His Dad Cared for Everyone but Himself: Movember's Dr Zac Seidler

We're talking about the rules men inherit, the pressures of modern day fatherhood, and what it takes to rewrite the script for the next generation. Zac, welcome to a wake up call. What an intro, thank you, so great to be here, guys.

Wow, super goosebumps, it's interesting because my dad has not been here for about 13 years, and lots of people get upset or overwhelmed by those moments when someone returns, and it is in conversations like this where I get to bring his memory into the room, and that's kind of like a beautiful honor to be able to do that. So we're in Sydney right now, and my dad actually worked just around the corner in Kings Cross, he was a GP, he was an addiction specialist, and he was just an incredible, funny, loving, caring guy. He was a public speaker, he always wanted to share a story, anecdotes were everything to him. And I worked at his practice in Kings Cross when I was like 14, and there were methadone patients coming in, it was the height, this was like late 90s, early 2000s, there's heroin addicts, sex workers, it was showtime in the cross, and he was like, Saturday morning, come with me, Zac, you're gonna be receptionist today. Sounds fun.

And that was your wake up call. Literally, and I'm like-- Welcome to the best of humanity.

Straight up, but he'd do that, and then Heath Ledger was a patient of his, he saw Hollywood stars, and he saw the homeless, and he saw the top and bottom of our economy. And so I think that what I witnessed is he'd come into the waiting room, and regardless of who was sitting there, he would give them the same look of love and care and dignity. And that was such an important lesson for me to witness. But he spent all of his time caring for others. He worked six days a week, he was so dedicated to the field, to making sure that people who were taking drugs didn't feel like they were pariahs and weren't worth anything, and he believed in their capacity for change. And yet, he had his own demons, and I don't think that he was willing to look at them. So often, those who care for others never care for themselves, and there was something so shameful, I think, within him, the fact that he had depression and he'd had it for a very long time. We found out later on that when he was 17, 18, he'd go for weeks on end not leaving his bedroom.

But that wasn't conveyed, and that was a time when it was the worst possible thing to be mad. And so he suppressed it, and-- Buried himself in his work. Buried himself in his work and was not willing to look at this stuff. He was dragged, kicking and screaming in some instances to therapy to see psychiatrists. And he believed that it would just fix itself, and for a long time, it did. He would go, he would get some treatment, and then a few weeks later, he would snap out of it. But the hurt was still there, the pain was still there, the darkness. And I got into my late teens, and I started studying psychology. And it's hard to know where that decision came from. I can look back and say it was because of what he was going through, but I think I had a natural inclination to want to understand people, and maybe because I couldn't access him in the way that I wanted to. What was he like as a father?

He was funny, he was really funny. There's four of us, and we're very loud, very loud people, and very opinionated. And so I think he was just holding on for dear life most of the time. But he was warm and caring. He was distant at times, but not in a cold way, just that looking back now, I was like, how much of him did I actually know? Because I think putting himself out there fully, there was a lot of facade, a lot of mask. But we had a lot of fun, and I'm very lucky that I have such funny, joyful memories with him, especially on holidays and hanging out as a family. And I often talk about the fact that we got to the point where he was sick for quite a while. I was around 20, 21, and I went overseas, and I woke up to seven Skype calls at the time, and I knew what had happened. And I thought about how that idea pops into your head as a kid, that your father is no longer here when I'm in Europe on the other side of the globe. And I just think that there was something in him that just couldn't overcome the pain that he was experiencing, that couldn't process it, that didn't feel safe enough to talk to others about it.

And so that was a huge wake-up call for me, and I think it's taken a decade for me to really wrap my head around it and maybe becoming a father myself as well, to really question what it is that I'm allowing out and what it is that I'm withholding. But that moment of finding out that he'd taken his own life, it was very shame-inducing. I didn't know how I was gonna talk about it. I think I ended up making a career out of it to shame away the shame. Like, "You don't have a place here. "I'm gonna be so vocal about this that I can't be afraid." But it was so, so overwhelming, and I just, I wanted, I never felt angry at him. I just wanted to be able to offer him some support, and being his son, you know, that's a really hard thing to do, to be parentified.

Yeah. So, yeah. And perhaps offer him some understanding through that process. When you say, you mentioned the fact that he was distant at times. Do you think he was stuck in the voices in his head? Do you think that there was, you know, he talks about his demons.

Do you think that that was what was keeping him stuck, perhaps? I think he was just so avoidant of them, because he managed to keep them at bay, I think, for extended periods. But that was through burying himself in work, and doing, and doing, and giving, and giving.

And then every three years or so, even during my childhood, and I've reflected on this with my mom, who's just an incredible woman, that she kept it from us. You know, she'd be like he's at a conference, even when he was in hospital, or he'd run away. He would just get in the car and drive to Wollongong, or some motel, and just literally head off and run away from himself, I think. And that's a common thing. Now, as a clinician, I know that lots of men do that, because they can't cope with what is in their head, with the feelings, and, you know, finding that outlet. He had friends who were so shocked, they had no idea, you know, that anything was going on for him.

Therein lies the problem. Exactly, and I think we have come a very long way since then. And, you know, I do hope that groups like Movember have been able to start that conversation, but there are so many steps. You know, awareness is not enough here. And, you know, I do think that if my dad were here now, he would be able to understand that he's not broken, and the pain that he's feeling, so many of us carry. When suicide or death rattles a family unit, how do you bind together? What do you learn about each other in these? Like, they're really, like, the floor just drops from underneath you, and people have described it to me, and I resonate with this, is just you become very present, and everything else, all of the head noise just disappears, and you're just so focused on processing.

What was it like for you and your family, and what did you learn in that? Well, so we were, my siblings, we were all in random places all over the world, and so we all came home in, you know, crazy times on crazy flights, and descended upon the family home. And I'm Jewish, and we have a very clear doctrine about how to grieve, which is seven days, sit in. And so, we're all at home, we're all there, and everybody comes, and we sit in the darkness, the pain, the grief, the memory. And I think that that was super comforting, the community that was around, just endless food being dropped. And you don't need to think, because it's such a long tradition that there's so much awareness about how to do this.

That said, when it is suicide, I think that shakes everybody. No one really knew what to say or how to deal with it. But I've written about the fact that I think my family is closer without a father than we were with one. And it's kind of sad to say that, and I get a bit upset when I do, but it bonded us, you know, it's trauma bonding in one way or another. But I also think that it gave us a sense of pause and presence and going, "What now?" And we were young, you know? But my sister was 16, and she's gone on to doing incredible things as have my brothers. And I think that I repeatedly come back to the idea that I'm not angry at him. I understand that he was really struggling and suffering. And now I have a choice about what I do with his legacy, with his memory and how I choose to live my life. And so we could have crumbled, and many people do. And I don't think that they should be judged for that, but that wasn't really an option. And that's probably 'cause my mom is hardcore.

She crumbled, but there was still so much structure, and she was holding us together. And the idea that we were just gonna, we were gonna get on, not move on, if that makes sense. Yeah, beautiful. And what a gift to have that woman as your catapult to ignite change and to help people through the shit. Yeah, well, she kept Dad alive. I think there's no doubt that she has her own demons to tell her that she didn't do enough, but he wouldn't have been here. They were married for over 25 years, and he was struggling throughout that whole time. And she just got him going, got him out of bed, got him functioning in ways that I don't think anyone else could.

What a woman, what's her name? Debbie. Debbie, shout out, Debbie. And so you talk beautifully just now about you had a choice. Both of us have experienced our wake-up calls in many different formats, but what it comes down to is the choice that you do with it, 'cause it's gonna happen. Pain is gonna happen, grief, death, hopefully not suicide, but the statistics, you will come across that in some way, shape, or form.

He gave us that idea of aspiring towards your potential in many ways. And so I guess the choice really was that I was going to hopefully create a career where I could understand what he had been through in some ways and make sure that others don't need to experience this alone, because many will experience it regardless, but how we can create support systems that actually understand the complexities of this stuff, rather than this umbrella, pseudo support, which I don't think really gets to the core of the real struggles that so many of us face. It sounds like the culture around the Jewish approach to grieving and processing and sitting in the darkness was a real powerful tool for you and your family to ignite that inner flame, that intrinsic motivation to go, "Okay, I'm going to do something with this. "I'm not going to be a victim of this. "I'm going to actually be the victor here "and help me understand what was going through "my dad's mind and how can I prevent other men "from doing what my dad has just done." How about the rest of your family? I mean, you said your sister's gone on to do remarkable things. How did your brothers respond?

Yeah, victim and victor. There is no victim mentality in my family that will not happen. I have four Holocaust survivor grandparents. They're like, "Fuck this, we're going. "We are getting on with life." My grandma came to Australia as an orphan at 14. She'd lost everyone and everything. And she's the most optimistic person. She's 96 now, unstoppable. So there's an intergenerational thing going on there as well where I definitely felt that I'd been passed the keys to living a good life. And creating impact.

Yeah, yeah. Well, I definitely, and that's probably my dad as well. And it's a bit of ego. He was definitely a, he loved to take up space, as do I, and to have a voice and have an opinion. But that idea of you are here, make yourself known and useful is definitely something my entire family feels. My brothers are incredible. One is an author, he's written a book, It's a Shame About Ray, which is about dad. It's an incredible memoir. It was really, really successful. And he's written another two books since. My other brother's a lawyer who lives in the States, but he's always here. And even though he's away, it's like we have such a strong unit now. And I often think about, like we have a family dinner with our cousins, all the nieces and nephews, every Friday night. Like it's not Christmas. If we're fighting, we're fighting every week.

And it's like, we can't avoid this. And I think that that is so important because I think dad did a lot of cutting off parts of himself and not showing that. And now we're trying to be our full messy selves in front of one another. Yeah, that's what Tess and I love to say, that we're normalizing conversations around joy, pain, suffering, struggle, happiness, success.

But like you lose either side of the emotional spectrum over time being a guy, you know? My son is 10 months. He's got every possible emotion known to man. There is no difference between him and his cousins, his female cousins. Like there is this just beauty and the beast of masculinity on display. Especially 10 months. Exactly, and you know, over time, what I've seen clinically, what I know in the research is that you just start to cut away and police certain emotional expressions amongst guys to the point where you end up with just like this irritable, frustrated person who can't express happiness and joy, as you say, but nor sadness, you know?

And I think that the human experience requires all of those colors to exist and the pain of that and the excitement and all of that, you know? There's just a mutedness to male emotionality and there's many reasons for that. It's, you know, it's feminine, it's gay, it's, you know, all of the things that are othered as, you know, so it's a problem to do these things rather than the solution.

Bonus mum, okay. Yeah, and we, because of the nature of our work, we work a lot with corporates, we work with a lot of men. And we've decided to do men's only workshops because men are different around men and we wanna encourage them to feel the full spectrum. I didn't actually realize what we did until I listened to a previous interview with you and you were saying that we don't know how to feel anymore 'cause it's been cut out of us. So I realized why our workshops work so well. So what is happening?

Yeah, it's a really difficult time. The idea of what it means to be a man today is being shaken up because women and girls have started to thankfully become empowered and aware of themselves and what is possible, thanks to world champion surfers. You get to the point where men are now saying, what's my role, where am I? What's the, you know, the tectonic plates underneath my feet are shifting and there are some very bad voices telling them that they're having things taken away from them and they should grab back power and control. And just, so what are they being told, what do they feel like is being taken away from them?

Well, I think that there is still this traditional idea that they must be the protector and provider when we're hopefully getting to a point where you can have equal breadwinners in a heterosexual relationship. You can-- - Kinda need to in today's economical society. - Exactly. And it still is extremely triggering for lots of guys who saw their dad as the one who brought home the bacon and, you know-- - The wife stayed at home. Exactly. - Made the house clean.

And instantly now, people when we hear that, we go, well, that's primal 'cause men went and-- Yep. - Hunted. Hunted. - Gathered.

And that's where the conversation in my world ends because that's true. - Yep. I think it was my mom said yes, but the women gathered. - Yeah. 60% of the food source, so we still had more.

The men go out. - Exactly. The men just went out and fought. Yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So what-- - It's also like we're not in caves, so. - No. Yeah. - Like, let's-- I know, but we're still iPhone one.

Yeah, I get that. - So we're-- Yeah, but there's something to be said for what evolution does, which is it provides flexibility and choice, which is like there are just more options now. There are more people than there ever have been, and as a result, there's more diversity and more options at everyone's disposal, and I think that what's happening is that lots of guys are feeling like things are being taken away from them. The clarity, the certainty of what existed in previous generations.

Which is purpose, like they feel like they're purpose, my job, my role in the home. - Exactly, but what they don't see is that there's actually far more choice and more purpose. It's just not as clear, and it's not being sold as this black and white box that they can fit into. And so they're remaining rigid in their thinking. And choosing not to see the choice. Well, it depends on the guy, but I think that it's scary. It's scary to move into this, it depends, maybe this, maybe that. It's very gray, especially for young guys now. You know, they want to be successful. They want to have partners and be financially stable, and the world is extremely uncertain.

And so what we need to do is message to them in a way that's like, we see that, we understand, but we don't need to take it out on others. We need to find accountability within ourselves to take control of our own lives and to realize what is possible, while the likes of Movember and others start to hopefully shift the structures and systems around them. Because just going to guys like do better, be better, stop being toxic, whatever, is a very hard thing for your average 22-year-old who's struggling to pay rent. And what is toxic masculinity and what is healthy masculinity? That is very blurry. Like you have that conversation around our dinner table and it is frightening.

Exactly. But we were talking about this just before this episode started. Your wife challenged you and said, "You need to be more open and curious and less certain," but I feel like in this space, we need certainty. Oh yeah, I get that. But in my experience, putting toxic in front of masculinity and walking into a school and saying, "I'm doing a seminar on toxic masculinity for 12-year-old boys," they're like, "Fuck right off." Understandably. They're like, "Okay, so I'm broken."

There's no way their dads will let them in that row. Exactly, now you're gonna fix me? And I think all men and boys, just as women and girls, can understand that there are flaws. None of us are perfect, things go wrong. But I think we should be providing an aspirational message of what to move towards. We're doing a lot of don't do this, don't be that. And if you're a 15-year-old kid and you hear your masculinity is toxic and you're like, "I don't even know who I am or what I want to be," and you're saying, "Don't be a predator," I'm like, "I don't wanna join this conversation." You want to bring them in, we want to engage them.

I'm not saying that harm doesn't happen. There's a horrible situation with sexual domestic violence taking place in this country. But I think that we need to find a way to bring men into that conversation as the solution, not as the problem. And that's what I love about your research, especially with your PhD, when you're focusing on helping understand why men don't remain in healthcare. And instead of focusing on what they can't do, actually reframing it to what they can do and how they can do things a little bit better and be more engaged.

And you're doing a lot of work around reformulating that and crafting that to be a better message for men. I think we have so much to learn from women's health. As an example, medical misogyny is something that is being spoken about so often, like endometriosis, the fact that women are having heart attacks that are being misunderstood and, you know, hush hush. Well, we've only just started gathering women data.

Data, exactly. And so we've got a lot of male data, but we don't have a lot of men's data. Yeah, what's the difference? Yeah, so we have a lot of physical data. So for instance, all of the randomized control trials of all of these drugs, they're all male bodies. So we understand the side effects that are happening for these guys. But when I talk about men, I'm talking about gender. So that is how they exist within the world, their behaviors, their psychology, et cetera.

So we know a lot about prostates, as an example. But what we don't know is that when men have their prostates out, what happens to their life, to their wives, to their families, to their conversations, to their psychology? So that's men's health, exactly, that's men's health. And so we've done a lot when it comes to the, we call it the psychosocial understanding of women, because that was socialized. It's something we can talk about. We can understand women's wellbeing. We don't understand female physiology and their bodies in ways that we need to. And so that's now taking place. In a similar vein, we're pretty good with the male body. We're not good with the male mind, relationships, emotions. So we actually need to reverse and give a bit of that there and a bit of this here, because when men come into the health system, sure, they are the perfect specimen of what is expected given the research that's happened. But medical professionals actually aren't very good at connecting with them and keeping them there.

Psychologists have done so much research that shows that therapists actually reinforce stereotypes amongst guys. If you get a therapist who's sitting across from a guy who's crying or who's angry or something, they can actually perpetuate a really dangerous idea that tells the guy, this isn't safe. This isn't how you should be expressing yourself. As a man.

Exactly. And so- - Boys don't cry. Exactly. And it's often just this back of the brain thing. We do this as parents. No matter how progressive or well-meaning we are, we've been brought up in this culture. And so consistently, we read less to boys. We sing less to boys.

And you've developed that online program for clinicians. It's called Men In Mind, right? For clinicians to train themselves up on how to deal with, well, how to treat men when they're within their care. Exactly. And you're seeing profound positive impact.

We are, we are. So think about the idea, as I said before, we don't wanna just heap more responsibility on a guy to be different, be better. You wouldn't go to a physiotherapist as a guy and the physio would be like, that knee, I can't deal with that knee, I'm not into it. But we have a lot of therapists who like, the way in which the masculinity exists in the room, they're like, that's not for me, that doesn't work. You're not communicating emotionally in the way that I was trained. Oh, wow.

And the guy's like, fuck off. Like this, I'm paying, why? And so we're not adapting. And so the aim of Men In Mind is to actually upskill the system. Rather than say, hey guys, take on a different form, maybe the system should start to wrap around them and offer them something that works. What would you say is the clinical difference between treating a man versus treating a woman mentally?

But an example is-- We can generalize menopause, so we can-- An example is male depression. So myself and a number of my colleagues have spent a lot of time trying to understand the fact that depression in men actually looks very different. So the way in which we consider it is an internalizing disorder, which is I start to feel shit about myself, hopelessness, worthlessness, sadness, tearfulness, all of the things that exist in the diagnostic manual, that's what we're trained in, except we now know from thousands of data points amongst men that when they show up with depression, it's anger, irritability, frustration,

drinking and drug taking, violence, these things that look like men behaving badly that is actually a cry for help because they have those internal experiences of worthlessness and hopelessness and sadness, but they're not condoned to be expressed. And so they push them down over and over and over until they boil over to the point where they're allowed to be the irritable, frustrated guy at work because at least he's not crying. And so it's an externalizing rather than an internalizing. He takes it out on the world and others around him, which actually makes people repel away from him, which is the hardest thing and why so many men don't get the help they need. And the links with suicidality when you're doing that type of risk-taking behavior is huge. So that's an example of how you change the system so that when someone comes in and they're showing that type of behavior, you don't go, oh, you need to go to anger management. In fact, you go, maybe this is actually a form of male depression that we can treat in a different way.

We have a quick favor to ask. If this podcast has been landing for you, please hit subscribe and leave us a rating or review. It helps us grow the show and keep bringing these conversations to more people. And you're unlocking something in them which they've probably never been able to discuss. Like anger is like the top of many different emotions that when you're told not to cry, when boys are to be tough, when they're on the footy field and smashing it out of each other, that's one form of therapy, but it's the internal stuff that just gets masked and band-aid. Exactly.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's still happening and it's happening every day. There's a lot of research about this idea of matrescence, which is that the female brain completely changes post-pregnancy and the hormones shift their personality fundamentally. There's now research about patrescence, which is that after having a child, you're not, you know, I didn't give birth, but the three to six months after, things literally start to shift in you neurobiologically. And I've felt that. What happened?

Well, testosterone, all of the hormones kind of shift, but your role shifts. Studied? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think that's so important that we talk about--

Great book called "Dad Brain" by Darby Saxbe that just came out. Incredible, "Dad Brain." - Dad Brain. So what happens to the testosterone? Does it increase or decrease? It decreases.

Which limits your ability to do it. Well, your energy, your-- - Everything. So many different things. But it also makes you much more, well, it makes you less likely to flee the house evolutionarily. - I was about to say, it makes you more present and calm.

It does. - I was gonna, I thought you were gonna say it makes him less likely to get a heart on. Is that what you're gonna-- - Yeah, that too. Well, no one wants to-- - She doesn't wanna have sex. Exactly, yeah, yeah. But there's definitely something around the idea of presence and grout and just, and also my brain shifted massively towards service. Like my ego started to dissolve because there's now someone else there who's an extension of my ego, I guess, but much cuter.

But he needs me and she needs me. And so I find that, you know, I do a lot of talks and therapy with guys who say the first six months are so hard because they don't know who am I, what do I do? I can't breastfeed. And I'm like, this is the greatest opportunity for you to show up. And it might not look like you wanted to, you might not actually feel like you're doing anything, but just preempting the water that she needs, preempting the meal, it's like that act of service is the greatest expression of healthy manhood that I can think of that's just proactive caring, really. And I think we should be putting that on a pedestal as something that people should be looking for. And did you, were you well aware of that? Or you just learned that or?

I kind of started feeling it during the pregnancy. I shifted away from like focusing on myself to trying to look after my wife a lot more. But I just think like my priorities have completely changed now. The things that I used to stress about or care about don't matter. That said, it's very fucking difficult. Like trying to work and care give and have a marriage that works and keep this kid alive and fed. There's only so much space. And now I just added all of this stuff and we've done awesome research at Movember. It's called More Than a Provider, this report that we did, that's really focused on the idea that there is still all of those traditional ideas of what a man needs to do and be. And now we've added, actually, I also want you to be caring and vulnerable and cook and clean and show up.

But I also need that stoicism. And that was never modeled to you either. So like you're changing-- No, my dad was a very caring guy, but I don't think he changed the nappy.

Yeah, so you're changing generational trauma or-- Exactly. Like live in front of you. With very little guide.

Yeah. You know, there's no map for how to do this. And you constantly feel like you're failing. And both of you are shit tired and you can't, you know, have no idea what is actually going on. And so trying to have those conversations amongst each other is so important. I'm just laughing 'cause I can hear Layne saying, "And that is why I didn't know not to have a child."

Kudos. Why do you have kids? Because they're cute for like five minutes a day.

Well, so are cats.

Sure. I do mega kickers every Saturday with my son, Benji. Chris and I both go 'cause we love it, like watching him shine. And every lesson for the last sort of six weeks, there's this kid who is sort of very nervous when he has to kick with his dad, he's really good, belts the ball. As soon as there's a game, he breaks down into tears. He's shaking, he won't go and stand near anyone. He sits away from all of the kids and he's visibly distressed. And this dad is the most present, calm, I can see the fume coming out of his ears. He comes beside his kid, the kid's like crying every time.

So this goes on for about six weeks and I was thinking, God, he is the most present, calm dad, like sure enough, gentle parenting in play. Two weeks ago, same again, he just, it just, he snaps. The kid is screaming, crying. He throws the kid over his shoulder and he storms out of the center and I was like, oh. But in my head, I'm like, I wonder how this is gonna play out. He comes back last week, the kid's in the game, the kid's playing, he's running around, it's a new kid. I didn't say anything, we just let it flow 'cause we didn't wanna bring any more attention. It was just like, good game, kid, high five. And even my son Benji was like, he's in it. And I said, yeah, what do you think changed? I said, he just, he believed in his, like innocence, right? The next week, I was like, I wonder if this is gonna happen again, the kid's in there. And my husband said to the dad, I'm just so curious, mate. Like, what did you do?

How did you handle that? He's a different kid and he goes, the day I set a boundary and I walked out of here and I said, if you're not in there, I'm not coming anymore. I've given you enough patience. And these kids are like five, I can't come back anymore. So it was tough, tough love. Tough love, wowza. So I hear you in saying, there's all of this clinical data, we need to feel it. I feel it in myself. I'm watching Chris re-parent. Like we know we just had Maggie Dent in and it's the gentle parenting, come beside, hold a boundary. But the tough love worked.

Yeah, yeah. How do you... There's a time and a place for it.

There is a time and a place for it. And there's also like tough love of previous generations was cooked and tough love today, I think looks very different. I do this in therapy all the time. You wield the relationship to your advantage. It's like you will be gentle and caring and present. And then there is a time when, for instance, I've had a young client say to me, I'm not gonna be here next week. I'm done, I'm done with life. He's really, really unwell. And that's when I just say, you will come back next week for me or I'll fucking kill you myself. And it's wild. I've done it once. And he was, he laughed and he came back and he's still a client of mine and he's incredible. He's a uni, and that's where like using a joke, using banter, you need to be very careful and very aware and obviously have trained long enough to know when, and I get it wrong sometimes.

But like resilience is a buzzword that's being thrown around a lot now, but there is definitely something to be said for how we are parenting our kids and like the helicoptering that we think is helping when in fact we need to let them be bored. We need to let them struggle. We need to let them get beat down and get back up again. And I think that what he was doing was saying, actually, I need to tell him that I care about him. I need to tell him that I want to be here, but I also need to tell him that he can do better than this and that I believe in him. And who knows what those conversations were during the week. - I'm not wasting my time and any money anymore, that's it. Yeah, and that could have backlashed and that's the hard thing. - It could have.

He could have said I'm never playing again. From my perspective, and I'm not a parent, so I'm always observing because I love to watch the dance between parents and kids. And I feel like the lesson there that I got from hearing that story was communication. How we communicate with our kids determines whether they feel safe in the boundary or not. So if he literally said what he said to Chris, that he said to his kid, I need you to know that I'm here for you, but unless you're in the game, I'm not coming back. So it's not like you're fucking disappointing me. You're embarrassing me. Get the fuck up, son, get back in the game.

This is bullshit, I'm paying for this. Then he was shaming and blaming and criticizing his child. But if he's saying, giving him a really healthy boundary and communicating how he feels as opposed to projecting that onto his kid, then perhaps the kids understand. It's like I'm often asked by parents how they can be better parents. And I say from a dad's point of view, replace solving the problem with being more curious. Ask more questions, but let them know how you feel based on how you feel as opposed to how you think you're meant to feel. And that comes down to really clear communication. And I see parents, through their own fear, attack their kids because they're tired, they're overwhelmed, they're fed up, they're exhausted, or they're scared about how people are seeing them. And so they take it out on the child.

I've seen parents in airports, I mean, that's where you see the worst of humanity, right? 'Cause they're exhausted and the kids are exhausted. I saw a parent kick a child at the airport and I was mortified. I didn't want to go near it because I wanted to say something 'cause I just thought that's not acceptable, but that's just creating a whole lot of trauma. But I think it always comes back down to having the presence and we share a lot about the tools, about creating more presence, which is literally taking the time to breathe before you respond. And then coming from a place of truth for you and establishing that clear line of communication. I would have loved my dad to do that for me 'cause I grew up in a place of tough love, harden up, get up, get over it.

You'll be right. Yeah, you'll be right. But how many people would look at that and be like, and that's what made a world champion surfer, this is the issue. Lots of people who got a lot of tough love became very successful. And then there are, again, you end up with that split and this is not a choice in the person.

It's trauma either leading to growth or suffering. Yes. And lots of them end up on the street.

Yes, yep. It's one way or the other. But that's your temperament, your personality, the other supports around you. Yes.

It's important the parents understand the child and who they are and if they actually think that they've got it in them, they just might need that oomph to get them over the line. And I think about this in a clinical environment, a medical environment. I was in a spinal ward for a while and the doctors would tell the patients whether they would walk again. And I asked Dr. Su Langley about this just recently around post-traumatic growth and what, she's like, it's not, there's actually a small percentage of people who, if they were told they would never walk again they'll turn around and say, watch me. Like there's, like, through, yeah, like. But what the clinicians were telling me, I was like believing in and it almost like destroyed my life. It came from truth and it came from certainty. When you're dealing with people who are going through a mental health crisis, like a new dad, whatever it is, and they're coming in and they've never felt their pain and emotion before, how do you get someone to feel?

Therapists don't do that. It's very unique. There's very few experiences where you've got someone who's not gonna put themself in the story. And so when a new dad is coming in and telling me, you know, I'm feeling these things but it's fine, it's fine. I shouldn't because she's been through this and blah, and I think that the normalising is super important which I often say, I'm like, I've seen five people today and four of them have said exactly the same thing because that experience of being so isolated and feeling like you are the first and last person to have ever experienced this thing and why am I so broken and deficient to have not gotten my shit together to be able to move through the world? Just telling them that that is such a human experience and that's my, you know, I'm so privileged to be able to know that other men are feeling this and experiencing it and to be able to convey that to someone, to unburden them of the fact that they are not crazy, they're not alone and that someone else who was just in the waiting room felt exactly the same way and maybe you should go to a dad's group and hang out, you know? So I do think that providing the space means something very different depending on who the person is but lots of these guys just need to be allowed to express the deep, dark things that kind of exist there and I just don't get scared by that stuff, you know?

And that's surprising that you lean into that given your dad, like often it can make us move out when you are pregnant, I've told Layne about this, that they separate you from your partner and they put you in another room and it's like a psychological assessment but my nurse sat down and said, "Look, you've gone through a lot "and I can see that you're like," 'cause I was very anxious and she said, "I just need to ask you, are you being abused at home?" I was like, "What, no?" She's like, "Okay, well you've got, "it doesn't matter what your signal is, "we have to ask this," and she said, "We have you abused when you were a child, "physically, sexually, or mentally," and I was like, "No," and she said, "Okay, well I just need to warn you "that as you're parenting your baby, "as you go through each age of your baby, "all of your trauma from that year will come up. "So you'll look at you," and I think I've said that to you before and it brought you to your knees 'cause you were like, "Oh, this poor baby," like, "What was I going through as a baby?"

Yeah. - And what was-- As a four-year-old, then a seven-year-old, when I was my mother. - Yeah. How, when someone, and you would be going through this with your 10-month-old, how do you help people understand that? Yeah, I often attempt to, and this might be my own psychology, I lean heavily into optimism and growth rather than everything's, because how much storytelling I got when we were pregnant that was like, "Everything's gonna change, "it's all gonna be fucked, it's gonna be so painful, "so horrible, good luck, say goodbye to sleep," blah, blah, blah, and I even, I said it to you, I leaned into perpetuating those things again because it feels like you're in a club, whereas I made this decision, it's beautiful, I enjoy it, it's hard, but it's the best thing I've ever done, and I think that when a dad comes in

and is experiencing some of these difficulties, there is a normalising, but there's also a realising that this stuff doesn't define them, it won't drown them, and there is a perspective shift that is possible. Women have such a role to play in that 'cause there's so many, that rhetoric of, "Oh, he's so hopeless, I have to do it all around here," like, when did you ask? Yeah, and let's empower him and tell him, "This is your job, this is your job." My wife is like, "You will cook, "you will cook the entire first month," and I was like, "Thank God someone told me." Well, 'cause she would have just been shitty that I didn't do it, but it was very clear, and I was like, "Good, I've got it."

I was watching a documentary on ABC around masculinity and in prep for today, and he goes to the USA, the host goes to the USA, and he meets a influencer who's got about 12 million followers, and talks to him about his influence on the world, and this guy looks like his body is the perfect body, the muscle, the house is huge, he's driving a sports car, he's running an online business, he follows God, you know, there's so much to him, he's got guns and a $15,000 dog, you know, so he's projecting all of this. And when he's talking to him, he actually turns out to be like a really nice, grounded guy who was a dork who changed his body, invested in himself, and made a life out of it. But the flip side is, which they explore, is there's a whole heap of men, or boys, who are looking at this going, "I'm never gonna be good enough 'cause I'm not big. "I'm never gonna be enough 'cause I'm not making money." And this guy, this influencer, is challenged in that 'cause he doesn't know, he's like, "Well, I could ignite change. "It's not my fault that they're not accepting it."

Yeah, it's super, super complex. This is so hard because it's like, again, tall poppy stuff. It's like, if you are successful, if you've got grit and you're pushing and things are working out for you, you should be able to share that. The issue with social media specifically is like this weaponizing of attention for a commercial model. And these guys are setting up a success-failure dichotomy for young men, which is like, if you don't have all of these things, which are largely unattainable, you have failed as a man. And so what I actually think is happening for these guys is they then go, "All right, so I need testosterone supplements. "I need steroids. "I need to go and loan a Ferrari, "even though it will financially cripple me." All of this-- - Get on the peptides.

Exactly, from some black market somewhere. Yeah, exactly. This desire for self-betterment is really great and is something that I witness constantly in men and is actually one of the greatest assets that we have. It's when it's turned up to this extreme level of nothing is enough. I will never be good enough. I will never be able to provide enough.

I have friends who've been able to buy houses in this city, which is an insane thing. And they're still like, "Is that enough? "Are we done? "Are we at a point?" And it's like, "No, we need to level up to the next thing." That's where our culture is right now. And I think that we need to turn down the heat around understanding what success actually means from a values perspective. And so young men are leaning into performativity of masculinity such that they're actually completely separating themselves from their authenticity of who they are, who they want to be, what matters to them. And they're just driving towards these goalposts that just keep moving.

Yeah, which makes it, as you say, unattainable, unhealthy, creates-- - And anxiety-inducing. Yeah, and anxiety-inducing, yeah. And then when they don't get it, what all of these influences do is say, "It's women's fault, it's immigrants' fault, "it's refugees' fault, it's trans people's fault." And that's a very good way of making more money because then, rather than, "My model was shit "and I'm sorry that I've sold you snake oil," instead, "Go blame someone else." And that's why we're getting massive social cohesion problems because everyone is blaming someone else for their issues.

Yeah, and I grew up in the sort of, "Fuck men, we can do it on our own." Feminism terms, yeah. - "Burn the bras." But my husband and I were trying to show that it's, both of us don't have that language or story around-- Everyone can be, it doesn't need to be a zero-sum game. Everyone can be empowered. There is enough pie going around. The idea that if women benefit, men suffer, and vice versa, not a useful idea, and we should work out that we have to coexist. What does utopia look like?

So many people would be like, "I just want every bloke to go to therapy." I don't want that, I don't have an interest in it, nor do I think that the psychs are ready for that. I do think we need a pre-parenting course, though. Oh, yeah. - You cannot have a child unless you get this license.

Yeah, that's good. - You and Maggie can run it. I'd love that. God, Maggie's the best. But I think that what we should be looking for is trying to peel back that performativity and actually help people gain human skills and value human skills in a way that's not, what do I have, but who am I, and what am I trying to achieve here? But that's all very well and good, but we need to look at the macro stuff that's going on, which is like, how many wars are happening? How much economic insecurity is there? When the scaffolding that is holding us together is so shaky, it's very hard to tell people to just get their shit together and do better.

And I think that that falls on deaf ears and drives radicalization, really. So we wanna get to the point where I think that young guys especially see their place, see their purpose, and see their ability to be change, to be powerful change-makers for themselves and for others. I think the greatest expression of masculinity now is making sure that you can be the best version of yourself to look after others. And lots of people use that, but then they subvert it a bit and it becomes dark and dangerous. So I think utopia really is around helping people have the time and the space where they're not so stressed about putting food on the table, that they can have those conversations with the people that they love around what they're working towards, what matters to them. And it's not coming from a scarcity mindset, it's coming from abundance, which is that we can be and do anything.

And is that the essence of the tattoo that you have on your body, reach for the stars? Is that really where that comes from? Yeah, it definitely is. It's funny because it will take on so many meanings over the next couple of years, but my son's name is Artemis, and Artemis was the goddess actually of the moon, hence the NASA rocket ship. And besides the hope that I think that he hopefully will be six foot five and a basketball player, I really want him to always know that he can just keep trying and that failure is not the impediment that he thinks it is. It's actually that's the fire to keep going and that I'll always be there to catch him.

Beautiful. If Raymond was here now and he is, you can feel him in the room, what do you want him to feel and know now? I think early on, and I still feel this now, I just want him to know that we're okay because I think that that was probably his greatest fear. But I also know that he wouldn't have left us if he didn't know that we could band together and hold each other up and survive. And I'm very grateful for the foundations that he gave me.

I can err towards anger and resentment and sadness, but I got 20 years of an incredible father and I get to carry him with me moving forward. So I'm okay and I'm learning and growing and I'm grateful for him. Beautiful. It seems to be a consistent theme throughout this podcast when we've talked to people about loss, especially of loved ones and how it's often experienced through a lens of gratitude. I know that's how I do it. I experienced the grief of the loss and then I go, but I'm so grateful I had. Is that--

Better to have loved. Yeah, better to have loved than, yeah. But I think that there's so many different forms of grief. And losing a child, losing this, they're so very different. But I do think that it's made me who I am and I'm just not a regretful person. I don't look back and go, what if? I'm very lucky that that's not my way of moving through things.

So I go, that's what it was. That's what I've been given. What are you gonna do about it? Yeah, hear the cards, choose to play. Exactly.

Beach bum. Beach bum, exactly. I lived in Melbourne for a bit and I was like, I can't handle this. You gotta get all agitated.

I get seriously agitated. But you know, my brother's in New York and he runs to the coastline in the middle of winter to go for a swim. It's in our bones. I just, I need, and ice baths do this as well, I just need the literal shakeup. I have cold showers. Washing off.

Yeah, it's just, it is a washing off, but it's like a reminder that there's another way to feel. So when I'm hot and bothered and anxious and stressed, it's like I can find a new mode and I will return to baseline and things will be okay. And I think that it's the replenishing nature of the ocean that does that for me. And I like to run before, you know, I swim as well. So I get the hot and cold of life. I'm very much a man of extremes. And what about if you're away from the ocean and you can't run, what do you do mentally?

Mm, I find it difficult. I'm getting better at it by realizing that I have the control in my own brain to like give myself that brainwash, I guess, in some ways. But-- What would that look like for someone on the road that just therapies me? Yeah.

'Cause, you know, you see a whole lot of dads come home angry, fed up, big day. Yeah, well, something I always did, because, you know, if I'd have a number of clients up until eight or nine p.m. and then I have to go to bed to start again the next day, firstly, I would ride home if I could, just again, feel something different get out of my body. And I would always take five or 10 minutes sitting at my front doorstep before I went in, which is like, here is a line in the sand, you know? That day is gone, whatever happened, happened. And now I'm in dad mode, husband mode, TV, watching mode, whatever it might be, because otherwise, and this is what happens now, everything is blending in to itself. And especially with phones and social media, it's just, it's messy and it's overwhelming and there's no demarcation of the day.

Of the role. Of the role, yeah. We encourage people to take a shower and get into the clothes that you need for that role. So like, if you wanna have, if you're gonna go for a run, like get straight into the gear. For me, it's getting into my mum pyjamas.

Yeah. The other day, someone said to me, "Peter Alexander's killing sex life." Because like-- I'm in chill mode now.

And that's like mother bear, like mother bear doesn't wanna get it on. It's like there needs to be another one after that. But I think it's so important that we give our brain psychological cues that it's changing or moving and who do you wanna be? We start every podcast with the intention, because if we're not getting clear on just that, like I think deep down we're all sitting on a knowing of who we wanna be and how we wanna show up. To the man who's listening or to the woman who's hearing this and like, I've kind of, and they wanna be better. How would you encourage them to lean into doing things a little bit differently and a little bit better? Like consistency is everything. I always find it hard when people like, I'm in my running phase. And then it's over and now I'm surfing and now I'm doing this. And those people, it is very much about one foot in front of the other.

I've tried it for a week and it didn't work. Exactly. And what is working? What is it actually supposed, what does success look like? And I think the effort is super important, the consistency is. And also realising that you have control. I think we've lost that idea. So many things are happening to us that we don't feel like we can decide so many things. And I often think, I'm holding my phone, I'm like, I can put this down. Like no one's telling us that we are the ones in control here and it's addictive and it's overwhelming and everyone else is doing it.

But we can decide how we live our lives and no one can control that for us. What a place to finish this. Dr. Zac, where can people find you? What can they do with you? Where do you want this conversation to lead people to? 'Cause we want it to lead to change, to help people control their own lives. Where do you want it? Where do you want to draw people to?

For sure. Well, obviously, Movember.com. Yes. It's a big month. Extremely stressful, disgusting looking bore out massage that I'm wielding.

Ah, you're too hard on yourself. I think you are rocking it. I appreciate that. I think it actually suits you.

Yeah, to be honest, keep it. Thank you, I will. I have to, it's in my contract. Obviously, going to Movember.com and realizing that everyone can take part in this global movement. What does it do?

What does it do? Well, it funds our research, it funds our understanding, these programs, and it builds community, really, which I think is something that we are sadly lacking. Men and boys don't have places to go. And every November, they know that at their local surf club, there's gonna be an event going on. At the park, there's gonna be a dad's group. It's a coming together. It's an understanding that there is something greater and bigger than ourselves. And let's actually advocate for ourselves and our own well-being, 'cause women and girls have been doing that so well for so long. Maybe we need to step up and go, we actually, we wanna do something different. We wanna do better.

Yeah, to see the change, you gotta be the change, right? Exactly. Yeah, well, we will support, I won't be growing a moe.

You're a moe sister. Yeah, we're a moe sister. And we're supporting in every way that we can. Dr. Zac, thank you so much for joining us today. Can you finish this sentence to bring us home? Your wake-up call is not your wake-up call until you.

Jump in. - Give it a crack. What's yours? Oh, today? Today? - First and what, Zac?

Oh, I love the, just taking control of the moment. Like being in the moment and going, actually, I'm choosing this. I'm choosing to be the dictator. I'm choosing to be the asshole, or I'm choosing to be the compassionate one. I'm choosing to look at my phone. Just make consistent choices, and that's how you get control back of your life. Amen.

Mine is shine a light on shame. I have a lot of shame stories that I attempt to bury, and I felt you in that. I don't think there's anything more courageous, and I wanna thank you for your honesty and vulnerability today. 100%. I cannot emphasise enough how much courage it would take for you to sit here right next to your dad's office and share his story, particularly the GP that chose to end his life, who was an advocate for the space. Like, I can't think of a tougher situation for you to have to hold and express to people and then use it as your superpower.

It does bring it up when you share it every time, and you have to make a choice to share it and to bring it up for you and your family. And I just wanna acknowledge you that takes guts. It takes courage. I know it's gonna save someone's life today and save someone from the release of shame. Thank you. And that is a freedom in itself. So thank you for sharing your story. We've loved having you.

You're an absolute gift to the world. Thank you, Zac. Thank you. All right, Dream Team. If today's episode has brought something up for you, which I'm sure is and has, Dr. Zac, I think you can take this clinical note for me. Where do people go? What do they do?

Definitely head to lifeline. Movember.com also has lots of support services as well. Reach out to a friend, a loved one. Can we get therapy with you? Are your books open? They're pretty full, but give it a go. Shoot me now at zacseidler.com. See what happens.

I'm gonna send a few men your way. Otherwise, Dr. Roy Sugarman. Actually, you should come to our Men's Mental Health Workshop in June next year.

I'll be there. Great. - Excellent. Game on. All right, Dream Team. We'll see you next week. Toodles. - Toodles.

Awake is a center of human performance. So if you wanna bring more energy, motivation, and connection to your team. Reach out to us at [email protected].