The Dad Edge Podcast

This week's Wednesday Q&A is a little different, I'm running it solo since my usual co-host Joe couldn't make it, and honestly, it turned into one of the harder, more important conversations we've had. A man in our Alliance named Rich called in with a genuinely difficult situation: his 17-year-old stepdaughter recently went through a breakup, was hospitalized shortly after making statements about wanting to end her life, and Rich is trying to figure out how to support her while also being honest that he's not sure whether what he's seeing is a real crisis or a manipulation tactic she's learned to use.
I want to be upfront that I am not a licensed therapist, and neither is anyone else on this call. We have someone in our community who specializes in this exact area, and when a situation is acute, that's who we point men toward. What I can offer is real, lived experience, because one of my own boys went through a genuinely frightening season with depression and anxiety years ago, and I've been in the position of feeling completely out of my depth as a father.
If you're a father watching a child struggle right now and feeling like you have no idea what you're doing, or you're not even sure if what you're seeing is a real crisis, this conversation won't give you all the answers, because there often aren't easy ones. But it might help you feel less alone in it.
 
Timeline Summary
[1:02] Opening the Wednesday Q&A solo, and introducing today's difficult topic
[1:48] Introducing Rich, a leader in the Alliance's teen-parenting group, and his situation
[3:13] Rich shares that his 17-year-old bonus daughter has recently expressed suicidal thoughts
[4:33] Understanding the timeline: a difficult personal season followed by a breakup two weeks ago
[5:43] Larry announces Roommates to Soulmates cohort three, starting September 16th
[7:25] Larry's disclaimer: not a licensed therapist, and where the community sends acute cases
[8:37] Asking Rich what he'd want to see in his stepdaughter's life a few months from now
[9:49] The tension between wanting to support her and wanting to hold her accountable to her own goals
[10:47] Assessing her circle of friends and the instability there
[12:30] First piece of advice: don't go through this alone, and find a therapist she connects with
[13:20] The breakfast and games advice from a mentor, and why simple connection mattered more than conversation
[15:27] The medication journey: an initial diagnosis, a worsening condition, and a specialized brain scan clinic
[17:07] How a corrected diagnosis and a supplement-based approach turned things around over about a year
[17:32] Larry shares his own 2017 hospitalization following extreme physical training and severe insomnia
[19:29] Reiterating connection over correction as the throughline of the advice
[19:51] Larry announces a rare, small-group preview of the Dad Edge Business Boardroom Brotherhood
[24:19] Closing advice: don't go through it alone, connect first, and remember that without connection there is no influence
 
Five Key Takeaways
You don't have to be a mental health expert to support a struggling child, but you do have to know when to bring in someone who is. Recognizing the limits of your own expertise and connecting your family with the right specialist is itself an act of good fathering.

Connection has to come before correction. A struggling teenager often needs low-pressure time with a parent, free of goal-setting or serious conversation, far more than another conversation about fixing the problem.

Finding the right therapist matters as much as finding a therapist at all. A mismatch in chemistry or approach can make a child more resistant to help they genuinely need.

A diagnosis can be wrong, and it's worth getting a second opinion when treatment isn't working. A corrected diagnosis and a different treatment approach turned around a genuinely difficult, months-long decline.

You are not required to be blood related to be the father figure a child needs most. Consistent presence during a hard season is what a child remembers and trusts long after the season ends.

 
Links & Resources
Get the full show notes and every link from this episode: https://thedadedge.com/1525
Ready to stop feeling like roommates and start leading your marriage? Join the next Roommates to Soulmates cohort: https://thedadedge.com/soulmates
Know a dad with a story worth sharing, or want to be on the show yourself? Apply to be a guest: https://thedadedge.com/guest
 
Closing
If you're a father in the middle of a season like the one Rich is walking through right now, please hear this: you don't have to have it figured out, and you don't have to do it alone. Get connected with people who know more than you do, keep showing up for the small, ordinary moments of connection, and trust that the fruit of your presence will show up even if you can't see it yet. Without connection, we have no influence, so lead with connection first, every time. Go out and live legendary.
If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide, the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is available 24/7 by calling or texting 988.

Gentlemen, welcome to the fourth and final episode of this month's series with my wife Jessica, and I want to start by saying thank you for showing up for this one, since August actually had five Fridays this year, which means she recorded a full bonus episode she didn't have to do. Today we're tackling something that trips up more marriages than almost anything else: roles and expectations, and specifically, all the unspoken assumptions about who does what that quietly cause resentment when they're never actually talked about.
Jessica and I get into the finances first, how I took over bill paying for our first five years of marriage and, driven by my own anxiety around debt, paid things down so aggressively it actually put us in a bind more than once. We talk through why swapping our roles, me handling investing and her handling the day to day bills, ended up being the right fit for both of us, and why neither of us wants to trade back. From there we get into dinner, probably the single area that's caused us the most quiet frustration over the years, from Jessica's years of resentment doing all the cooking to the practical shift we finally made once we actually talked about it out loud instead of just enduring it.
We also open up about how we split the harder parenting conversations, why the sex talk with our boys has always fallen to me, and why Jessica has become the one I lean on for basically every other hard conversation in our house. I share what I've learned watching her approach conflict, calm, strategic, and incredibly well timed, compared to my own instinct to just react in the moment. We close out by talking through how we split up kids' sports and activities, and what boundaries actually held up over 22 years of marriage.
If your marriage has ever hit friction over who's supposed to be doing what, and you've never actually sat down and talked about it, this conversation is a real look at how two people figured that out over two decades together, including the parts that took way too long to fix.
 
Timeline Summary
[1:02] Introducing the fourth and final episode of the August series with Jessica
[12:56] Reflecting on last week's lower-energy episode and setting up today's topic: roles and expectations
[14:12] Larry announces Roommates to Soulmates cohort three, starting September 16th
[16:33] Why unspoken and unknown expectations are what actually trip couples up the most
[19:00] The early years of bill paying: Larry's aggressive debt payoff and the strain it caused
[21:52] Why paying bills stressed Larry out so deeply, no matter how much money was in the bank
[24:36] Checking in on whether Jessica still feels good about handling the bills 17 years later
[25:39] Introducing the second financial role: why Larry handles all the investing
[27:05] Larry's own journey from investing overwhelm to genuinely loving it today
[30:45] Confirming neither of them wants to trade financial roles, and why that alignment matters
[31:27] Introducing the dinner problem: why family meals can become a major source of strife
[32:52] The moment, about a year ago, Jessica finally said out loud that she hated cooking
[33:32] The fix: splitting cooking nights and having the non-cooking spouse handle cleanup
[37:55] Larry announces the first-ever Dad Edge Day with the Arizona Cardinals, November 15th
[42:22] Checking in on what Jessica would still change about how dinner works today
[43:24] Jessica's regret: never requiring the kids to eat what was served instead of making separate meals
[46:34] Why the sex talk role has always fallen to Larry, and how he approaches it with their boys
[52:36] Breaking down Jessica's calm, strategic approach to conflict versus Larry's reactive instinct
[57:14] A callback to an earlier, lighter moment in the series about Larry's past drinking
[1:00:49] How they split kids' sports and activities, and the assumptions each of them still carries
[1:03:22] What comes next: Jessica joining monthly, and how to submit topic ideas
[1:04:51] Introducing two free resources: 25 Intimate Conversation Starters and 21 Days to an Extraordinary Marriage
 
Five Key Takeaways
Roles that feel natural today were often built through real trial and error, not instinct. Larry and Jessica swapped financial responsibilities after outside mentors pointed out they'd assigned them backward, and it took years to get right.

Resentment builds fastest around unspoken expectations. Nearly every friction point in their marriage, from bills to dinner, traces back to one person assuming a role the other person quietly grew to dread.

Sometimes the fix is simple once you finally say the hard thing out loud. Jessica's years of resentment around cooking dissolved almost immediately once she told Larry directly that she hated it, leading to a workable rotation within one conversation.

Timing matters as much as the message when addressing conflict. Jessica's approach of waiting for a calm moment, rather than confronting an issue in the heat of frustration, consistently produces a better outcome than reacting immediately.

Roles don't have to be permanent or symmetrical to work. Twenty-two years in, the goal isn't a perfectly even split of every responsibility, it's each person operating in the role that actually fits them, while staying willing to revisit it when it's not working.

 
Links & Resources
Shownotes for this episode: http://thedadedge.com/1524
Roommates to Soulmates (Larry's 8-week marriage coaching cohort; next cohort starts September 16th, with free preview calls): http://thedadedge.com/soulmates
The Dad Edge Day at State Farm Stadium (Arizona Cardinals vs. Los Angeles Rams, November 15): https://thedadedge.com/nfl
 Closing
Wrapping up this series, what stands out most is that Jessica and I don't have this figured out because we never struggled, we have it figured out because we finally stopped avoiding the hard conversations about who does what and why. Every role we've settled into came from a real conversation, sometimes an overdue one, not from assuming the other person would just handle it or just deal with it forever. If something in your own marriage has quietly been building resentment because nobody's actually said it out loud, let this be the nudge to finally have that conversation. Go out and live legendary.

Don Ross is the founder of Manhood Tribes, a former pastor of 20 years who now works in digital marketing and has spent over two decades helping men cut through the noise around masculinity and build real brotherhood. Married 22 years with two boys, he's built his work around five marks of manhood and, more recently, helping men prepare for what he believes are the biblical end times.
This is a unique episode. Don walks Larry through the specific signs he sees converging right now, the nation of Israel and the temple, the move toward digital currency, and the gospel reaching every ethnic group, then pivots to what actually matters for the average man: building community, growing real-world skills, and developing a genuine relationship with Jesus rather than just checking religious boxes. If you've felt the anxiety of scrolling the news and wondered how to lead your family through uncertain times, this conversation offers a grounded, faith-centered answer.
 
Timeline Summary
[3:29] – How close are we to the end times, and what that phrase actually means
[5:28] – Why the anxiety men feel scrolling their phones connects to the bigger picture
[7:33] – The specific signs happening now that are unique in human history
[9:05] – Introducing Don Ross, Manhood Tribes, and the epidemic of male loneliness
[12:35] – The Euphrates River drying up as a minor sign
[13:29] – Israel reestablished as a nation in 1948 and the Ezekiel dry bones prophecy
[15:10] – The Temple Institute, the red heifer, and preparations for a third temple
[20:41] – Why the dome of the Rock and secular Israeli politics have stalled the temple
[25:05] – Global commerce, the mark of the beast, and central bank digital currencies
[29:23] – How state-controlled currency mirrors China's social credit system
[32:29] – The third and more hopeful sign: the gospel reaching every ethnic group by 2033
[35:27] – Why the decline of masculinity collides with this moment in history
[37:13] – Larry on feeling spiritually ready but not practically prepared
[44:05] – What Covid revealed about government control, framed carefully as speculation
[48:39] – Why building a bunker is the wrong first step
[50:34] – The five marks of manhood: strength, courage, skill, honor, and allegiance
[51:34] – Monthly challenges, from cold showers to learning vehicle maintenance
[54:20] – The spiritual anchor and connecting relationally to Jesus
[56:56] – Knowing Jesus as a person, not just checking the church and Bible boxes
[1:03:44] – Larry's hike through Garden of the Gods and the decision that brought him peace
 
5 Key Takeaways
Watch the Season, Not the Date — The instruction was never to predict the day, but to recognize the season and be ready. Don points to several signs converging at once as reason to pay attention rather than panic.
Loneliness Is a Crisis, and Community Is the Answer — Most men believe they have to figure life out alone, and the isolation is at an all time high. Real brotherhood is what helps men survive hardship and become better husbands and fathers.
Don't Build a Bunker, Build a Community — The prepper instinct is individualistic, but the biblical model is to love your neighbor as yourself. The right next step is building strong community that can support each other through any storm.
Grow Real Skills as a Man — Strength, courage, skill, honor, and allegiance are traits you develop over a lifetime. Practical challenges like cold showers or basic vehicle maintenance build the grit and capability most modern men have lost.
Know Jesus as a Person — Faith isn't just going to church, reading the Bible, and praying as a checklist. It's a relationship built through conversation, listening, and shared experience, the same way you'd cultivate connection with a spouse.
 
Links & Resources
Episode page and all links: https://thedadedge.com/1523
Manhood Tribes on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@ManhoodTribes
Roommates to Soulmates (cohort 3, starts September 16, free preview calls September 8 and 9): https://thedadedge.com/soulmates
Dad Edge Day with the Arizona Cardinals (November 15, Cardinals vs Rams, State Farm Stadium): https://thedadedge.com/nfl
The Pursuit of Legendary Fatherhood by Larry Hagner: https://thedadedge.com
 
Enjoyed This Episode?
If Don's challenge to be informed, prepared, and faithful struck a chord, take one small step this week. Learn a practical skill you've been avoiding, or spend ten quiet minutes listening in prayer instead of just talking. If the show keeps delivering, follow, rate, and leave a review so more fathers can find these conversations.

Larry is back in studio with his wife Jessica for the fourth installment of their couples series, recorded the same month they hit 23 years of marriage and 30 years of knowing each other. This time the whole conversation centers on one word that quietly makes or breaks a marriage: alignment. Most couples, Larry notes from a decade of coaching, are misaligned on parenting, money, intimacy, and faith, and never realize it until it derails their connection.
Larry and Jessica walk through how they actually got aligned over 22 years, from choosing experiences over stuff and a backyard over a sports car, to spending on healthy food and shared workouts, to raising kids who value connection over possessions. They're honest that it came through constant, daily communication, the kind most couples avoid. If your marriage feels more like managing a household than sharing a life, this conversation is a window into how two people build shared values on purpose.
 
Timeline Summary
[3:04] – What alignment in marriage actually means, and how misalignment shows up
[6:09] – The daily reality of getting kids to help, and delegating chores
[10:10] – Pulling back the curtain on a heated dinner with one of their kids the night before
[10:52] – Why cleaning became Larry and Jessica's separate processing and thinking time
[12:10] – The core values exercise and discovering they valued environment and connection, not possessions
[13:36] – Their family mission: experiences over stuff, memories over things, connection over everything
[16:05] – Why some couples need to buy or schedule experiences just to feel connected
[17:53] – The Covid dishes conversation and Jessica's grounded response to Larry's darkest thought
[19:52] – No luxury cars, no name brands, and being genuinely okay with less
[22:36] – The backyard project versus a sports car, and what Ethan learned from it
[24:16] – How they actually arrived at shared values through talking and reflecting
[26:40] – 2017 as the turning point toward chasing experiences over stuff
[27:04] – The three gifts rule at Christmas and where it came from
[30:39] – Jessica's advice to their kids: communication is the key to any relationship
[33:55] – Why couples talk about logistics but avoid the deeper alignment conversations
[36:02] – The intimacy parallel: what happens when you stop pursuing each other
[38:24] – Why they never run out of things to talk about, even after 23 years
[40:14] – Can people be taught to communicate, or is that just who they are?
[44:43] – Alignment as the make or break, and the non-negotiables they built together
[45:33] – Going to bed at the same time, and when it's actually okay to go to bed angry
 
5 Key Takeaways
Alignment Is the Make or Break — Most couples are quietly misaligned on parenting, money, intimacy, and faith, and it derails their connection without them realizing why. Building shared values on purpose is what holds a marriage together over decades.
Experiences Over Stuff — Larry and Jessica built a family mission around memories over things and connection over everything. The backyard they gather in beat the sports car precisely because it creates shared experiences instead of solo possession.
Communication Has to Be Daily — Talking through logistics isn't the same as real communication. Checking in every day, even briefly, keeps small tensions from compounding into the silence and assumptions that quietly end marriages.
Don't Let Intimacy Drift — Just like conversation, physical intimacy erodes when you stop pursuing each other. Let too much time pass and it becomes awkward and hard to return to, so keep reaching for each other before the gap widens.
You Can Change If It Matters Enough — "That's just who I am" is an excuse, not a fact. People revert to old patterns, but anyone can learn to communicate better if the relationship matters enough to them to keep practicing.
 
Links & Resources
Episode page and all links: https://thedadedge.com/1522
Roommates to Soulmates (cohort 3, starts September 16, free preview calls September 8 and 9): https://thedadedge.com/soulmates
Dad Edge Day with the Arizona Cardinals (November 15, Cardinals vs Rams, State Farm Stadium): https://thedadedge.com/nfl
 
Enjoyed This Episode?
If hearing Larry and Jessica lay out the values they built on purpose made you wonder where you and your spouse are actually aligned, pick one area and talk it through this week. Ask your partner what they'd want more of, or download the 25 questions and work through a couple on your next date. If the show keeps delivering, follow, rate, and leave a review so more fathers can find these conversations.

Officer Randy Keith is a military veteran, a 15-year law enforcement officer, and the founder of Present Father, a platform that now reaches hundreds of thousands of dads across the world. He didn't set out to build a movement. He built it from the darkest chapter of his life, a high-conflict divorce that put him through false allegations, an order of protection that nearly cost him his career, CPS interviews of his young children, and the terror of dropping his kids off not knowing if he'd get them back.
Randy walks Larry through the night it all began, why he chose 50-50 custody when his attorney said he could have won full custody, and the moment in his car around the corner from his ex-wife's house when he pulled out his phone and started talking, the post that became Present Father. This is a raw conversation about father's rights, staying present against enormous odds, and turning your mess into your message. It's also a heavy one, with an honest look at how many men in these situations reach the edge, and why community can be lifesaving.
 
Timeline Summary
[1:23] – The night his ex-wife went for the gun safe and he called 911
[4:34] – Declining to press charges because he didn't want to jail the mother of his kids
[5:48] – Discharged in hours after telling nurses he was abusing his power as an officer
[7:14] – Filing a Title 36 mental health petition and getting emergency custody
[9:01] – Choosing 50-50 so he could look his kids in the eye someday
[10:15] – His attorney saying he was in the driver's seat and could have full custody
[12:13] – Served with an order of protection built on false allegations
[13:09] – How a federal firearm statute nearly ended his law enforcement career
[14:38] – His kids interviewed by CPS at school without his knowledge
[15:40] – The mosquito-bite doctor's note that became a bedbugs and abuse allegation
[17:25] – Inviting CPS in, and being asked to teach parenting classes at the end
[20:49] – Why she really moved four hours away, and the job that lasted two weeks
[23:28] – The threats that continue and the fears he carries as a target
[26:35] – Finding purpose in the worst season and turning mess into message
[30:10] – Why high-conflict divorce is rare, and why so few men talk about it
[33:28] – Introducing Randy Keith and the Present Father platform
[36:00] – The moment in the car that birthed Present Father
[38:24] – The first TikTok post and the flood of men who felt the same
[42:30] – From 800 followers to nearly 900,000 across platforms
[44:08] – The suicide messages, and how Randy responds personally
[46:08] – Sean Pearson and the Dad to Dad peer support platform
[47:22] – The father who thanked him for comforting his son in his final moments
[48:06] – Larry on losing two men from the Dad Edge community to suicide
[50:30] – The therapist's question that reframed suicide for Larry in 2017
[52:22] – Why the pain is a season, not a life sentence
[53:39] – Larry on being glad he didn't listen when people said "this too shall pass," and glad he listened just enough
[54:08] – The vision for Present Father: a nonprofit providing attorneys to the falsely accused
[54:35] – Advocating in D.C. for equal shared parenting as the standard
[56:05] – Bankruptcy as a common cost of fighting for your kids
[56:34] – What he learned from his first relationship and carried into his new marriage
[57:57] – Why one bad experience doesn't mean everyone will treat you the same
[59:55] – Where to connect with Randy and the Present Father Show
 
5 Key Takeaways
Presence Beats Perfection — Your kids don't need a perfect father. They need a present one. Even when circumstances are stacked against you, showing up consistently is what matters most.
Your Mess Is Your Message — You don't have to be the polished expert to help people. Randy's raw honesty as an everyday guy going through it reaches people precisely because it's real and relatable, not because he has it all figured out.
The Pain Is a Season, Not a Sentence — In the darkest moments it feels like it will never end, but it's temporary. Suicide doesn't end the pain, it transfers it to the people you love most, for generations. Reaching out and finding community can be lifesaving.
You're Not Alone in This — High-conflict divorce and false allegations are isolating, and shame keeps men silent. Finding even one other person who's been through it turns unbearable isolation into a community and a path forward.
One Bad Experience Isn't the Whole World — Surviving a devastating relationship doesn't mean everyone will treat you the same way. With honest due diligence and self-work, there is happiness and partnership on the other side.
 
Links & Resources
Episode page and all links: https://thedadedge.com/1521
Present Father (Randy Keith's website): https://present-father.com 
The Present Father Show podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PZwSoq6glUSq20CcHB88R
Roommates to Soulmates (cohort 3, starts September 16, free preview calls September 8 and 9): https://thedadedge.com/soulmates
Dad Edge Day with the Arizona Cardinals (November 15, Cardinals vs Rams, State Farm Stadium): https://thedadedge.com/nfl
 
If You're Struggling
This episode deals openly with suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling, you can call or text 988 in the US to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, available 24/7. You are not alone, and the season you're in is not the end of your story.
Enjoyed This Episode?
If Randy's story reached you, whether you're in the middle of your own hard season or you know a dad who is, don't let him carry it alone. Send this episode to a father who needs to hear that presence beats perfection and that he's not alone in this. If the show keeps delivering, follow, rate, and leave a review so more fathers can find these conversations.