March 28, 2025 • 15 mins
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
James Guttman (00:14):
Hi Pod, I am Dad.
He's not just Hi Dad, he's mydad.
James Gutman, just hi dad, he'smy dad.
James gutman folks, jamesgutman, hi pod, I'm dad.
Welcome back to another editionof the podcast.
Thank you for joining me onhypod, on dadcom, any streaming
service, I appreciate it.
(00:35):
Hit the bell, hit the subscribe, hit the hit the road jack.
Either way, hit something.
Thank you so much for forjoining me.
It's good to be here.
I'm in good mood.
Um, I've I've had a lot of stuffand I got to tell you Lucas is
a big part of that.
For those of you guys who arenew, lucas is my son.
He's nonverbal, just turned 14.
He has autism and he is, honestto God, the most unique person
(00:59):
I've ever known in my entirelife.
It's one of the reasons I writeabout him, one of the reasons I
covered this blog.
Talk about autism appreciation.
Lucas is unlike anyone else andevery day I learn something new
, whether it's about him and hisgrowth or just me as a person
and understanding.
He has a way of really showingyou things about yourself.
(01:19):
I've said since he was littlethat having Lucas taught me that
you don't say hello to someonejust to get a hello back.
You don't do something forsomeone just to get a pat on the
back or appreciation.
And I used to say that when hewas little, almost kind of like
a I don't know, just reinforcingthe good to myself.
You know, hey, you're doingthis for the good of it.
(01:41):
He might not say thank you, hemight not show appreciation, he
might not seem to miss you andyou're not around, all these
things that I would tell myself.
And now, as he's gotten olderluckily for a lot of it, it's
not true anymore I get to seeappreciation.
I've gotten to learn who he isand help him with his receptive
language, help him to understandthe world around him, help him
(02:02):
to express gratitude and love.
And it's really been amazingand it's been wonderful in that
respect, raising a boy like him.
You know, when your son'snonverbal, you can't really
verify a lot of stuff.
I can't be like you appreciatethis, right?
No, I couldn't do that, so itstarted out with little things.
I would go up to him Lucas, saythank you, say, say thank you.
And he would walk up to people.
I swear to God, I would sayLucas, say thank you to this
(02:25):
person.
They would look at me becausethey know he didn't speak.
He would look at me like whatam I supposed to do?
And I would just look at him.
I go say thank you, say thankyou no-transcript of little
(02:54):
things in terms of his uh,language and his, you know, use
of hands, and that I reallyhaven't done by the book.
So if you're one of thoseparents who don't feel bad, I
know, as parents, I worriedabout that I said I don't, this
kid doesn't know sign language.
You know it's kind of like thisI don't know this, this dialect
.
I come from.
You know my family's halfItalian.
(03:16):
So one of the things whenyou're Italian that you learn
very young is that a lot of thewords that you say are not
really the Italian words for it,it's from somewhere else or
whatever, and they're like oh,it's just our Italian, it's how
we do it.
Well, it's the same thing withLucas.
He's got these little Italianhands where sometimes, you know,
touching his mouth means likegive me food.
It also means like yes, I don'teven know Half the time we're
(03:36):
just kind of doing stuff, but weget it.
You know, teaching your kid tocommunicate, it doesn't matter
if you do everything by a bookor whatever, but Lucas has
learned to express thanks andgratitude and love and things
like that and I've watched himgrow in that respect, physically
, right.
I want to tell you guys rightnow you talk about Hi World I'm
(03:56):
Dad, the book coming out in June, my new book.
For those who don't know HighWorld I'm Dad, how Fathers Can
Journey from Autism Awareness toAcceptance to Appreciation
Pre-order it today.
But one of the things about thebook that you guys have to know
is I only wrote this book overthe course of the last year,
right, so it's not like anoutdated book from 100 years ago
.
And in the book I talk abouthow we used to call him or at
(04:19):
the time did call him the roundmound of sound.
That was my little.
We'd always say it to Lucas.
He would come over and he wouldjust be making noise.
He'd be like you're the roundmound of sound and I'd tickle
him and he'd laugh.
It was this cute little term ofendearment.
And Lucas is not, I repeat, notthe round mound of sound
(04:40):
anymore.
Lucas is a stretched out.
Stretched Cunningham kind of.
Blows my mind.
So I found these two pictures.
I found one from March 27th.
Blows my mind.
So I found these two pictures Ifound, one from March 27th 2021
, and one from March 27th 2025.
And it is a completelydifferent human being,
completely different.
One is just this little blob ofbaby and the other one is this
little man in my house.
And what's crazy is that in myhead I still I want to say I
(05:01):
still see the little round babyversion of Lucas.
Right, but I do and I don'tLike.
I think in my head, I rememberit, but it's not until I see it
that it feels like it was 100years ago.
I'm like that's my kid and he'sgrown so much in that respect
and with all of those thingsbeing true, it only serves that
Lucas also grows in hisunderstanding in terms of the
(05:23):
things he can do, and that'swhat we've been working on.
Lucas has been, you know,working on life skills, whether
it's using a fork a lot betterthan he has, or taking bites of
things in an appropriate way,things that he always could do.
But it was just easier to cutup his piece of pieces.
You know, you cut up the littleslices into squares.
He would pick them up.
A little bit of a mess.
(05:44):
You wipe off his hands, youmove on.
I started giving him forks.
Now he's been using the fork todo it.
I finally just gave him aregular slice.
I showed him.
I said pick it up, take a bite.
And these are things that arereally hard to explain to
somebody because they go.
You don't let your kid justpick up a piece of pizza and
bite it.
No, I don't do that because forthe longest time he would, I
swear to God, fit the entirething into his mouth.
(06:06):
It was insane.
And when you have a kid whodoes that, when you have a kid
who will take an entire slice ofpizza and shove it into his
face, you can't even stop them.
And when I say can't stop him,I don't mean that I physically
couldn't pull it out of his handor anything.
I mean you're in such shock,almost like watching like
Ripley's Believe it or Not whenthey start to do this crazy
(06:27):
trick.
And you're just glued, I'm juststaring at him like is he going
to get it?
And then, once it gets in, I'mlike I might as well save his
life now.
So come here and you reach itin, you're grabbing it out, so
you worry about that.
Then at a certain point youstart to realize you know what.
This is easy.
I'm going to cut up the chickenfingers.
But then you see this pictureof this boy who is like a little
young man and maybe you can doit.
(06:49):
And downstairs, even just now,I was giving him pizza and we
were doing the thing with thefork, and then I'd pick up the
pieces and he was just doing it.
So take a bite.
They were the smallest bites inthe world, but he was doing it.
Everything like that, a lot ofthings that I used to kind of
let go Like.
Lucas has a habit of speedwashing his hands and I would
always frustratedly come overand just do it for him.
(07:10):
What he does is he presses thesoap.
Sometimes he doesn't even havehis hand there to catch it, he
just presses it.
It lands on the sink.
He turns on the water.
He karate, chops the water witha slow, underhanded, like
hi-yah right through the waterand then just walks away.
And I go dude, what are youdoing?
I go step by step, step by step.
So today I had him do all of it, step by, like the real thing.
(07:32):
I said no, no, no, put yourhand back.
And I corrected the things andagain you're going to hear this
and it sounds like I'm thislackadaisical, don't care kind
of dad, but I think a lot ofparents in my position you get
into a routine, right.
There's things that he's doing.
There's things that I've taughthim to do that he's been doing
really well maturing and beingpatient and knowing how to get
(07:53):
your attention in an appropriateway.
There was a time where Lucaswould come over and take you by
the chin with one finger andturn your face towards him to
get your attention, and it wascompletely inappropriate.
Shouldn't do it.
Adorable, I would laugh everytime.
So we kind of let it go for awhile.
So you teach him how to do that.
I wrote a blog a few weeks agoabout driving with him in the
(08:13):
car and when he needs me to dosomething with his iPad, I'm not
worried he's going to grab myhand while I'm driving.
There was a time where I wouldhave so things like that you
work on, but because of that youlet things go.
You know you don't want to washyour hands completely by
yourself.
I'll come over, I'll help youout.
You know you don't know how todo it.
I got it.
He knows man.
It's a giant little man.
He knows, and I think that'sthe thing and I think it's the
(08:36):
same for for all kids.
Dude, like my daughter.
I talked about my daughter.
My daughter is going to be 17years old.
It's crazy 17.
That was my baby.
Baby, that was my best friend,my little kid.
And they grow up and they getbigger.
There was a time where all ofher friends were these little
baby girls in school.
(08:57):
She came home from school, Iremember when she was in
kindergarten and told me aboutthem.
I have this one friend.
She's crazy.
We call her Crazy Kimmy.
Crazy Kimmy does crazy stuff.
Crazy, crazy Kimmy does crazystuff.
Crazy Kimmy is like a lady now.
I saw the kids the other day.
I'm like, oh my God, they'repeople, they're like grownups
and sometimes you're not readyfor that transition.
And the same thing, I think,with my son.
I see it.
I see it in Christian, mygirlfriend Lauren.
(09:19):
Her son, luke, is his bestfriend.
I've watched them grow uptogether.
So you kind of see it a littlebit.
But it's almost delayed becauseLucas is still my baby.
Lucas will come over and sit onmy lap.
Lucas weighs more than me.
Straight up weighs more than me.
Lucas wears, in some cases,clothes that are bigger than my
clothes.
I can't even give himhand-me-downs of some things
(09:40):
because he's bigger than me.
As he's gotten a little taller,it stretched out a little bit
and we could share a little bitmore.
For a while it was really roughwhen he was that little round
mound of sound.
Nothing fit over him.
We were like you know gettingkayak covers.
But yeah, man, they get, theyget big.
All kids get big and you haveto recognize it.
(10:00):
You have to know how to proceedwith that.
You know, if I never taught mydaughter how to drive, if I was
just like no, you're a baby, youdon't drive, s course I can't
do that because she would belike, no, I'm driving, I'm gonna
be this age.
Lucas can't do that.
If I wanted to, I could keephim a baby forever and you can't
do nothing.
We just.
We just lock the doors, sealthe windows, I will feed him
(10:20):
pirate booty and mac and cheese,you know, and that's it.
We'll just be happy, I'll washhis hands forever, but I can't
do it, man.
I can't do it because I'm notgoing to be around forever.
That's the truth.
We're all going to go.
I'm going to go.
I almost went in 2012.
Had a heart attack, had aquintuple bypass, thought I was
going to die, and because ofthat I think about that.
(10:43):
Not constantly, but I thinkabout it.
I'm aware of it.
I'm aware that there's someoneon this earth who needs me in
every way.
I mean, people need me and weneed each other.
But, honestly, like Lucas issomebody who needs me, and if I
can't be there for him one day,I have to show him how to do as
many things on his own as I can.
(11:04):
And as he gets older, I have toremember he's getting older, I
have to remember that he's a man.
Things he doesn't do he has tolearn how to do.
He has to wash his hands.
He has to be able to you knowuse utensils.
He has to clear the table.
He has to do real grown-upstuff wash dishes, do laundry
all the things he has toeventually do.
There's things he can't do aswell.
He can't lash out at somebodyhe can't like.
(11:25):
You know, when he was five, ifhe swatted somebody, they go oh,
it's okay, don't worry If heswats at somebody.
Now, dude, this is the age thatthey worry you.
When you're young they saywatch it, one day he's going to
be too big, he can't grabpeople's food, he can't hit
people, I know, and that's wherewe're at now and that's
something as a parent I have towork on, because I'm not always
going to be there, and never inmy life has that ever been more
(11:49):
of a real statement than as itapplies to Lucas.
One day I won't be there, willhe know what to do?
I'm going to do everything Ican now to hopefully make sure
he's as prepared as possible forthe day that I'm not here
anymore, and I owe him that.
Is it easy?
No, it's not easy at all.
I spent a lot of the blog andstuff talking about.
Is it easy?
No, it's not easy at all.
I spent a lot of the blog andstuff talking about, like autism
(12:11):
appreciation.
Oh, it's so much.
You know it's great and it is,and all the things that are
great about it are great.
But when it comes to really theconcern about, like, what's
going to happen to my kid oneday, or what do I have to build
now to make sure he doesn'tsuffer, then that's major and
that's unique to a situationlike this.
So it's my job, it's myresponsibility and I'll do
everything I can to make sure hegrows up, and I'll tell you
(12:34):
this, though he's done a greatjob so far, and that's the thing
that gives me solace.
Again, I wrote about that in ablog a few weeks ago too.
I'm concerned and I worry and Ithink about the future.
What's he going to have?
What can he do?
What's it going to look likewhen he's 30?
How's that going to work?
But then I remember what Iworried about him being like at
(12:56):
14, when he was three or fouryears old, and I see the
progress that he's made in areasthat we worked on, in areas on
his own, his understanding, allthat stuff, and it makes me feel
better.
So, yeah, we're in good shape.
Hopefully you are too.
If this is a pep talk, I don'tknow.
Maybe you're going through it,maybe you're thinking too.
All I can say is what I saidbefore it's been a good week.
He's been doing fantastic, he'son an upswing at school,
(13:17):
everything's been really happyand it's been an honor man
sharing it with you guys talkingabout it.
Parts, too, is that the book iscoming out now, during one of
his real growth spurts, hisrebirth, his physically changing
emotion.
Everything about him is justbecoming a little man, and we're
(13:41):
on a good spike.
You go through these ebbs andflows, but there were times when
we weren't.
There were times I worriedabout him.
We transitioned to his newschool.
He was going through transitionissues for a while and during
those days I remember not beinglike this, not being like yeah,
it's great, but being able tocome onto the blog and write
about what we were going through.
I wrote about him, you know,having meltdowns at pickup and
(14:04):
not wanting to go home, thingslike that.
I wrote about the tough stuffand because of that, you guys,
the blog, this podcast, they allgot me through it and that's
why I'm so happy and lucky to beable to share our story now,
during a time where I'm just so,I'm over the moon and I
appreciate you guys being thereto help me out through this.
So, thank you.
Please.
Do me a favor, go pre-order thebook man.
(14:25):
Do me a favor, go pre-order thebook man.
It's on Amazon, it's on BarnesNoble, it's on I think it's on
most places High World on Dad.
It comes out.
It's going to be in stores,online, everywhere, june 19th
619.
I think at Rey Mysterio.
Can't get away from it.
Can't get away from wrestling.
That's how that goes.
Do me a favor.
(14:50):
Every week I just said it I'llgo to the high pot on dadcom
every Friday.
I'm back here with the podcast.
And follow me on social media HI, james Gutman.
Hi, james Gutman.
I'm on Facebook.
I'm on Instagram.
Hi, blog I'm.
Dad is on Facebook as well.
We're everywhere, so pleasefollow.
Thank you Like.
Subscribe, pre-order the book.
(15:10):
Do all the good stuff and joinme back here again next Friday.
Until then, james Gubbinssaying be well, bye pot, I'm
done, I'll see you next time.
Hi Pod, I am Dad.
He's not just Hi Dad, he's mydad.
James Gutman, just hi dad, he'smy dad.
James gutman folks, jamesgutman, hi pod, I'm dad.
Welcome back to another editionof the podcast.
Thank you for joining me onhypod, on dadcom, any streaming
service, I appreciate it.
(00:35):
Hit the bell, hit the subscribe, hit the hit the road jack.
Either way, hit something.
Thank you so much for forjoining me.
It's good to be here.
I'm in good mood.
Um, I've I've had a lot of stuffand I got to tell you Lucas is
a big part of that.
For those of you guys who arenew, lucas is my son.
He's nonverbal, just turned 14.
He has autism and he is, honestto God, the most unique person
(00:59):
I've ever known in my entirelife.
It's one of the reasons I writeabout him, one of the reasons I
covered this blog.
Talk about autism appreciation.
Lucas is unlike anyone else andevery day I learn something new
, whether it's about him and hisgrowth or just me as a person
and understanding.
He has a way of really showingyou things about yourself.
(01:19):
I've said since he was littlethat having Lucas taught me that
you don't say hello to someonejust to get a hello back.
You don't do something forsomeone just to get a pat on the
back or appreciation.
And I used to say that when hewas little, almost kind of like
a I don't know, just reinforcingthe good to myself.
You know, hey, you're doingthis for the good of it.
(01:41):
He might not say thank you, hemight not show appreciation, he
might not seem to miss you andyou're not around, all these
things that I would tell myself.
And now, as he's gotten olderluckily for a lot of it, it's
not true anymore I get to seeappreciation.
I've gotten to learn who he isand help him with his receptive
language, help him to understandthe world around him, help him
(02:02):
to express gratitude and love.
And it's really been amazingand it's been wonderful in that
respect, raising a boy like him.
You know, when your son'snonverbal, you can't really
verify a lot of stuff.
I can't be like you appreciatethis, right?
No, I couldn't do that, so itstarted out with little things.
I would go up to him Lucas, saythank you, say, say thank you.
And he would walk up to people.
I swear to God, I would sayLucas, say thank you to this
(02:25):
person.
They would look at me becausethey know he didn't speak.
He would look at me like whatam I supposed to do?
And I would just look at him.
I go say thank you, say thankyou no-transcript of little
(02:54):
things in terms of his uh,language and his, you know, use
of hands, and that I reallyhaven't done by the book.
So if you're one of thoseparents who don't feel bad, I
know, as parents, I worriedabout that I said I don't, this
kid doesn't know sign language.
You know it's kind of like thisI don't know this, this dialect
.
I come from.
You know my family's halfItalian.
(03:16):
So one of the things whenyou're Italian that you learn
very young is that a lot of thewords that you say are not
really the Italian words for it,it's from somewhere else or
whatever, and they're like oh,it's just our Italian, it's how
we do it.
Well, it's the same thing withLucas.
He's got these little Italianhands where sometimes, you know,
touching his mouth means likegive me food.
It also means like yes, I don'teven know Half the time we're
(03:36):
just kind of doing stuff, but weget it.
You know, teaching your kid tocommunicate, it doesn't matter
if you do everything by a bookor whatever, but Lucas has
learned to express thanks andgratitude and love and things
like that and I've watched himgrow in that respect, physically
, right.
I want to tell you guys rightnow you talk about Hi World I'm
(03:56):
Dad, the book coming out in June, my new book.
For those who don't know HighWorld I'm Dad, how Fathers Can
Journey from Autism Awareness toAcceptance to Appreciation
Pre-order it today.
But one of the things about thebook that you guys have to know
is I only wrote this book overthe course of the last year,
right, so it's not like anoutdated book from 100 years ago
.
And in the book I talk abouthow we used to call him or at
(04:19):
the time did call him the roundmound of sound.
That was my little.
We'd always say it to Lucas.
He would come over and he wouldjust be making noise.
He'd be like you're the roundmound of sound and I'd tickle
him and he'd laugh.
It was this cute little term ofendearment.
And Lucas is not, I repeat, notthe round mound of sound
(04:40):
anymore.
Lucas is a stretched out.
Stretched Cunningham kind of.
Blows my mind.
So I found these two pictures.
I found one from March 27th.
Blows my mind.
So I found these two pictures Ifound, one from March 27th 2021
, and one from March 27th 2025.
And it is a completelydifferent human being,
completely different.
One is just this little blob ofbaby and the other one is this
little man in my house.
And what's crazy is that in myhead I still I want to say I
(05:01):
still see the little round babyversion of Lucas.
Right, but I do and I don'tLike.
I think in my head, I rememberit, but it's not until I see it
that it feels like it was 100years ago.
I'm like that's my kid and he'sgrown so much in that respect
and with all of those thingsbeing true, it only serves that
Lucas also grows in hisunderstanding in terms of the
(05:23):
things he can do, and that'swhat we've been working on.
Lucas has been, you know,working on life skills, whether
it's using a fork a lot betterthan he has, or taking bites of
things in an appropriate way,things that he always could do.
But it was just easier to cutup his piece of pieces.
You know, you cut up the littleslices into squares.
He would pick them up.
A little bit of a mess.
(05:44):
You wipe off his hands, youmove on.
I started giving him forks.
Now he's been using the fork todo it.
I finally just gave him aregular slice.
I showed him.
I said pick it up, take a bite.
And these are things that arereally hard to explain to
somebody because they go.
You don't let your kid justpick up a piece of pizza and
bite it.
No, I don't do that because forthe longest time he would, I
swear to God, fit the entirething into his mouth.
(06:06):
It was insane.
And when you have a kid whodoes that, when you have a kid
who will take an entire slice ofpizza and shove it into his
face, you can't even stop them.
And when I say can't stop him,I don't mean that I physically
couldn't pull it out of his handor anything.
I mean you're in such shock,almost like watching like
Ripley's Believe it or Not whenthey start to do this crazy
(06:27):
trick.
And you're just glued, I'm juststaring at him like is he going
to get it?
And then, once it gets in, I'mlike I might as well save his
life now.
So come here and you reach itin, you're grabbing it out, so
you worry about that.
Then at a certain point youstart to realize you know what.
This is easy.
I'm going to cut up the chickenfingers.
But then you see this pictureof this boy who is like a little
young man and maybe you can doit.
(06:49):
And downstairs, even just now,I was giving him pizza and we
were doing the thing with thefork, and then I'd pick up the
pieces and he was just doing it.
So take a bite.
They were the smallest bites inthe world, but he was doing it.
Everything like that, a lot ofthings that I used to kind of
let go Like.
Lucas has a habit of speedwashing his hands and I would
always frustratedly come overand just do it for him.
(07:10):
What he does is he presses thesoap.
Sometimes he doesn't even havehis hand there to catch it, he
just presses it.
It lands on the sink.
He turns on the water.
He karate, chops the water witha slow, underhanded, like
hi-yah right through the waterand then just walks away.
And I go dude, what are youdoing?
I go step by step, step by step.
So today I had him do all of it, step by, like the real thing.
(07:32):
I said no, no, no, put yourhand back.
And I corrected the things andagain you're going to hear this
and it sounds like I'm thislackadaisical, don't care kind
of dad, but I think a lot ofparents in my position you get
into a routine, right.
There's things that he's doing.
There's things that I've taughthim to do that he's been doing
really well maturing and beingpatient and knowing how to get
(07:53):
your attention in an appropriateway.
There was a time where Lucaswould come over and take you by
the chin with one finger andturn your face towards him to
get your attention, and it wascompletely inappropriate.
Shouldn't do it.
Adorable, I would laugh everytime.
So we kind of let it go for awhile.
So you teach him how to do that.
I wrote a blog a few weeks agoabout driving with him in the
(08:13):
car and when he needs me to dosomething with his iPad, I'm not
worried he's going to grab myhand while I'm driving.
There was a time where I wouldhave so things like that you
work on, but because of that youlet things go.
You know you don't want to washyour hands completely by
yourself.
I'll come over, I'll help youout.
You know you don't know how todo it.
I got it.
He knows man.
It's a giant little man.
He knows, and I think that'sthe thing and I think it's the
(08:36):
same for for all kids.
Dude, like my daughter.
I talked about my daughter.
My daughter is going to be 17years old.
It's crazy 17.
That was my baby.
Baby, that was my best friend,my little kid.
And they grow up and they getbigger.
There was a time where all ofher friends were these little
baby girls in school.
(08:57):
She came home from school, Iremember when she was in
kindergarten and told me aboutthem.
I have this one friend.
She's crazy.
We call her Crazy Kimmy.
Crazy Kimmy does crazy stuff.
Crazy, crazy Kimmy does crazystuff.
Crazy Kimmy is like a lady now.
I saw the kids the other day.
I'm like, oh my God, they'repeople, they're like grownups
and sometimes you're not readyfor that transition.
And the same thing, I think,with my son.
I see it.
I see it in Christian, mygirlfriend Lauren.
(09:19):
Her son, luke, is his bestfriend.
I've watched them grow uptogether.
So you kind of see it a littlebit.
But it's almost delayed becauseLucas is still my baby.
Lucas will come over and sit onmy lap.
Lucas weighs more than me.
Straight up weighs more than me.
Lucas wears, in some cases,clothes that are bigger than my
clothes.
I can't even give himhand-me-downs of some things
(09:40):
because he's bigger than me.
As he's gotten a little taller,it stretched out a little bit
and we could share a little bitmore.
For a while it was really roughwhen he was that little round
mound of sound.
Nothing fit over him.
We were like you know gettingkayak covers.
But yeah, man, they get, theyget big.
All kids get big and you haveto recognize it.
(10:00):
You have to know how to proceedwith that.
You know, if I never taught mydaughter how to drive, if I was
just like no, you're a baby, youdon't drive, s course I can't
do that because she would belike, no, I'm driving, I'm gonna
be this age.
Lucas can't do that.
If I wanted to, I could keephim a baby forever and you can't
do nothing.
We just.
We just lock the doors, sealthe windows, I will feed him
(10:20):
pirate booty and mac and cheese,you know, and that's it.
We'll just be happy, I'll washhis hands forever, but I can't
do it, man.
I can't do it because I'm notgoing to be around forever.
That's the truth.
We're all going to go.
I'm going to go.
I almost went in 2012.
Had a heart attack, had aquintuple bypass, thought I was
going to die, and because ofthat I think about that.
(10:43):
Not constantly, but I thinkabout it.
I'm aware of it.
I'm aware that there's someoneon this earth who needs me in
every way.
I mean, people need me and weneed each other.
But, honestly, like Lucas issomebody who needs me, and if I
can't be there for him one day,I have to show him how to do as
many things on his own as I can.
(11:04):
And as he gets older, I have toremember he's getting older, I
have to remember that he's a man.
Things he doesn't do he has tolearn how to do.
He has to wash his hands.
He has to be able to you knowuse utensils.
He has to clear the table.
He has to do real grown-upstuff wash dishes, do laundry
all the things he has toeventually do.
There's things he can't do aswell.
He can't lash out at somebodyhe can't like.
(11:25):
You know, when he was five, ifhe swatted somebody, they go oh,
it's okay, don't worry If heswats at somebody.
Now, dude, this is the age thatthey worry you.
When you're young they saywatch it, one day he's going to
be too big, he can't grabpeople's food, he can't hit
people, I know, and that's wherewe're at now and that's
something as a parent I have towork on, because I'm not always
going to be there, and never inmy life has that ever been more
(11:49):
of a real statement than as itapplies to Lucas.
One day I won't be there, willhe know what to do?
I'm going to do everything Ican now to hopefully make sure
he's as prepared as possible forthe day that I'm not here
anymore, and I owe him that.
Is it easy?
No, it's not easy at all.
I spent a lot of the blog andstuff talking about.
Is it easy?
No, it's not easy at all.
I spent a lot of the blog andstuff talking about, like autism
(12:11):
appreciation.
Oh, it's so much.
You know it's great and it is,and all the things that are
great about it are great.
But when it comes to really theconcern about, like, what's
going to happen to my kid oneday, or what do I have to build
now to make sure he doesn'tsuffer, then that's major and
that's unique to a situationlike this.
So it's my job, it's myresponsibility and I'll do
everything I can to make sure hegrows up, and I'll tell you
(12:34):
this, though he's done a greatjob so far, and that's the thing
that gives me solace.
Again, I wrote about that in ablog a few weeks ago too.
I'm concerned and I worry and Ithink about the future.
What's he going to have?
What can he do?
What's it going to look likewhen he's 30?
How's that going to work?
But then I remember what Iworried about him being like at
(12:56):
14, when he was three or fouryears old, and I see the
progress that he's made in areasthat we worked on, in areas on
his own, his understanding, allthat stuff, and it makes me feel
better.
So, yeah, we're in good shape.
Hopefully you are too.
If this is a pep talk, I don'tknow.
Maybe you're going through it,maybe you're thinking too.
All I can say is what I saidbefore it's been a good week.
He's been doing fantastic, he'son an upswing at school,
(13:17):
everything's been really happyand it's been an honor man
sharing it with you guys talkingabout it.
Parts, too, is that the book iscoming out now, during one of
his real growth spurts, hisrebirth, his physically changing
emotion.
Everything about him is justbecoming a little man, and we're
(13:41):
on a good spike.
You go through these ebbs andflows, but there were times when
we weren't.
There were times I worriedabout him.
We transitioned to his newschool.
He was going through transitionissues for a while and during
those days I remember not beinglike this, not being like yeah,
it's great, but being able tocome onto the blog and write
about what we were going through.
I wrote about him, you know,having meltdowns at pickup and
(14:04):
not wanting to go home, thingslike that.
I wrote about the tough stuffand because of that, you guys,
the blog, this podcast, they allgot me through it and that's
why I'm so happy and lucky to beable to share our story now,
during a time where I'm just so,I'm over the moon and I
appreciate you guys being thereto help me out through this.
So, thank you.
Please.
Do me a favor, go pre-order thebook man.
(14:25):
Do me a favor, go pre-order thebook man.
It's on Amazon, it's on BarnesNoble, it's on I think it's on
most places High World on Dad.
It comes out.
It's going to be in stores,online, everywhere, june 19th
619.
I think at Rey Mysterio.
Can't get away from it.
Can't get away from wrestling.
That's how that goes.
Do me a favor.
(14:50):
Every week I just said it I'llgo to the high pot on dadcom
every Friday.
I'm back here with the podcast.
And follow me on social media HI, james Gutman.
Hi, james Gutman.
I'm on Facebook.
I'm on Instagram.
Hi, blog I'm.
Dad is on Facebook as well.
We're everywhere, so pleasefollow.
Thank you Like.
Subscribe, pre-order the book.
(15:10):
Do all the good stuff and joinme back here again next Friday.
Until then, james Gubbinssaying be well, bye pot, I'm
done, I'll see you next time.
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