Autism update

Last month I linked to a story about reseach indicating that autism rates rise with the age of the father regardless of the age of the mother. Now comes research that found a link between autism and - of all things - time spent in front of the tube.

You can read the Cornell University study here.

Is your kid really special enough to get that scholarship?

I know alot of us are one day going to be faced with paying for college at the same time we're getting ready to retire. It's a financial double-whammy that makes lots of us nervous. And it probably should. A new report by AllianceBernstein Investments Inc., an asset-management firm in New York, found that parents don't adequately prepare for their children's college expenses and are overly confident in their abilities to turn talents into scholarships.

The report is titled:

WHY CAN'T JOHNNY AFFORD COLLEGE?
BECAUSE HIS PARENTS SPEND UNWISELY, DEPEND ON DEBT,
AND HAVE UNREALISTIC EXPECTATIONS FOR FINANCIAL AID

Ouch!

Happy half-birthday...

...to my daughter, Delaney, who turned six months old today. That means I've been an over-40 new dad for half a year now. It seems like both a long time ago and only yesterday that she was born. My wife, Desiree, had a very difficult pregnancy, and it has been a real blessing that we got through it and have had this wonderful new addition to our family. Now, if she would only sleep through the night...

Trends in spending time with kids

Here's an interesting read: One of today's most e-mailed stories from the New York Times is about a large study that looked at several years worth of data on the family workload. Among the trends - moms spend as much time with the kids now as the did 40 years ago despite more of the women being in the workforce. Also noted was gender equity in the workloads, with men and women both averaging about 65 hours per week.

Ads with older dads

you know your issue is going mainstream when even Madison Avenue notices. I saw a commercial last night where a man with a little grey in his hair is eating cereal and his wife walks in with a preganancy test. He then glances up a a family picture with him and a girl in a graduation gown. And then he grimaces with a "here we go again" look on his face. I guess he thought his child rearing days were over. At first I thought it was a commercial for the pregnancy test, but actually its for the cereal - promoting its health and energy benefits.

Study: Free-play time for kids undervalued

You may have heard some of the media reports about a study from the American Academy of Pediatrics which urges more unstructured play time for children. The full 32-page report is available on the American Academy of Pediatrics' web site and is worth reading. It is available here:

http://www.aap.org/pressroom/playFINAL.pdf


For those who don't have the time to read the full report or want to know what the study is all about, here is the abstract:

ABSTRACT. Play is essential to development as it contributes to the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being of children and youth. Play also offers an ideal opportunity for parents to engage fully with their children. Despite the benefits derived from play for both children and parents, time for free play has been markedly reduced for some children. This report addresses a variety of factors that have reduced play, including a hurried lifestyle, changes in family structure, and increased attention to academics and enrichment activities at the expense of recess or free child-centered play. This report offers guidelines on how pediatricians can advocate for children by helping families, school systems, and communities consider how best to ensure play is protected as they seek the balance in children’s lives to create the optimal developmental milieu.

The importance of just being there

I was very moved by an e-mail from Art P., from which I quote below:

You know, I suppose I am lucky because my father just died two years ago on his birthday at 82. But then, as he was a Neurosurgeon, I was never really a priority in his life due to the fact that there was always someone more important who needed their life to be saved. That's just the way it was growing up. He did apologize, however, for not being there for his family a week before he passed and I guess this comforts me, knowing that at least he was cognizant of what had happened during his life, but it seems little compensation to a lonely little boy. Would have rather had the time to get to know him better because, as it turns out, he was a very interesting man. But, if nothing else, my experience has certainly helped to set in stone my priorities for my own family. He told me that, "No one ever writes on their gravestone 'I wish I had spent more time at work.'" Something he learned from his Oncologist, far too late.

Over the last few years, I have looked back on the amount of time I have spent on my kids and sometimes wondered if it would have been in their best interest for me to focus more of my attention on getting ahead so that I could do a better job of providing for them. But Art is right. The time you give just being there for them, to talk to them and help them grow, is probably the best thing you can do for them. And I doubt my kids will ever say "Why didn't you spend less time with me?"

Homecoming

This weekend was my 20th college homecoming reunion, and I was struck - as I wandered past gatherings of people from my Class of '86 and a few years beyond - how many couples I saw with young children. I know technically they are old enough to be grandparents, but I got the impression that for many of them this was their first generation of children. In my group of about a dozen or so people, there were three of us - all in our early 40s - who had children within the last two years.

I asked one of them, my friend Fritz, who has a 16-month old son, to tell me what life is like for him now with a new child. Here is what he wrote:

"As for becoming a Dad, it's the single, most wonderful event in my entire life. I think about things that I've never thought about previously - where I live and how I live, and particularly how my career fits in with all of my other priorities. Saturday used to be a fairly routine work day for me, at least in the morning. It's now officially designated as 'family day' in the Smith household. When I'm around my son, I always seem to have his safety and happiness at the fore in all of my thoughts. I want to protect (but not necessarily isolate) him from all the bad in the world, teach him to avoid the mistakes I've made, and with my wife's help, create a warm and loving environment for him to grow up in. I love my wife, my parents, my brother and sister and their families dearly, but the love that I have for my son is somehow stronger. It's unconditional, at least for now, and I hope it never changes."

Elvis Costello and wife, Diana Krall, expecting twins

I have been a fan of musician Elvis Costello since the early 1980's, so I was happy to hear he will be joining the ranks of older dads. Costello, 52, and wife Diana Krall, 41, also a talented musician, are expecting twins in December. Costello has a son, Matthew, from a previous marriage.