catch every bad parachute even with multiple points of failure.

In fact not only should the plant be designed to be safe with everyone working at less than 100% because, obviously, that's an unsustainably high bar to manage. It should be possible even if everyone is unexpectedly having a bad day at the same time, because you know, stuff like contagious illnesses and bad weather events and local tragedies can impact many people in the workplace at once.

A parachute company which claims it needs its workers to give 100%, or any other company which uses that as an example of 100% all the time being necessary, is failing to implement safe margins of error.

[firebirdeternal]

I work in retail, low-end management. (Like, bottom-most rung. Only technically management in that it's my job to count money and be first-response if there's a customer who needs something more complicated than a basic transaction)

I always tell any new hires that what I want out of them is a solid 65% to 70%. If everybody at our store works that level of hard, not exhausting yourself, taking more breaks than they technically allow us, occasionally responding to messages or checking socials or stopping to tell a funny story, we'll be fine.

Unless corporate *absolutely overloads us* with way too much work, we can handle every task at that level of effort.

And? If you're having a bad day, you're a little under the weather or sad or just Not Feeling It today? Let me know. Take a 40% day. Man the register and pull up a chair, do the very basics, the rest of us can put in a 75% or an 80% today and everything will balance out.

100% every single day is burnout levels. That's knee and back injury levels. That's stress-induced breakdown levels, and there's not a paycheck in the world that's worth doing that to yourself over.

Any job that sincerely asks that of you knows exactly what they're doing, they're planning to wring you out like a wet rag and throw you out when they're done.

[coinandcandle]

Local house witch telling you to please learn basic housekeeping skills.

It’s not your fault if no one ever taught you but YouTube is a magical place and can teach you at your own pace.

[coinandcandle]

Someone asked me what housekeeping skills I’d recommend learning.

Keep in ming that this is not me shaming you, I know you have your reasons, folks. This is just a guy who enjoys clean spaces asking that you start learning now.

Here’s what I suggest as an adult who has lived with other adults who didn’t have housekeeping skills:

First and foremost, learn about all the places in your house that need to be cleaned and understand how often they should be cleaned. the American Cleaning Institute (I guess that’s a thing) has a good article about basic cleaning info. Plus this video on cleaning tips is great!

Learn how to do your dishes. HOT water is the only way to clean your dishes.

Learn how to clean your shower head, especially if you live in a place with hard water. Same goes for your sinks.

Learn how to do your laundry correctly. Even without the whole “separating whites and colors” thing, there are things you need to learn about washing your clothes. Learn what the tags mean, too.

Also, you don’t have to use fabric softener and you shouldn’t use it on towels or any fabric meant to absorb. (Learn about laundromats) And please learn how to clean out your dryer vent, it’s a safety hazard!

Get a disinfecting cleaner for your high-touch areas, especially the gross ones like the bathroom. Just because it doesn’t look dirty, doesn’t mean it’s clean!

Learn how to sweep, mop, and vacuum effectively.

You’ll also want to make sure to change out your home’s air filters.

TL;DR, here are some cleaning videos.

How to Clean Everything in Your Bathroom

How to Clean Everything in Your Kitchen

Livingroom Cleaning Routine

How to Clean Everything in Your Bedroom

Now these resources are not the end-all-be-all, but I think if you don’t know much about cleaning your space this is a good way to start.

[desultory-suggestions]

It's okay to be scraping by. Even if you would rather be doing better, even if you technically could be doing better. Sometimes the weight of things just pushes us down. Keep moving forward, even if is slow. In time you will be back where you want to be.

[styrke-deactivated20240722]

life doesn’t end at 25. life doesn’t end at 27 or 30 either. life doesn’t end at 35 or 45. life doesn’t end at 65. it doesn’t matter how old you are, when you decide to get your high school degree or start a family. it doesn’t matter when you decide to go run a marathon or go travel the world. life is not made up by numbers, age is, and your age is not all that you are. you got time. life doesn’t end until it ends.

[wholeheartedsuggestions]

you deserved a good childhood. you did not deserve what they put you through. it wasn’t your fault even if they blamed it on you. you were just a kid who should have been given a chance to just be a kid.

[thatwitchrevan]

I personally wanna see less 'you are not a burden/it's not work to love you' and more 'you are worth the work it takes to love you.' I KNOW I'm a burden sometimes. that isn't such a terrible thing! humans are strong. we can carry burdens. and it is work for me to be there for my friends, but it's work I'm willing to do.

we need to acknowledge this because pretending love isn't work will never make people like me feel less guilty for accepting love. we need to talk about it so people don't feel bad for having boundaries and not always being up to do the work. we need to accept it so we can properly appreciate what others do for us and what we're doing for them.

yes it does take work to love you. but guess what? you still deserve love, and you deserve people who are willing to do the work to love you. it doesn't make you bad. all love take work. and everyone is worth it.

[serendistudy]

you don't need to be productive all the time. you deserve to take breaks. you don't need to try and fill every small gap with something productive to do. you are allowed to just sit on the bus and stare out of the window or listen to music or whatever you'd like, there's no need for you to use every small moment for revising or learning. you are allowed to use all those moments to just relax and breathe, and you should.

[vamptits]

the right hairstyle for your face is the one that makes you smile when you see yourself in the mirror btw.

[wholeheartedsuggestions]

this post is for you. yes, you! you are so deserving of a good, happy, content life. you are so strong and resilient, and i am proud of you. you will make it through all this hardship and come out the other side doing better than ever.

[recoverr-deactivated20250621]

i don't know who needs to hear this, but guilt, self-hatred and shame are not sustainable sources of growth and healing. you can't hate yourself into feeling better, or being better. you can't repeatedly punish yourself for your flawed humanity and expect wholesome results.

[spooksier]

young artist posting your work online, heed my warning. im holding your face so gently in my hands, you have to stop caring about numbers right now and start caring about making the weirdest and most self-indulgent art you possibly can

[spooksier]

STOP listening to the demon of capitalism and START listening to the angel of hedonism, i love you i believe in you keep making what you love forever ok?

[sunflorally]

so you dated the wrong person and learned a hard lesson. you chose the wrong major and had to start over again. you cherished a friend who backstabbed you. it sucks, but it’s also going to work out. that’s life; you learn, hurt, love, cry, laugh, and keep going. you experience setbacks and you grow and it’s all okay.

[fennecandco]

Trauma didn't make me nice, I consciously made me nice because I don't want anyone else to suffer like I did. Trauma didn't make me strong, I made me strong. Don't you dare ever tell me my trauma made me anything but scared, broken, and confused. Don't give credit to the abusers for me being a good person. They didn't make me good, I made myself good.

[their-we-go]

[uncanny-tranny]

I think so many people are so deeply alienated from themselves that they have no clue how to exercise their free will and autonomy. For some, this alienation runs so deep that they are afraid of their own autonomy and humanity. It is completely understandable why one would have those feelings, but it can be worrisome.

I want to help others who feel this way, so here are small things I have done to exercise my free will:

Add "guilty pleasure" songs to playlists and actually listen to them (I have a ton of late 1990s-early 2000s music I listen to now proudly that I never listened to in the past out of shame)

Getting the décor item, bath set, bed spread, ect. in the patterns you like, even if it's "childish" (I got a dinosaur-themed wastebasket from the kids' décor section and I adore it)

Taking a new route to get to a place you go to often

Eat dessert first

Celebrate well, and often

Collect things that are "odd" or don't seem like an "acceptable" thing to collect (somebody on my "for you" page collects dandelion crayola crayons and it was so cool!!!!!!)

Incorporate one new piece in an outfit you wear frequently (e.g., a new chain, a necklace, ribbons, bracelets, ect.). Challenge yourself to add onto the outfits if you feel up for it.

Sing along to songs without worrying that you sound "good" or your intonation is completely accurate

Read a book from a genre you weren't allowed to read as a kid (comics, thrillers, mysteries, anything!)

Walk without having a specific destination or goal

Pick up a new craft without expecting yourself to master it or to ever be "good" enough. Get your hands messy.

I don't want to shame anybody for not feeling as though they have free will or that they are exempt from exercising it. However, I wanted to give ideas so that you might read this list and find your own ways to express your intrinsic autonomy and will. You deserve to be a person, to feel alive, not just living. That is what our lives are for.

[avarkriss]

listen. listen to me so carefully right now. (if you're in the eclipse path/planning on viewing). please don't stare directly at the sun tomorrow. i am begging you - do not stare at it. if you got eclipse glasses off of amazon/other, please put them on in your house and make sure you can't see anything; if you can still see like regular sun glasses, they are not safe for eclipse viewing, you will burn your retinas, and we cannot fix that. eclipse glasses should be iso/ce certified, and aas (american astronomical society) approved. please make smart choices and protect your eyes. please.