Meg Meeker: Help Your Husband Be a Hero in the Home
Welcome back! We have Dr. Meg Meeker, this country’s leading authority on parenting, teens, and children’s health, on today for a Father’s Day special. Meg is a writer, speaker, and a mom of four. She is also a pediatrician who does counseling with her own patients and shares a medical practice with her husband, who is also a physician. I can’t wait for you to listen in and be encouraged!
On a “Simply” & “Joyful” side note…
I bring up a chapter about “living simply” in one of Meg Meeker’s books, The Ten Habits of Happy Mothers and ask Meg to share a little bit about that. Meg says that you’ve got to be intentional when it comes to simplifying, no matter what stage of life you’re in. Meg’s advice is to schedule in quiet time for each day to be by yourself and pray. She also shares about strategies for scheduling extracurricular activities for your kids. It’s great advice! Be sure to listen in.
In This Episode…
In this episode, Meg shares about how she first started her writing career —and the fact that she was Dr. James Dobson’s co-host for 4 years. Then we jump right into discussing the widespread problem that society is faced with the lack of good fathers and the importance for a child to have a “hero” dad. You are going to LOVE this episode!
Highlights from This Show…
- “Your life will run out very quickly if you don’t take charge.” – Dr. Meg Meeker
- Meg shares about how she first started writing. Disturbed at the hypersexualization and how it was hard to find decent clothing, she began lecturing about the importance of modesty. A publisher from Washington D.C. heard one of Meg’s talks, and asked if she would be interested in talking to them about her material and printing a book. Her career not only as a doctor, but a writer, grew from there.
- Meg and I discuss the “epidemic” she mentions in her book about how fathers being marginalized. There are also many children are growing in fatherless homes. Meg talks about why it is so important for a family to have a father — and what research shows about the benefits of having a father in the home.
- “Fathers are crucial in the formation of healthy emotional stability in a child’s life.” – Dr. Meg Meeker
- Meg explains how society does not teach or encourage men to have good fatherhood skills. Rather, they are portrayed as idiots. She says it is crushing to children — and is the reason she decided to write Hero.
- I ask Meg to answer a question my husband had for her: “What are the common mistakes she feels most Christian dads are making.”
- “The biggest problem dads have is underestimating the importance of their effect on their kids on a day-to-day basis and overvaluing all the ‘stuff’ that kids do.” – Dr. Meg Meeker
- “I think that another big mistake that fathers make is that they don’t act on their instincts…Kids need fathers to act on their instincts in a very positive way.” — Dr. Meg Meeker
- “Parenting great kids is extraordinarily simple, but it’s hard.” — Dr. Meg Meeker
- I share a little about my background as a child whose parents divorced when I was four years old. Meg explains that, particularly in divorce situations, fathers often make decisions in order to not create conflict. They often don’t understand the importance of one-on-one time with each child vs. screen time. She also talks about the importance of ex-wives not demoralizing their children’s father — and why it hurts them in the long run.
- I ask Meg how mothers and wives can support dads to become that hero that their family needs. Meg challenges moms to tell their husbands something positive about them once a day for one month, even in front of the kids, and see what the children’s relationship is like with their dad at the end of the month. Her advice is amazing in this segment.
- “Men need respect. They need respect from their children. They need respect from their wives. – Dr. Meg Meeker
- I mention the opening of Meg’s book where she talks about how her father was her “safety net.”I asked her advice for dads who never had a good role model for fatherhood.
- I also bring up the problem that parents are more unwilling to sacrifice time, energy, and their comfort for their kids. Meg gives her advice for parents who need the motivation to keep going and talks about the pay off in the end.
- “We have to teach that parenting is sacrifice.” — Dr. Meg Meeker
- Meg and I discuss how parents should be helping our kids to think about their long-term future vs. the short-term gratifications this world offers — and how to be aware of consequences.Meg says that when she talks to boys, she tells them that society will make them believe they are out of control, but she wants them to believe that they are in control.
- “Kids believe that the good life is lived before twenty … so we need to present a very different picture. The good stuff is later on, not now.” — Dr. Meg Meeker
- Meg shares her thoughts about how men need to be morally strong fathers — and the rest struggle that so many have with porn. who are struggling with porn. She talks about how sons can take on the mentality of “why can’t I do it, too?”
- “The most powerful way a child’s identity is shaped is by watching parents and picking up cues on what parents believe and think him, and then imitating parents’ behavior.” — Dr. Meg Meeker
Please Note…
- Be sure to grab your FREE copy of my book, Sanity Savers for Moms, by joining our Simply Joyful community. It’s a great way to keep in touch…and get subscriber only freebies like my book. Click HERE to get the book and join!
Connect with Dr. Meg…
Pediatrician, mother, and best-selling author of six books, Dr. Meg Meeker is the country’s leading authority on parenting, teens and children’s health. She served as co-host of Dr. James Dobson’s nationally-syndicated daily radio program Family Talk from 2012-2016, and has appeared on national programs including TODAY, FOX & Friends, Dateline, NPR, Psychology Today, The Huffington Post, Oprah Radio, and more. Dr. Meeker is a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, certified by The American Board of Pediatrics and serves on the Advisory Board of The Medical Institute. She is an active part of the NFL’s Fatherhood Initiative, and is a regular speaker at Dave Ramsey’s Smart Conferences.
You can check out Dr. Meg’s books HERE on Amazon! Be sure to visit her site as well at www.MegMeekerMD.com.
*Don’t miss her awesome podcast: Parenting Great Kids!
Thank you, Rend Collective for allowing me to use your incredible song “The Joy of the Lord is My Strength”!
(This podcast is by Kristi Clover. Discovered by Christian Podcast Central and our community — copyright is owned by the publisher, not Christian Podcast Central, and audio is streamed directly from their servers.)