Dads in the Limelight ( #limelightdads ) – Paul Blanchard ( @DadOnAMission )

Our 196th Dad in the Limelight is Paul Blanchard. I want to thank Paul for being a part of this series. It has been great getting connected with him and now sharing him with all of you.

1) Tell me about yourself, (as well as how you are in the limelight for my readers knowledge)

I am a 38 year old father of two. I never married my children’s mother. We split up before we found out about her first pregnancy with my daughter Madison who is now 12 years old. I have dated once since my little girl was born but it didn’t work out well and honestly led me down a very dark road in my life. You can read more on that at my site if you like.
I am lucky enough to be able to work from home for my family run business as a financial coordinator and I.T. manager. I spend a great deal of my free time writing for a couple of blogs and working with my children on their hobbies and homework. I have occasionally considered dating again, but as of this writing I have not been presented with an opportunity worth exploring.

2) Tell me about your family

Six years later she found herself pregnant for the second time by a man who made the decision to not stick around. He did what I am sure he felt at the time was the right thing to do: He walked away in the middle of the night after finding out he would soon be a father. He taped an envelope to the front door of her house with a moderate amount of money and no explanation.
Nine months later my beautiful son Gabriel entered my life. He came to the conclusion on his own that I was his father. We never fed this information to him but it was a natural conclusion for him to arrive at. He grew up with me and hearing my daughter call me daddy… I couldn’t be more pleased though.
My son and I have developed an amazing relationship.
My childrens mother and I share 50/50 custody and we get along well enough that the children, her, and myself can spend time together during the holidays, the kids sporting events, and any other happenings that you would normally expect both parents to attend. This actually becomes even more of a remarkable situation considering she has recently married. Her husband and I get along very well to.
I still refer to her parents and siblings as my in-laws and they think of me the same way. I understand this is a very unusual situation for some to fully grasp, but our modern family is prospering and doing great.
What is important here is my children are happy. There mother and I both take an active role in their lives utilizing our strengths and helping one another through our shortcomings to have a truly unique family dynamic.

3) What has been the largest challenge you have had in being a father?

The greatest challenge for me in being a father was overcoming my own personal demons, namely addiction, to be a positive role model in my children’s lives. I do realize that even hearing the word will give many a very negative impression of me but I have a strict policy of complete and total honesty. (It’s one of the steps) From the time my daughter turned one till she was just about to have her fifth birthday she barely knew me. No thats not really accurate… she didn’t know me. Though her mother and I always maintained contact we both decided that until I had completely overcome the addiction that it was in the best interest of Madison if I wasn’t there. I spent those years bouncing from hospitals to rehabs and worse. Like I said the addiction took me down some very dark roads.
I am ashamed of the choices I made during that time, however, there are no time machines in life. I can only move forward and use that negative time for the best purposes I can come up with.
Firstly my children are well aware of where I was then and why. They know quite a bit of the details of what I was going through and the extreme difficulty I fought through to make it back. I consider myself very, very lucky to have made it out the other end of that tunnel. So many never do. I have channeled my energies to educating other absentee fathers that it is possible to repair some of the damage they have caused. I am a believer that children need their father, even the rotten ones… just not until they are able to change those negative actions that led them to be away in the first place.
Some fathers I am sure shouldn’t be allowed back into the lives of their kids, but every situation is different and that is up to the mothers and the fathers to decide.

4) What advice would you give to other fathers?

Everyone has advice to give, whether it is worth being followed needs to be taken with a grain of salt. There are many who would discredit anything I have to say on this subject and that is there right to do so.
The best advice I can give to fathers be they in similar situations to me or not… is to spend as much time with their kids as possible. Children grow up so fast and in athe blink of an eye they will not want that attention and closeness anymore. When I was a child I have very few memories of spending any time with my own father. Basically because he didn’t know how to enjoy himself but thats not very relevant here.
Spending time with your kids is the easiest thing in the world to do. Firstly you need to set aside your petty desires to do what you want and enjoy spending time with the kids doing what they want. It is really not that hard to be a kid again. You are only as old as you feel. I can still pick up a stick and see a gun, I can count to ten and go seek, I love to read stories and see kids movies, and etc…
You get the point I’m sure. It doesn’t matter in the slightest if I really enjoy the activity at hand or not… What I do enjoy is seeing my children happy, and if that means not going to bars with friends, if that means when my buddies get together for guys night out I have prior engagements with a box of legos and my son, or being behind the camera for my little girl and her friends as they film their latest YouTube vlog… well so be it.
I have missed way to much time with the two most important things in my life already, and time isn’t going to slow down for me or you. Take the time to get to know your children. And love every minute of it.

5) Seeing that you (or your position) are in the limelight, how have you come to balance parenthood and outside life? If you are currently not in the limelight per se, please still answer this in regards to how you balance parenthood and outside life.

I don’t know if I am the best example for this question. I really don’t have a very extensive outside life. I work at home as I have said. I do have time for a social life, as I mentioned I have 50/50 custody with their mommy, but I guess I have just shied away from socializing so far. When the kids aren’t with me I write. I’m not ready yet to introduce anything as drastic as dating again. When the time presents itself I’ll just have to play it by ear.

6) What have you learned from the fathers that you have interacted with?

I haven’t interacted with many fathers. Before all this happened in my life I worked as a child care provider for a local San Diego receiving home. If there were anywhere I learned to be a good dad it would be from there. As a matter of fact that is where I was working when I first met Sara, My kids mom.

7) What else would you share regarding your experiences as a father thus far?

There has never been anything in my life as rewarding as parenthood. Believe me when I tell you that parenting can be hard work, but you will never have another job as rewarding, or where your work can love you back so unconditionally.
Just using me as an example, when you think of all the expletive I put my kids through, and yet I know inmy heart, without the slightest doubt… If you were to ask my children about me they would say I was the greatest man let alone father in the world.
If a man like me can change his ways and become a good father anyone can do it. It is more worth it than you could ever guess

What have been the most memorable experiences that you have had thus far as a parent?

Every experience I have as a parent is memorable. I was there to cut the umbilical cord on my daughter, how could anyone ever forget that. I was there to take the training wheels off of my children’s bicycles… that was pretty great. For the first year of my daughters life she only slept on my chest, her and I downstairs in the living room cuddled up in an easy chair. It all pales in comparison though to those magic words I am so blessed to hear… at night when I tuck my babies into bed… turn down the light and go to leave the room… when they call me back for a hug and to say, “I love you daddy”. There is nothing in this world that I would trade for that. There is nothing anywhere that could ever bring a man to tears so quickly as the realization that true love is that love you feel from the beautiful treasures from God that are your children.

If you have any questions for Paul, please leave a comment here and I will make sure that he gets them so that he may be able to respond!

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