The Anxious Dad: An Introduction
I never had anxiety before. I mean, I did but I didn’t if you know what I mean. I had the components of anxiety, but they were all just sitting inside the fridge or in the pantry. That anxiety hadn’t been fully cooked yet.
When I looked at those individual ingredients, I saw run-of-the-mill character quirks and personality traits.
Yes, I had a driving need to plan out every trip or date night or work day, but that was just the hallmark of a productive and organized person.
Yes, my brain raced when I went to bed, writing e-mails or scenes from scripts that I had planned to start tomorrow, but that was just the side effect of a creative temperament.
Yes, I over-analyzed what people said to me and internalized what they thought about me until I convinced myself of a given narrative, but that was just a normal desire to please people. Also, probably a consequence of being picked on as a kid.
So while friends of mine owned their anxieties and found ways to manage them (shout out to the stress nappers), I simply put my head down and trudged forward.
Until I couldn’t.
I don’t know if it was a direct result of my son being born that the oven dinged and those ingredients finally formed a fully baked crippling anxiety or whether it was bound to happen sooner or later and becoming a father was just the domino that fell at the right time.
All I know is that I finally saw those separate ingredients for what they were, and it damn near punched a hole through my chest.
I started talking to somebody about where my anxiety may come from and why it manifests for me in the way it does, and that’s helped. However, I’ve always been compelled to write things down.
I printed and bound my own short stories when I was in 2nd grade. In 3rd grade, I wrote a series of fantasy stories inspired by the “Redwall” series about talking animals who were also avenging warriors. I’ve turned countless personal moments into scripts that range from useless to really-not-so-bad.
For better or worse, I write out my shit. That’s how I process what goes on around me, so it makes sense that it’s also the method that feels best for processing these two major moments coinciding at the same time: becoming a father and confronting my own anxieties.
Since nothing is private in 2022, and having a public audience holds me accountable, I decided to put my thoughts together in a Substack. Every other week I’ll try to sort through the plentiful options and pick one moment of parenthood-based anxiety that feels ripe for a squeeze.
I’ll make fun of myself, analyze my reactions, and overall try to process what’s going on through writing. Not to teach anybody lessons or to become some glorified Augustin Burroughs memoirist, but because I’ve learned that having a community is helpful in dealing with both anxiety and parenthood.
While there are many moments where it feels like there is too much information and too many opinions, it’s been nice to know that other parents struggle with the same realizations or that other dad’s had similar struggles with anxiety sprout at the same time.
I don’t plan to talk to just dads or just parents. I’m not even sure I’ll really be talking to anybody. I’ll just write, and maybe you’ll find it enjoyable or helpful.
Or maybe my son will read it one day and find it embarrassing. There are endless possibilities, so let’s see where it goes.