Front Row Dads with Jon Vroman

You're exhausted, so we made this one short.
Two things worth your tired attention. First, a nearly free trick for kids' bedtime that works with their biology instead of against it: no arguing, no negotiating, just light. And second, a genuinely kind word for couples who've been short with each other lately: sleep-deprived people are not their best selves, and that's not a character flaw.
This is part of NEW DAD WEEK, five short episodes for expecting dads and dads in the first year. Free field guide for the whole week at frontrowdads.com/newdad.
IN THIS EPISODE:
The light trick: dim the house an hour before bed and watch your kids drift upstairs on their own
Why light placement signals a child's body that it's time to sleep
The 90-minute wind-down: big lights off, low lamps on
Grace for the sleep-deprived marriage, and why weathering the season is the actual strategy
This one came from a longer conversation about sleep, circadian rhythms, and why sleep is a skill you can build. Hear the full episode: frontrowdads.com/431
 
This is part of NEW DAD WEEK, five short episodes for expecting dads and dads in the first year. Free field guide for the whole week at frontrowdads.com/newdad.

We asked what advice he'd give a new dad. His answer had nothing to do with the baby.
 
Steve Olsher's advice for men entering fatherhood is to prioritize your wife, above the kids. It sounds backwards, especially when there's a newborn in the house who genuinely needs everything. But his reasoning is hard to argue with: the most important relationship in a family is the one between mom and dad, and when the two of you are off, the whole house feels it. He also makes an uncomfortable case that nearly every conflict traces back to one thing.
 
This is part of NEW DAD WEEK, five short episodes for expecting dads and dads in the first year. Free field guide for the whole week at frontrowdads.com/newdad.
 
IN THIS EPISODE:
Why the strongest thing in your family is the relationship between the two of you
What happens to couples who let the whole dynamic become about the kids
The long view: one day they leave, and you're either with your best friend or a stranger
Why 99 times out of 100 the fight was your fault
How selfishness quietly runs most conflict, and what to do about it
 
Hear Steve's full conversation at frontrowdads.com/199.

Suzanne Yatim Aslam had postpartum depression after her son was born, and in this conversation she tells dads exactly what it looked like from the inside, including the part almost nobody says out loud: for a while, she blamed her baby for ruining her life. Her husband didn't know. She never asked for help. She just kept saying she was fine.
 
This is part of NEW DAD WEEK, five short episodes for expecting dads and dads in the first year. We built a free field guide to go with it: the main points from every episode plus prompts you can actually use. Grab it at frontrowdads.com/newdad.
 
IN THIS EPISODE:
"Depression is its own character in your brain, and it tells you lies"
What it feels like to blame your own child, and why that's the illness talking
Why "I'm fine" is the most dangerous sentence in your house right now
Why she needed her husband to advocate for her when she couldn't advocate for herself
What NOT to say: "enjoy it, it goes so fast" and "at least he's healthy," and why they make a drowning mom feel worse
The systems that actually helped her recover: solo days, therapy, and a daily mid-day break
Fix it or feel it: the four-word question that tells you what she actually needs
A note: this episode discusses depression and mental health honestly. If you or your partner are struggling, please talk to a doctor or a therapist. In the US, you can call or text 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, and Postpartum Support International is at 1-800-944-4773.
Hear Suzanne's full conversation at frontrowdads.com/341

Your wife is struggling, and everything in you wants to solve it. That instinct is the problem.
Welcome to NEW DAD WEEK. Five short episodes for guys who are expecting or in the thick of the first year. We're starting with Jason Kreidman on the skill that matters most early on, and it isn't tactical. It's empathy, which he calls the single biggest game changer in how he parents and how he loves his wife. He also lands on four words that will save you an enormous amount of grief: do you want me to fix it, or feel it?
 
We built a free field guide for the whole week: the main points from every episode plus prompts you can actually use. Grab it at frontrowdads.com/newdad.
 
IN THIS EPISODE:
Why the number one thing a new dad needs to hear isn't tactical, it's "you're not alone"
Everyone feels like they're the only one who doesn't get it. Everyone.
Empathy as the game changer, and what it actually looks like in practice
"Do you want me to fix it, or feel it?" and why asking beats guessing
Why "what can I do?" often doesn't help, and what to do instead
The neighbour rule: don't ask what food they want, just bring food
Meeting your wife's love language at a higher level than you think is reasonable
Hear Jason's full conversation at frontrowdads.com/101.

There are two lessons available when something in your life keeps hurting. One is to get tougher. The other is to walk away. Most men only ever get coached on the first one.
 
WHAT THIS IS
This is the first episode of something new we're calling Walk With Jon.
No studio, no script, no guest, no editing. Just Jon Vroman on a walking trail near his house, thinking out loud. In his words:
"What I don't want to do is stand at my desk anymore at my expensive microphone and try to record the highest quality show. I thought, if we were friends and on the phone and talking to each other, it would sound like this. You'd hear the wind in the background, the crunch of the rocks under my feet. It wouldn't be the highest quality audio, but it would be authentic. It would be real. You would be with me."
So yes, the audio is rougher than what you're used to from us. That's the point. No edits, no stops, no re-records. His words again: "just mistakes, back steps, corrections throughout." In a world where you can't always tell what's real and what came out of a machine, these are his unfiltered thoughts as he walks.
He also asks for two things up front. That you send feedback and tell him what you'd want him to think through out loud, because he's a verbal processor and this helps him as much as it helps you. And that you allow him to change his mind later, because that's what growth looks like.
 
WHAT HE'S THINKING ABOUT THIS MORNING
He calls it the nut-kicking line. Picture standing in a line where you keep getting kicked, and a coach beside you saying the lesson is resilience. Toughen up. Build grit. Focus your attention somewhere else.
Sometimes that's exactly right. But Jon's point is that there's a second lesson almost nobody coaches, which is that you're allowed to step out of the line. Learning to let go, to say no, to move on, is also a lesson.
He works it through his own three ultramarathons, one of which he thinks genuinely hurt him, and then through marriages, business partners, employees, and kids of divorce who say they wish their parents had separated sooner. Both paths have beautiful stories. Both have regrets. As he puts it: "All of it's true."
The question he lands on isn't which one is right. It's what you'd hear if you got quiet and honest enough to ask yourself.
 
IN THIS WALK:
Why he's recording on a trail instead of at his desk, and what unfiltered is worth right now
Why he reserves the right to change his mind, and why that's growth and not flip-flopping
The nut kicking line, and the two very different lessons hiding inside it
His 52-mile walk-run in 2006, doing it again in 2007, and the anniversary run ten years later that cost him
Whether ultra-endurance events serve your body or only your mindset, and where David Goggins fits
Ben Greenfield trading hard training for long walks, and what shifting seasons looks like
Where this shows up for real: marriages, business partners, employees, and children of divorce
Why he believes there are no bad decisions, only decisions, and that even the hard ones come with blessings
It's okay to not be okay, and even indecision is a decision
The Hoffman Institute method his friend David uses: asking your emotional body, mind, heart, and spirit separately, then integrating the answers
Jon's four core values: truth, love, respect, responsibility
Front Row Dads turning 10, and heading back to Philadelphia where it started in 2016
Jon reads every reply. If something here landed, or if you think he's wrong about it, tell him. He'd say the disagreement is as useful as the agreement, because it shows you what you actually believe.
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Front Row Dads is a brotherhood of family men with businesses, not businessmen with families. Nearly a thousand men have come through the community in our first ten years. To learn more, go to frontrowdads.com.