<p>My dad did work a lot of hours, but since we had breakfast at 5:15 (it only lasted 10 - 15 minutes), he was able to get into work by 6am. Being in L.A., that is important to beat the traffic. Thus, he could easily put in a 10-hr day and still be home by 5:30pm. My dad still works a lot of hours, but he still gets to work by 6am (he’s a morning person). At my current job, many people with children do the same thing. They work 50 - 60 hrs/wk, yet they are home for dinner at night. It is not that uncommon. I also see a lot of my coworkers working from home 1-2 days per week. That is also becoming a new norm.</p>
<p>“Sseamom” I find your post quite amusing. My dad is not a flowery writer and I could never imagine him writing things out like how you gave examples. Like most of his children, he is very logical/factual/precise and not so much on the flowery side. I think that has way more to do with writing ability/style than attitude. </p>
<p>Also, I agree that his writing does appear to have a lot of pride in the way he raised his children. But then again, don’t most parents take a lot of pride in their children? And when they take pride in their children, don’t they credit themselves to at least some degree? Is this not taking pride in their own methods? </p>
<p>Yes, of course we’ve been fortunate with good health. Just 'cause my father didn’t mention that doesn’t necessarily mean he doesn’t recognize that (there were a million things he didn’t mention in the article). On the other hand, not all of us agree with his theory on food allergies. But then again, we all do think quite differently on many subjects and disagree all over the place. That’s what makes a family fun; So many different personalities all learning to appreciate each other. A coworker told me that her family taught her that she can love anyone (“If I can love my siblings, as difficult as they are, I know I can learn to love anyone”)!</p>
<p>GirlThompson, I can’t see into your father’s heart. I’m judging him by what he wrote; that’s what we do when we read articles that people write. Maybe he is grateful for his children’s success in the genetic lottery. But the article had none of that. It came across as smug.</p>
<p>If he wants to not sound smug, then he has to put things on paper, because every time I read one of those people spraining his shoulder patting himself on the back for his wonderfulness in something he allegedly did that produced his children’s success, I say to myself, yeah, I did some of those things too, and yet my son still has Aspergers.</p>
<p>Do what your father did, but do it with twelve adoptees from twenty-four different parents, and then come back to me and tell me how much of the children’s success is parenting and how much is genetic. I suspect that the results will be very different.</p>
<p>The food allergy thing boggles my mind. My SIL has nearly died more than once by being exposed to melon juice on other food on her plate. That’s all it takes for her. Allergies can worsen over time. That’s a fact-the reason a person can be stung and just swell up until they one day lose consciousness from the 5th sting, or the 6th…</p>
<p>The idea that forcing kids to eat whatever is put on their plate no matter what-had my SIL as a kid said she didn’t like melon because it made her feel funny and been forced to eat it? Well, she wouldn’t be here now.</p>
<p>Well I didn’t think he sounded smug (and I can quite clearly see your father’s heart and I see love for his children and pride in how he raised them) - just a different viewpoint or way of looking at the world I guess. And they didn’t have 12 children from 24 different parents, he talked about his 12 birth children and how he raised them. Take what you can from the article and leave the rest if it doesn’t apply.</p>
<p>I think it’s reasonable to expect a child to try a new food, but if the child had a reaction to it, I think a parent would omit the offending food. Since there never was a food reaction, the rule continued.</p>
<p>I didn’t force the issue if a child objected to eating something. There were enough healthy choices to choose from. However, it would be hard to accommodate 12 childrens individual preferences. </p>
<p>I am not as structured a parent as this family, but we have rules. Sometimes though, I had to adjust if the rule wasn’t working well. Some of parenting is trial and error. I imagine that by child #12 there’s a lot of experience.</p>
<p>Oh, I’m certain he wouldn’t force a KNOWN allergic child to eat a food that was dangerous to him/her. But kids don’t always understand what’s going on. When my asthma-stricken child was little, she’d say her chest hurt. She didn’t say she was having trouble breathing. </p>
<p>If a little kid has an undiagnosed allergy, s/he might say something like that food makes them feel funny. A person who doesn’t believe in food allergies might think that the kid is trying to get out of eating it. And the kid could end up in the hospital or worse. </p>
<p>Even in our small family, we don’t cook special meals for people, but we don’t force them to eat a food they don’t like or starve, either. There’s always a stash of cereal or peanut butter, etc. so that they can at least eat. But if one of my kids when they were little said a food tasted weird or made them feel weird, I would take it seriously, because I believe in food allergies.</p>
<p>I’ll also take another leap of imagination with the cooking. A family with 12 children would not waste time or money cooking something kids wouldn’t like. Mealtime should be pleasant. I am thinking it was more like “eat your chicken casserole and carrots” not something the family doesn’t like.</p>
<p>Sseamom- we have food allergies in the family and it is real. I know what you experience- the tummy ache, funny feeling, vomiting and/or rash. I don’t think this family experienced that.</p>
<p>I am personally more lenient with food, but I am not sure how lenient I would be cooking for 12 children.</p>
<p>@sseamom. Like my sister I actually laughed at your rewrite of my dad’s article. He is not a flowery writer. I could not imagine him writing the way you did.
On a side note I have a daughter who has severe allergies to egg she gets anaphylaxic, hives, and breathing issues. Going over my parents house I never have to worry about whether or not she’s going to have to eat something she’s allergic to because my parents (dad and mom) make sure the house is sanitized from all egg and egg products before we get there. If there was an allergy they would have never put us in danger.</p>
<p>i’m happy that this worked out for this family. It seems that it is not likely that many others will be able to replicate it. </p>
<p>I don’t want to attack them. Like others, I find it irritating that people (not just this father) believe that just because something has worked for them, it will work for others. </p>
<p>This ability to miss meetings, not work evenings and weekends and be a superdad may be sometihg that is more doable if you are senior management than if you are middle management or the ordinary drone. </p>
<p>I’m glad they have such a lovely family, but I think that there are a lot of different kinds of lovely families.</p>
<p>girlthompson, glad to hear that you could make the longer hours work for your family. This is going to depend a great deal on the workplace culture and the length of the commute. My spouse and I live in the same general metro area; one of us has some flexibility in work scheduling, but the other cannot work an early day because that’s the nature of their field. Both of us have seen dinner time creep later in the day because of growing workplace demands, and that’s been the experience of our friends in the same geographic area. </p>
<p>It takes an enormous amount of commitment to eat breakfast as a family at 5:15!</p>
<p>I havent read the whole thread, but a few of the Thompson kids have suddenly found cc right after this article was linked and registered to participate in the conversation? Really? And does the fact that all 12 kids are grown but there are only 18 granddkids amongst all of them reflect the fact that maybe they want a different life for their kids than they grew up with? Just wondering…</p>
<p>jym626 - one of the Thompson kids addressed how they found CC (via some sort of newsfeed or something after the dad’s article came out), then alerted the other siblings who have since chimed in.</p>
<p>If I have this right (Thompson kids feel free to help me out here!) Dad is about 64ish. Has been married 40 years, so married around 24. Oldest child is 37 so he was maybe 26 when wife was first pregnant. And if the 12 were born within 15 years, most were born by the time he was the age the oldest is now. They have some catching up to do!!</p>
<p>So some of the “subjects” are involved in the thread? I thought there were some great ideas and wish I had instilled some of those values in my own (2) children, like doing chores. We were way to soft and generous with our kids.</p>
<p>I was wondering about the family photo, and the caption “Or Photoshop, since they haven’t all been in the same place since 1998” I would have thought a close family like that would have periodic reunions. </p>
<p>Also, as a car guy, I found the part about handing a kid a project and having it finished in 11 months - with rebuilt engine, transmission, and new paint - a bit hard to believe. </p>
<p>The story about 18 qts of oil in the radiator was a bit easier to believe. :D</p>