I’ve been really focused on me.  The heavy stuff on my heart.  Can I just say that being a husband and father is the most amazing thing in the world!?

I wrote this to ABC Family.  I’m still waiting on a response.

Dear ABC Family,

I have a bone to pick with you.  I don’t even really know where to begin.  When I think of the word family incorporated with a tv channel, I automatically think, “Oh, this is something the entire family can watch together.”  I almost get excited. I think of the opportunity to talk to family about real life issues.  (As I thought was going to be possible with your ‘hit’ show, “The Secret Life”)

Now, the content of the shows don’t bother me as much as your rhetoric and target audience. (I won’t touch on the wonderful acting today)  The name of your channel is ‘ABC Family’.  Family.  Now, at first glance I thought, “The Secret Life”, what a wonderful opportunity to talk to a child about premarital sex.”  Amazing my astonishment when this show was filled with some (horribly thought 0ut) plots.  Not only does a teenager get pregnant, but her dad is cheating on her mom, her christian friend becomes a slut, (from my understanding) another man’s wife dies, (or the other way around) and merely 2 weeks later he is sleeping with another woman.  Wow.  Now, I am sure that this is great television to some, but I have to disagree with the way you are targeting our youth for this kind of garbage.

If you have a defense for that show, (Which I’m sure you do) how on earth do you explain another one of your prime time shows, “Greek”.  (GRΣΣK). I really don’t have to explain further do I?  How do you justify targeting young kids to watch this junk?

I urge you to consider changing the name of your station to something a little more reasonable, instead of just changing your tag-line to “A new kind of family.” That’s a little misleading.  The options are endless.  Maybe ABC Half:  “Just not good enough for the REAL ABC.”  Or, ABC Trying To Take a Dollar While Corrupting Our Youth “Seventh Heaven could only carry us so far.”

I might be being a little harsh.  Maybe I’m jumping the conclusion.  But your plots are not those of a family show.  Your situations are not ones that a child should be watching.  Your characters are not ones children should be aiming to be.  In today’s world, something needs to change.  I urge you to promote the change.

Thank you,

In case you don’t know. Tam does something called Thursday swap over at her corner of the internet.

If you don’t know Tam, you really should.  She has an awesome husband and a great funny family (but doesn’t use punctuation or capitols.. unlike me, I use them whenever and where ever I want).  From all the tweets and comments I’ve read, everyone admires her children.  If you don’t know her story, read it here. It literally speaks the love of God.  You cannot afford to not read it.(did I word that right?)  But… today is not about me… so without further ado, I give you….. Tam

———————————- Family—————————-

we’ve been talking about family, kids, open communication and sex over at my place this week. ive always felt that families today arent near as open with one another as i feel they should be. we live in a society where we let other people do our work. the work of the family, the parent. we defer way too much to the schools. public and private. in fact, i found that when our oldest went to a private christian school, for kindergarten and 1st grade, we became very relaxed in our responsibilities at home. like, talking about God, reading the bible and even praying with her. in the back of my mind i knew she was gettin all that stuff at school, so i didnt feel as guilty when i let it slip and slide in our home.

parents? we have to be proactive. we need to be. our kids need us to be. being and doing so shows our children we care. shows them they are important enough to us to take the time to tackle the hard stuff because they are worth every ounce of effort and energy we can give them. is it always easy? no. is it always convenient? nope. but does that mean we dont do it? of course not.

and even though we’ve always heard that it takes a village to raise a child, which i agree with, it doesnt mean we step back and let the village do it alone.

ive been told before “youre so lucky you have such good kids!”. seriously? do you think it was really luck? no. its been, and still is, the hardest thing we’ve ever done. but when something means the world to you…you will go the ends of the earth for it.

its time we take back our families and our roles as parents seriously. the future of our young ones depend on it.

as andy and andrea prepare for their first born i believe they will be phenomenal parents. ive read their written words, which i believe are the desires of their hearts, and am convinced they will pour every bit of themselves into their family.

lets remember to pray for them. to pray for each other and our children. THAT is the best thing we can do for one another!

God,

Thank You for waking me up.  I love everything You do for us.  I love You Lord.  Today I pray for patience.  Not just for me, but for the world.  I know times are tough, and I pray that today, You can just give us light hearts and help us take today in stride.  Lord, I pray for my temper.  I pray that you can help me overcome the small things that set me off.

God, I’m not a whole lot without You.  I know sometimes I try to play you up, or leave you out, but Lord, I pray that today, I can’t do that.  I pray that today I am reminded that I need You to breathe.  I pray that I am reminded that I need you keep my job.  I pray I am reminded that I need you to keep my anything.   Lord thank You for everything you’ve carried me through.  Thank you for loving me when I couldn’t love myself.  Thank You for seeking me out.  Thank you for accepting me.

Lord, please just look over my family, my wife and my child.  God, please just show them love.  Show them you’re here.  And protect them from the craziness of this world.  Your love is unexplainable, and more than enough for me!  I love you God..

My kid sister’s name is Heather.  I guess some people would say she’s a little old for me to call her kid sister, but that’s her name.  She is 23, and has a kid of her own.  So, “Kid Sister” is probably a little out of date. I digress.

Heather has grown to be an amazing woman.  As you can tell by reading this blog, the struggles of our childhood were real, and traumatic.  Adrienne and I did our best to protect the youngers, but they still got some backlash.  When Adrienne died, I was not living at home, and I think the realities of every thing we had protected Heather from hit her full force.  Fortunately, Heather was wise enough to know how to handle it by that point, and never took what we had taught her for granted.  She quicky realized what she had only had a glimpse of, and sometimes I think she regrets not realizing it before Adrienne passed.

Somehow, in the recent years, she has, bless her heart, become the mediator for our family.  She talks to everyone and explains things better than we could explain to each other.  She’s wise beyond her years, (Though sometimes I still need to straighten out her views. ha)

She is a runner.  Meaning, whenever crap goes bad, or good, she runs.  She runs to celebrate, she runs to let off steam, she runs.  That what she does.  (Like Forrest Gump, but smarter)I think it’s good.  She has ran marathon’s, and recently (within the last few years) started riding a bike. She is amazing.

I think she always looked up to me, which could put me in blame for some of her issues, but I think all in all, she has learned a lot.  Mostly a lot of what NOT to do, but I like to think she took away some of my good traits too.  I was always able to make her laugh, no matter what situation we were in, and throughout our lives, I don’t think we have ever had a really bad arguement. (Aside from her Ron Paul fiasco, but that was just a learning experience.)

Now, from what Adrienne and I have taught her, she is on her own.  Raising a baby (and a husband)  I couldn’t be more proud of her.  She has overcome so many obstacles, and is making a life, a family, and is well in tune with the curse of genetics she needs to overcome.  It’s a great thing to see her realize that. It’s an even greater thing to see her overcome that.

Every day I talk to her, I am reminded that we didn’t do so bad.  Life wasn’t so much crap that we weren’t able to come out of it with our heads up.  We just had to clean some of the dirt off, and move forward.  It’s great to know that we have such a headstrong family, probably the best trait my mom gave us.

So.  If you want to go cheer my kid sister on in her post baby running adventures, PLEASE PLEASE do.  She loves encouragement, and your words will mean the world to her.