Gamer mom/dad thread

We just got back from visiting the in laws for a week and a half.  Little guy did pretty well considering it was close to a 13 hour drive.  How people drove that far without tablets in the past is beyond me.

 
bordjon said:
Congrats on the new job and expecting no. 2 dohdough!

We are headed to the dr. this morning. My younger daughter just can't seem to shake the chest congestion she's had since Saturday. We are guessing it's pneumonia. It doesn't seem to slow her down too much though - she has wanted to go out and swing and scoot and such all weekend! It's just nights and naptime where it's keeping her (and us) up and it doesn't seem to be getting any better.

My kindergartner daughter has been enjoying playing a very low tech game recently - go fish! It's quick and easy and we'll all sit down and play it a couple times after dinner.
Click to expand...
Thanks man!

Hope your daughter has an easy and speedy recovery!

 
So about 5 months ago or so, I noticed my son was very social with other kids. Sure he would play around them but not with them. He would just go do his own thing. Also, he would never listen to us, like he would acknowledge he heard us but wouldn't obey when other kids would.

So I told my wife "Hey, I think there might be something wrong with Lincoln, like autism or something" and she blew it off as nothing. I figured she would just because she wouldn't want to face the facts.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago. I mention it again and this time she agrees with me (as she finally came to the realization). She also takes some tests online to see if he has any traits for autism and sure enough he did. So we make an appointment for our pediatrician so that she can refer is to a specialist.

So we go to the appointment and we tell the doctor we want to get him tested for autism. She does he small test and ask us questions aboutbhis behavior such as if he lines up things around the house, doesn't make eye contact or listen, how is he with other kids his age, and so on. She goes on to say that she also think he has some form of autism, possibly a small form of it.


Now that we have about 3 or 4 referrals from the doctor we can move further in the process. It's bittersweet actually. I love that we can find out what he has but on the other hand I'm somewhat worried for when he goes to school on how other kids will treat him. You see all these stories of kids bullying special needs kids and thats the last thing I would want.

Sorry for the long read guys well if you make it this far
 
@ThunderChunky I have a close friend who's son sounds very similar to yours. He's on the light side of the spectrum but it's there. They have been treating it with special classes and ways for him to express himself. Usually through colors, sounds and other activities. It surely paid off and he is now in a normal Kindergarten class and seems to be doing well. He still has issues of repeating himself over & over and sometimes almost obsessive talking about subjects that his classmates are unfamiliar with. Other than that he seems sociable with other kids and able to express himself.

The key is catching it early and it sounds like you did that. Good thing your wife didn't stay in denial about it. That would've made things harder down the road. Good luck buddy

 
Last edited by a moderator:
tl;dr: Should I teach my kid about Santa?

So I'm sure by now that a bunch of y'all have heard about the Santa actor that had a kid die in his arms, which has really messed with my head. As an atheist, I couldn't care less about the holiday, but the whole thing has really gotten me thinking about the harm of The Illusion. Up until now, I've tried to keep it 100% with my daughter when it comes to cultural/religious myths, but philosophically speaking, is there really a difference between Santa and Thomas the Tank Engine? They're both fictional characters that, at this age and for the sake of argument, she thinks are real. For instance, when we went to the Thomas theme park, she thought that she was actually seeing the same Thomas from the tv show and we pretended that it was. When I relate that to the news story, I can't help but wonder if it's better to have that illusion as a source of wonderment.

A more cynical person would say that the kid dying in Santa's arms instead of the parents was fostered by society and the parents themselves...that if the parents didn't socialize the kid about christmas, then the parents would've been in the room instead of in the hallway watching a stranger pretend to be someone else being the last one to hold their child. To be quite honest, that person wouldn't be wrong. Then again, the child dying could've just as easily happened if the parents went to the bathroom or get a drink...you just can't predict these things and I'm not judging anyone in the story.

I certainly know that I'd want to be holding holding my child in that situation, but at the end, it's really about them, right? If cheap consumerist garbage can make the kid happy for a moment when they're at death's door, why should it be a problem? I just don't know how to square that circle and it really makes me question myself in regards to how I build relationships between her and certain things.

 
dohdough said:
tl;dr: Should I teach my kid about Santa?
Click to expand...
My wife and I are not teaching our kid about Santa, per se, but we are not telling him that other kids/teachers are wrong either. We play along because that's the norm.
I do not think it harmful either way, so long as when the kid is old enough, you gently tell them.
He's smart enough he will figure it out sooner rather than later, but, if he believes til he's 8, I probably wont care.
There is only so much a time a person can believe in the improbable that I wont take it away just to soothe my conscience.

It's like the spouse that admits to cheating because they felt guilty but now feel better. They were also being self-centered.

 
@dohdough I'm in a very similar situation as you. We're not a religious family but we still enjoy the holidays and celebrate X-Mas. She will eventually grow out of Santa but for now she is enjoying the idea of a Santa, so I let her enjoy. But I also don't want her to think all the presets under the tree are from him. So we visit Santa every year and she asks him for one gift. That's the one gift form Santa, the rest are from mommy and daddy. Last year she asked him for a harp. That wasn't happening so we compromised with a keyboard saying, "the harp is probably to big for Santa to carry." This year it was something much easier, Animal Crossing for 3DS.

All in all I don't see the harm in it as long as you take the time to explain there are families who don't celebrate X-Mas and some who don't believe in Santa. And there's nothing wrong with that because every family is diffrent. She's already encountered the "spoiler" kids in her calss who are telling her he isn't real, but she ignores them and chooses to believe. 

But that story you mentioned about the kid dying in Santa's arms was absolutely heartbreaking. I was chocking up yesterday as I explained the story to my wife. Stories like just destroy me and I realize how fortunate we are.

 
Just learned the kid dying in santa's arms was most likely a hoax. 

EDIT - Most definitely a hoax.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Hey guys! How are you all?

Checking in, my little one is gonna be 3. Pretty much didn't go through terrbile 2s, but I have yet to be successful in potty training womp wompw
 
Our daughter struggled with potty training up until she was 5. No bed wetting, but her issue was to stop what she was doing to go potty. She'd rather pee her pants than stop playing. I remember having dozens of long talks with her about it. I do not miss that.

Schools back in session which is a good and bad thing. I'll miss her since I won't see much of her, but at least we get a breather.

 
Yeah that's basically the best advice for potty training, don't rush it and be patient with temporary relapses.  I think my first daughter was trained at around 3 and a half, and my second daughter was closer to her third birthday, but that's not including incidents like Rodimus mentioned (rather play than pee).

My son just turned 2 and I haven't even thought of training him yet.  In the short term it is much easier keeping them in diapers, especially for errands / family events.  They'll all learn eventually...

 
Oh man, potty training. I hope my second kid will be easier than the first! My goal is to have her trained before the next one is due...don't think that's going to happen though.

 
Mine will tell you after she's gone, but now that Rodinus mentions it, I think I have the same thing, a little one who would rather play then stop.
 
Besides the stop playing issue our daughter was potty trained at 3.

It gets frustrating since you sound like a broken record after the 7th time.

The only time she wet her bed was the night before we went Japan. We were all excited. I guess she got really excited.

 
Haven't checked if with this thread in ages but glad to see potty training is being discussed. My son turns 3 next month and we just had a baby last month. I would really like to start potty training mainly because changing two sets up diapers is getting old real quick. He's so big now that changing tables out in public barely hold him.

But we just seem to busy to really try to tackle the task of training, due to more focus on the newborn. But I think he might be ready. I make him watch me pee in the toilet, which sounds crazy but I read it online and he finds it fascinating lol. He has one of those plastic playhouses in his play room that he runs into to poop. He doesn't even play in the house...just poop. So that tells me his #2s are planned.

He does however leak out of his diaper a few nights a week, despite me trying to limit his evening water intake (very little 1 hour prior to bed)

So I guess we just need to buckle down and do it. I just need to remind myself not to get stressed if it doesn't work right away.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Last edited by a moderator:
J-Squared77 said:
Haven't checked if with this thread in ages but glad to see potty training is being discussed. My son turns 3 next month and we just had a baby last month. I would really like to start potty training mainly because changing two sets up diapers is getting old real quick. He's so big now that changing tables out in public barely hold him.

But we just seem to busy to really try to tackle the task of training, due to more focus on the newborn. But I think he might be ready. I make him watch me pee in the toilet, which sounds crazy but I read it online and he finds it fascinating lol. He has one of those plastic playhouses in his play room that he runs into to poop. He doesn't even play in the house...just poop. So that tells me his #2s are planned.

He does however leak out of his diaper a few nights a week, despite me trying to limit his evening water intake (very little 1 hour prior to bed)

So I guess we just need to buckle down and do it. I just need to remind myself not to get stressed if it doesn't work right away.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Congrats on your newborn!

We let our daughter watch too(I'll sit) and sometimes she'll take off her diaper and sit on the potty next to us. Sometimes she'll even break out the toddler adapter for the regular toilet after we're done and want to flush the toilet herself. One of these days, maybe she'll even do #1 or #2 before flushing. Chances are that we'll just use a weekend to hopefully get her trained by the time the second one arrives. I ain't about that 2 diaper life either...haha

 
Last edited by a moderator:
J-Squared77 said:
Haven't checked if with this thread in ages but glad to see potty training is being discussed. My son turns 3 next month and we just had a baby last month. I would really like to start potty training mainly because changing two sets up diapers is getting old real quick. He's so big now that changing tables out in public barely hold him.

But we just seem to busy to really try to tackle the task of training, due to more focus on the newborn. But I think he might be ready. I make him watch me pee in the toilet, which sounds crazy but I read it online and he finds it fascinating lol. He has one of those plastic playhouses in his play room that he runs into to poop. He doesn't even play in the house...just poop. So that tells me his #2s are planned.

He does however leak out of his diaper a few nights a week, despite me trying to limit his evening water intake (very little 1 hour prior to bed)

So I guess we just need to buckle down and do it. I just need to remind myself not to get stressed if it doesn't work right away.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Congrats on the new baby!

We took our kids to see Sing a couple of weekends ago. We regretted it a couple of days later when all my 2 year old was saying was, "oh my gosh, look at her butt". I want to take them to go see the new Lego Batman so we'll see how that goes.

Is there any way to tell if youtube videos have profanity in them? I sometimes watch video game review videos on my TV while the kids are playing, but there are quite a few that will drop F-bombs, which has caused me to promptly turn the TV off. I'm talking about watching reviews on Mario games and the like, not even CoD or GoW. It would be nice if they had some kind of warning telling you the video contains profanity, kind of like how itunes podcasts show a little E in the corner letting you know there is explicit content.

 
@encendido5 - I don't think youtube has any kind of rating system for things like dropping an f-bomb. I guess just check out a few reviewers and find someone clean and just stick with them.

But we saw Sing too. Cute movie but I'm glad my local theater serves beer. That helped me get through it.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
Ugh, potty training, Art (my son), it wasn't hard to get him to pee in the toilet, but pooping was a big problem.  We were trying for over 6 months, and even had bought him some Transformers Rescue bots to give him (basically he would get one for each time he pooped in the toilet), and we still couldn't get him to do it.  Finally, I just said hey let him watch me do it, and that apparently was the trick, because he almost immediately started using it.

 
For the past few weeks my daughter and I have been playing Zelda BotW a couple days during the week. She mainly watches. But we just beat it last week and I must say it was a cool experience to play through a long game like Zelda with her.

She really got into it and with her great memory would help me with recipes. She even helped me with several puzzles. She made me promise not to beat it without her, since she knew I play after she goes to bed. Funny enough my wife didn't mind it so much since we were having so much fun and some genuine daddy/daughter bonding time.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
The most (semi) recent story I had like that was where my kids watched me play Luigi's Mansion, they really got into it back seat playing, telling me all the things I need to try sucking up.  Luigi's humming in that game is just too charming, and my daughters loved it.

Just this last Christmas I gifted my oldest daughter my DS, and got her a copy of Nintendogs.  Now I'm paying for it because she is obsessed with dogs now and wants a real one...

 
Billytwoshoes said:
The most (semi) recent story I had like that was where my kids watched me play Luigi's Mansion, they really got into it back seat playing, telling me all the things I need to try sucking up. Luigi's humming in that game is just too charming, and my daughters loved it.

Just this last Christmas I gifted my oldest daughter my DS, and got her a copy of Nintendogs. Now I'm paying for it because she is obsessed with dogs now and wants a real one...
Click to expand...
I did the same and gave my daughter my old 3DS with Animal Crossing. If I let her she could play it all day long. I was thinking about Nintendogs+ cats but she's fine with Animal Crossing for now.

 
What's going on gamer parents?  It's been a year since this thread has seen any activity.  That means our kids are a year older!  My oldest (4) is now in Pre-K so it's changed the gaming time I have every day.

How's everybody balancing their gaming life with kids?  Personally, I've trained myself to get used to a 5am-7am gaming schedule before my son wakes up for school.  I work a night schedule so this requires a sacrifice of sleep, but I get a serviceable 6 hours each night, and that allows me to put some work into my game backlog.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
WOW nice to see this thread active again.  I've most the mostly been a lurker in this thread due to me having nothing to contribute to the conversation since my kids are now 17, 16, and 15 and everyone talks about having youngsters.  I get to game whenever I want now due to their age and the only thing I have to look forward to is them leaving.  I love them dearly but teenagers suck and I cant wait till the day I have the house to myself again.  

 
I can't believe it's been so long since I started this thread.  The little boy on the first page is about to turn 7!  I also have a 3 year old who is now fully potty trained, which makes things a lot easier, not to mention cheaper since we don't need to buy diapers anymore.  I'm actually able to get a bunch of gaming in at night after the kids go to bed.  My wife works a lot of nights, so I am able to get at least a couple of hours a night.

 
Wow. This thread is hanging in there. I started posting when my girl was a year old. She's about to become 8 now. Damn time flies.

I'm able to enjoy gaming a little more now that she's older. We played and beat several games over the past year. Kirby Star Allies, Mario Odyssey, Overcooked, Fat Princess Adventures, Ratchet & Clank, Zelda BotW. So it's great I can play some of these games around her now. I just can't play something like God of War or Witcher.

She also has her Miitopia which she loves. It's pretty easy for her.

 
My kids (8 y.o and 9 y.o) are fond of League of Legends. They play it through eSports platform at https://dreamteam.gg/lol/teams with different players from around the world. I play it with them from time to time. Quite entertaining.

 
Last edited by a moderator:
My boy is almost 4 now, we occasionally play Roblox and Minecraft on the Xbox, but he doesn't seem terribly interested in playing. He does however love to to watch people play it on Youtube.

 
soulvengeance said:
My boy is almost 4 now, we occasionally play Roblox and Minecraft on the Xbox, but he doesn't seem terribly interested in playing. He does however love to to watch people play it on Youtube.
Click to expand...
My daughter (7) plays Roblox. In fact I was watching her play it today and I was impressed with her platforming skills. However if I put in something like Mario Odyssey and hand her a controller she is terrible and can barely make simple jumps.. I don't get it.

 
My son is 7 and we’re playing Overwatch together on a regular basis now. I’m ok with him playing this shooter because the violence is cartoony. He’s gotten quite good with the game and gets play of the game honors quite regularly. He plays on the OG PS4 while I play on the pro. Both systems are in the same room so I play with headsets on. We just communicate by shouting at each other lol. My 3 year old daughter will watch us play video games occasionally but hasn’t taken an interest in playing with the controller. Hope you gamer parents/CAGs are doing well!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'm gonna revive this thread again. My daughter is 6 and she loves playing Roblox too. I also gave her my old PSP where she plays LocoRoco and Patapon. I've tried to teach her how to play Minecraft, be she doesn't seem interested in it. She likes to watch how I play Stardew Valley but there's so much things in this game she can't figure out. The latest game she enjoyed was Slime Rancher. Have anyone heard about it? I haven't, just accidentally stumbled upon this slime rancher free download, checked the screenshots, guides and it seems like a really nice game. My daughter adores it very much now and thus I hope she will abandon Roblox finally...

 
And, I'm going to bump this old ass thread. Kid is headed off to kindergarten in two weeks. He's been more into platformers, although he's been on a big Roblox kick lately. Crazy how time flies.

 
I have three kids - two girls (5,8), and one boy (2). Very hard to fit any gaming in until about 9pm when they go to bed. 

 
My youngest is about to go to kindergarten too.  He really likes playing the Lego Force Awakens game, but other than that, he's not really interested.  He's more interested in watching Star Wars movies / shows or playing with his Lego Star Wars toys.

 
SilentE said:
I have three kids - two girls (5,8), and one boy (2). Very hard to fit any gaming in until about 9pm when they go to bed.
Click to expand...
This is very much life right now. It's about staying up past the kids and in my case, the wife too. She doesn't like me playing Xbox or I'm"choosing video games over her". I get time during the evening if I choose to play while everybody is up, but I dont want my kids to see me playing all the time. I am semi-addicted to video games and don't want my kids to only have an image of their dad with a controller in hand so staying up late is the way to go.

My 5 year old boy is in an extreme Mario phase right now after grandma bought him a 2DS or whatever its called.
 
When I became dad thing got different. I don't really have time on gaming, all I do is just play Fortnite on my smartphone. But if I suddenly have extra free time I play it on PC, because it's far more superior. I use this service to boost my rank just to stay in good shape and keep up with the latest updates.

 
SilentE said:
I have three kids - two girls (5,8), and one boy (2). Very hard to fit any gaming in until about 9pm when they go to bed.
Click to expand...
This has pretty much been my life since bringing home a husky puppy for a few months now. I can't imagine having kids, which is exactly why we don't want any lol. Being a dogfather is enough heh.

 
I'm reviving this because I know a lot of you have kids around my kids' ages, all of you need to check out Bluey, it's on Disney Junior, and not only is it bearable, but it's brilliant. (it's from australia)

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
bread's done
Back
Top