I’m not sure how much time you have spent around single moms, but it’s remarkable how they simply will not acknowledge when their only child is in the wrong or not doing their best. It’s like they have a filter that they simply will not allow any negative comments (however gentle) to get through when it comes to their child. I think they become emotionally enmeshed with their child to the degree they can’t see things impartially. A father figure knows the child will need to be on his or her own in the future, so he tends to understand or at least resister an issue with his child. A single mother somehow thinks she can always shield her child from the world and the problems he or she brings upon themselves. It’s scary. A child of a single mother can lie to you, get caught, and then not face anything from the mother who will turn it into “he means well, etc.” I’m curious about your comment that ten years ago you’d fight against the idea that a man needs to be present and assertive in a child’s life. Can you articulate when that change of mindset happened? Was it from these encounters with fatherless or absent father children?
I work (remote) for a company based in Southern California. We have had immense trouble hiring junior people to do basic admin sorts of tasks.
For example. We had a sales administrator who had an MBA on her resume. She talked convincingly about what she could do and we were happy to hire her in the expectation that she would do the basic order admin sorts of things to begin with and then move up to more demanding things shortly afterwards. It soon became apparent that she was unable to write coherent sentences. Since we wanted her to write emails with somewhat customized content to our customers and prospects this was a problem because there were no snippets of boilerplate she could use. She also appeared unable to read more than the first couple of sentences in any email - more than once she replied to emails asking a question that was answered a couple of paragraphs down in the email she was responding to. She had (and this shocked me) problems using excel to do basic things like calculate totals for multiple subscriptions with discounts then adding sales tax. She couldn't make a sales forecast for renewals that was accurate.
The worst thing was that she didn't realize she was the problem or that she needed to work on fixing things. So when someone fixed her first sales forecast she made the same mistakes the next quarter.
We have found a man now who is probably about the same age (late 20s / 30ish) who does all of these things. We are making sure he's happy and has no desire to move on to greener pastures because we don't want to go through this again. We've also had good luck with interns, but our interns are the children of current employees (who are all married) so they may be special.
I am surprised that I still have all my fingers. As a kid I packed cutoff match heads into used CO2 cylinders to make improvised rockets that sometimes exploded when set off. I like to tell my grandkids about how as ten year olds with paper routes my friends and I once rode our bikes to a nearby small airport. We gave a pilot we didn’t know a couple of bucks for gas and he flew us over our homes in a Piper Cub. When I got home and told my mom her response was “that’s nice, get ready for dinner” and that was it. We lived in a Chicago suburb and would ride the train to the Loop and wander through the big department stores and once ended up on State street south of Van Buren outside a burlesque show hoping to get a peek inside. A friendly doorman waved us in for a free show. That we never mentioned to our folks.
I was very interested to talk with a lesbian mother of a male infant patient that I was seeing in my office. She had been artificially inseminated and she and her wife had procured multiple specimens from the same donor so that their children would be related. She appeared to welcome my sincere interest in hearing their story. I asked, because I knew it to be recognized and important among others (single women and lesbian couples) how they planned to give a male role model to their infant son. I don't recall her precise response, but it did not seem to have been a prominent feature in the plan. The interaction was very pleasant and I examined and made recommendations for care of her young son's ear issue and saw them on their way.
Fast forward a few months. I was called to a meeting with my department head (a female surgeon) and HR representative based on a letter from the patient's mother complaining about my discussion with her and referenced my question about a male role model in their son's life. During my HR struggle session I explained to the women representatives that I routinely take interest in the "bigger picture " with my patients as I feel it is a big part of caring for the whole patient and helps me engage with patients and familes and their concerns. As they recorded the session with cell phone placed centrally on the desk, I explained that it is routine for me to plug in with patients "where they are at" and that I see and respectfully engage with patients from all backgrounds and persuasions and that this is part of the approach to care that has helped me understand and bond with patients over my 30+ years in practice.
I suspect that the mother who was present spoke to her wife and found it difficult to accurately represent our very matter-of-fact and friendly discussion and my question about male role models for their son. This apparently lead them into a frenzy of offense culminating in the letter and to my summons for the HR meeting.
During my HR session, I explained that my approach to engaging respectfully (and in a spirit of helping and interest) with my patients is an approach that is fundamental to who I am as a physician and not inappropriate or politically motivated, as they had assumed and were ready to warn and intimidate me about. I plan to continue the engagement with patients that I always have and that is nearly universally appreciated, as it is becoming increasingly rare in Healthcare.
It is certainly not lost on me that we have arrived at a place where a male physician can be taken to task by a series of women (mother, female administrator, female HR rep) for recognizing that men and women need each other and that children need both male and female role models. So many layers to this interaction, much to ponder. Like many distortions infusing our culture and perceptions, I don't think this one will age well for those involved.
A note I just wrote (before beginning to read this excellent piece):
Most challenges and struggles are 90% conception and perspective (framing) and 10% objective circumstance.
THAT should be the message of mental healthcare… instead our providers seem intent on affirming, indulging and (frankly) weakening their patients. The value of obstacles and and competition and suffering are discounted entirely.
Remember: boys lied about their age in 1943 to fight on the beaches of Normandy. People are capable of incredible things but they need character and resilience.
I can relate to this. I'm one of the young kids with lacking skills, because the things we learn in school are all aimed at jobs and work. Any kind of free-ranging or benign neglect is left to the side in order to boost career prospects and resumes with the hope of getting kids to jobs faster.
Eternal kids trapped by the drive towards the eternal present of work.
I’m not sure how much time you have spent around single moms, but it’s remarkable how they simply will not acknowledge when their only child is in the wrong or not doing their best. It’s like they have a filter that they simply will not allow any negative comments (however gentle) to get through when it comes to their child. I think they become emotionally enmeshed with their child to the degree they can’t see things impartially. A father figure knows the child will need to be on his or her own in the future, so he tends to understand or at least resister an issue with his child. A single mother somehow thinks she can always shield her child from the world and the problems he or she brings upon themselves. It’s scary. A child of a single mother can lie to you, get caught, and then not face anything from the mother who will turn it into “he means well, etc.” I’m curious about your comment that ten years ago you’d fight against the idea that a man needs to be present and assertive in a child’s life. Can you articulate when that change of mindset happened? Was it from these encounters with fatherless or absent father children?
I work (remote) for a company based in Southern California. We have had immense trouble hiring junior people to do basic admin sorts of tasks.
For example. We had a sales administrator who had an MBA on her resume. She talked convincingly about what she could do and we were happy to hire her in the expectation that she would do the basic order admin sorts of things to begin with and then move up to more demanding things shortly afterwards. It soon became apparent that she was unable to write coherent sentences. Since we wanted her to write emails with somewhat customized content to our customers and prospects this was a problem because there were no snippets of boilerplate she could use. She also appeared unable to read more than the first couple of sentences in any email - more than once she replied to emails asking a question that was answered a couple of paragraphs down in the email she was responding to. She had (and this shocked me) problems using excel to do basic things like calculate totals for multiple subscriptions with discounts then adding sales tax. She couldn't make a sales forecast for renewals that was accurate.
The worst thing was that she didn't realize she was the problem or that she needed to work on fixing things. So when someone fixed her first sales forecast she made the same mistakes the next quarter.
We have found a man now who is probably about the same age (late 20s / 30ish) who does all of these things. We are making sure he's happy and has no desire to move on to greener pastures because we don't want to go through this again. We've also had good luck with interns, but our interns are the children of current employees (who are all married) so they may be special.
Without life skills,
Life kills
I am surprised that I still have all my fingers. As a kid I packed cutoff match heads into used CO2 cylinders to make improvised rockets that sometimes exploded when set off. I like to tell my grandkids about how as ten year olds with paper routes my friends and I once rode our bikes to a nearby small airport. We gave a pilot we didn’t know a couple of bucks for gas and he flew us over our homes in a Piper Cub. When I got home and told my mom her response was “that’s nice, get ready for dinner” and that was it. We lived in a Chicago suburb and would ride the train to the Loop and wander through the big department stores and once ended up on State street south of Van Buren outside a burlesque show hoping to get a peek inside. A friendly doorman waved us in for a free show. That we never mentioned to our folks.
I
I was very interested to talk with a lesbian mother of a male infant patient that I was seeing in my office. She had been artificially inseminated and she and her wife had procured multiple specimens from the same donor so that their children would be related. She appeared to welcome my sincere interest in hearing their story. I asked, because I knew it to be recognized and important among others (single women and lesbian couples) how they planned to give a male role model to their infant son. I don't recall her precise response, but it did not seem to have been a prominent feature in the plan. The interaction was very pleasant and I examined and made recommendations for care of her young son's ear issue and saw them on their way.
Fast forward a few months. I was called to a meeting with my department head (a female surgeon) and HR representative based on a letter from the patient's mother complaining about my discussion with her and referenced my question about a male role model in their son's life. During my HR struggle session I explained to the women representatives that I routinely take interest in the "bigger picture " with my patients as I feel it is a big part of caring for the whole patient and helps me engage with patients and familes and their concerns. As they recorded the session with cell phone placed centrally on the desk, I explained that it is routine for me to plug in with patients "where they are at" and that I see and respectfully engage with patients from all backgrounds and persuasions and that this is part of the approach to care that has helped me understand and bond with patients over my 30+ years in practice.
I suspect that the mother who was present spoke to her wife and found it difficult to accurately represent our very matter-of-fact and friendly discussion and my question about male role models for their son. This apparently lead them into a frenzy of offense culminating in the letter and to my summons for the HR meeting.
During my HR session, I explained that my approach to engaging respectfully (and in a spirit of helping and interest) with my patients is an approach that is fundamental to who I am as a physician and not inappropriate or politically motivated, as they had assumed and were ready to warn and intimidate me about. I plan to continue the engagement with patients that I always have and that is nearly universally appreciated, as it is becoming increasingly rare in Healthcare.
It is certainly not lost on me that we have arrived at a place where a male physician can be taken to task by a series of women (mother, female administrator, female HR rep) for recognizing that men and women need each other and that children need both male and female role models. So many layers to this interaction, much to ponder. Like many distortions infusing our culture and perceptions, I don't think this one will age well for those involved.
A note I just wrote (before beginning to read this excellent piece):
Most challenges and struggles are 90% conception and perspective (framing) and 10% objective circumstance.
THAT should be the message of mental healthcare… instead our providers seem intent on affirming, indulging and (frankly) weakening their patients. The value of obstacles and and competition and suffering are discounted entirely.
Remember: boys lied about their age in 1943 to fight on the beaches of Normandy. People are capable of incredible things but they need character and resilience.
My essay about Fight Club and the reaction to its themes today: https://jmpolemic.substack.com/p/masculinity-in-revolt
I can relate to this. I'm one of the young kids with lacking skills, because the things we learn in school are all aimed at jobs and work. Any kind of free-ranging or benign neglect is left to the side in order to boost career prospects and resumes with the hope of getting kids to jobs faster.
Eternal kids trapped by the drive towards the eternal present of work.
https://argomend.substack.com/p/the-eternal-present