growing up with a dad who was pretty reserved and not emotional at all.

And the men in my life were very much brick wall, no emotions, man up, get through it.

No one cares, right?

And I always felt like even when I was a kid, I was always a feeler.

But I never really had that permission. And I always thought,

ah, you're just weird. You're just weird. And I bottled it up. And so many, so many men do that.

And it's coming off of a generation where that's kind of what we saw. And, you know, it's still kind of what we see in society.

I think it's getting better to where we understand it's not serving us.

It's not making us better men.

It's not really strength at all.

Like, yeah, sure, we can through the mud for a very long time we can hold it in for decades we can hide it

through alcohol we can run from our problems but i just feel that's not going to make us the best

husbands that's not going to make us the best fathers this is diane bowden and you're listening to

the minimalist moms podcast.

We hear a lot about how hard motherhood can be, but what about dads? Today I'm joined by John

Gustin, known as the tired dad for a deeply honest conversation about fatherhood, emotional load,

and what it means to show up fully for your family. John's work began after experiencing

real strain in his own marriage during the postpartum season. As he navigated shared mental

load, identity shifts, and the pressure providing while wanting to be emotionally present,

he started sharing his experience online. And what he found was millions of dads quietly feeling

the same way.

In today's episode, John opens up about the invisible weight fathers carry, the expectations,

...