Parental Guilt, Legal Considerations For Parents, and Career Change | David Lat (father of 2, lawyer, writer)

David: Take the advice that works for you and ignore the rest. Because as you mentioned, everyone is going to offer you advice. Anyone who's had a kid and you know, my parents, my in-laws, friends, and some of the things are going to work for you and other things are not because every family and every kid is different.

Listen with an open mind and try lots of things out, trial and error, enroll your kid in different activities, try different foods for them, whatever, but at the end of the day, follow the advice that works and ignore the rest, and don't feel bad about it.

Adam: Welcome to Startup Dad, the podcast where we dive deep into the lives of dads who are also leaders in the world of startups and business. I'm your host, Adam Fishman. And in today's conversation, I sat down with David Lat. David is a lawyer who started the legal news website Above The Law, and then later his own legal newsletter and a bi weekly podcast called Original Jurisdiction, which is now his full time job. He's a husband and the father of two kids. In our conversation today, we spoke about the transition from an in house legal career to the world of writing and podcasting, and how that has opened up time for him to be more present for his family.

We also talked about the surrogacy process that he and his husband went through, along with some of the important legal considerations in surrogacy and as a new parent, including setting up a will and why it's common for parents to drag their feet on this. We dove into the topic of parental guilt, something you won't hear many men discuss, and ended with a conversation on how to talk to your kids about different family types and configurations.

I learned a lot from David and I hope you do too.

Adam: I would like to welcome David Lat to the Startup Dad podcast. David, it is a pleasure having you on the show today. Thanks for joining me.

David: Thank you, Adam.

Adam: All right, let's get started here. So David, Tell me a little bit about you, and your professional background.

David: Sure. So I grew up in northern New Jersey and I went to law school and practiced law for a number of years, maybe six to seven years. And then after that, I went out on my own and did a more entrepreneurial thing. I started a legal news website called Above The Law in 2006 and was there from 2006 until 2019.

And Above The Law has grown quite a bit. It's a very large legal news website. And then, kind of wanting a new challenge, in 2020, I struck out on my own again and started a newsletter on the Substack platform called Original Jurisdiction. And that is now my full time occupation. I also produce a podcast, in addition, that is sort of an accompaniment to the newsletter.

Adam: All right. What was the decision to go from practicing law to then writing about the law? What was that like? Why'd you make that call?

David: So it happened sort of accidentally when I was working as a federal prosecutor in New Jersey under then U. S. Attorney Chris Christie. I started a blog under a pseudonym just for fun. This was in 2004 when blogs were becoming very popular. It was called Underneath Their Robes, News, Gossip, and Colorful Commentary about the Federal Judiciary.

And since I was appearing before judges by day and writing irreverent, occasionally snarky things about them by night, I did this under a pseudonym and it developed a following. It developed traction. And then a year and a half in, I revealed myself as the author of this blog in an interview with the New Yorker.

And then after that, I left the practice of law to focus on writing.

Adam: Oh, wow. I imagine that Chris Christie wouldn't have been excited about you writing a snarky kind of behind the scenes newsletter while also practicing and being part of the prosecutor department.

David: Well, it's interesting. I have to say, Chris was actually really very gracious about it. I just had him as the most recent guest on my own podcast, and we sort of relived those days. And back then, the Justice Department didn't really have a social media policy, so the people in D.C. told him, it's your call what to do with this guy.

And I had shut down the blog by that time, so he let me keep my job. I was very grateful to him for that. But eventually after being just a lawyer for a little while and not having the outlet of the writing, I realized that I did want to leave. So even though he didn't fire me, I eventually quit to focus on writing because I was realizing that I was enjoying the writing more than my day job and as a sort of condition of staying on once I stopped the writing. I just, I don't know, I didn't feel like myself.

Adam: Yeah. Well, we're going to get into that because I think it's a fascinating career transition, you know, I have a lawyer wife, so I'm familiar with the legal field and the demands of the legal field, but because this is a dad podcast, tell me a little bit about your family now and tell me about your partner.

David: My husband, Zach, we started dating in 2009 and then got married in 2015. He is also a lawyer, but unlike me, he still practices. We have two children, two boys. Harlan is six. He's in first grade. And Chase is eight months and he's in diapers.

Adam: I love that. Not in class. He's in diapers.

David: Nope. He's starting to crawl, which is fun.

Adam: So tell me a little bit about the decision to start a family and what that process was like. So I've interviewed other folks on the podcast. You've talked about things like surrogacy and stuff like that, but I'm always curious what this sort of route that you and Zach took was and what your journey to become parents was like?

David: So we did have our children through surrogacy, and we are eternally grateful to our egg donor and our two surrogates. And it was a long journey in some ways. We knew we wanted to have kids. And so fairly soon after we got married, we started learning about the process. And we actually did get the process underway fairly soon, we got married in September of 2015. And then shortly thereafter, we were already researching about the process. And I think it was in maybe, gosh, I'm trying to remember now, but in February of 2017, we did the embryo transfer and in October of 2017 Harlan was born and then we did not mean to have a six year gap between our kids, we were hoping to have them spaced a little sooner, but we ended up having a bit of challenges. We had a couple of unsuccessful embryo transfers, the pandemic intervened. And so, there was a time when IVF clinics weren't really performing procedures and so that second journey took a lot longer than the first, but eventually.

Last July, we welcomed Chase to the world. So that in a nutshell is our journey to parenthood.

Adam: So I've only really talked to maybe one other same sex couple who has gone through surrogacy. And I'm always curious, was that a challenging process to find surrogates? Some people have different opinions about being a surrogate for same sex couple. And so I'm just kind of curious what the challenges, not just the, you know, legal challenges and the sort of logistical challenges, but what were the other kind of maybe you know, lesser discussed challenges of going through this?

David: So I have to say it was in many ways a better process than you might expect in the sense that surrogacy has become increasingly popular, both for same sex and heterosexual couples. And there are now agencies that help you find egg donors and help you find surrogates. And they do a lot of the vetting of surrogates and really try to prepare detailed profiles of them.

And so we had a lot of great help from agencies and their teams along the way. So that was definitely a big help, obviously, and this is not a secret, the process is very expensive. So that is certainly part of it. I think that in some ways, what is challenging, but this is not unique to same sex couples is just, you know, when things don't work out.

So we had a couple of unsuccessful embryo transfers. We had one pregnancy loss, and I think it's tough and it's tough, not just on us, but also on our surrogates, because even though we have no idea when it doesn't work, why it didn't work, sometimes the surrogates they'll feel bad or they'll feel that they let us down or something, even though it was not their fault and we have no idea why the transfer didn't work.

So emotionally, I think that is a bit of a challenge, but again it's not unique to us. Lots of couples have fertility challenges or miscarriages or what have you. So, it's something that a lot of couples deal with.

Adam: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I imagine. And now the interesting thing is then you introduce a new person into the mix. So it's not just sadness or the disappointment from the couple, but then you've got another person in from the outside. So I wanted to ask, so you and your husband are both lawyers and I'm Married to a lawyer, so I know how demanding that field is. How do you and your husband, Zach, manage a household with a six year old and a eight month old in diapers, plus, you know, he has the professional demands of being a practicing attorney. You have the demands of being on the content treadmill of writing a newsletter and producing a podcast, which, as somebody who does the same, I know can be very demanding as well.

So how do do the two of you make that work at home?

David: Well, we are very fortunate. We have an au pair, Michelle, and we also have a part time nanny, Gloria, and they work really well together. The reason we have Gloria as well as Michelle is Harlan, like many six year olds, has a gazillion activities, and we didn't want Michelle schlepping a newborn to all of these activities, especially during the winter months, while also trying to deal with Harlan, who really, to be honest, is a bit of a handful.

So, when Harlan comes home they divide and conquer, and Gloria looks after Chase, while Michelle takes Harlan to all of his gazillion activities. We are also fortunate to have all four grandparents near us. One of the reasons we moved from Manhattan to the suburbs of New Jersey is the suburbs of New Jersey is where Zach's parents and my parents all live.

And so the grandparents help us out a lot too. And I don't know how people who don't have that help would nearby do it. So we are very lucky. We still have a lot of challenges and it's still very difficult to make things work as two working parents, but we consider ourselves very fortunate in the grand scheme of things.

Adam: Yeah. Does the newsletter writing and the podcast production, does that afford you a more flexible schedule than Zach?

David: Yes, and that is actually, I think, really key to our making it work. I think that if you're going to have one parent who has a very demanding job, it can be helpful to have another parent who also has a demanding job, but a flexible one. And you can probably relate to this, Adam. So, I can make my own hours, and I can write late at night after the kids go to bed or I can schedule things while Harlan is at school and it also is great because if something unexpected comes up like a pediatrician appointment because one of the kids is sick or something like that or a snow day or what have you? I don't have to really call in to a job and tell them, hey, I'm not coming today or something like that.

I'm really my own boss. And so it does help I think if you can't have one parent, who's focused and a stay at home parent, I think the next best thing is a working parent who has a lot of flexibility.

Adam: Yeah, that's great. I've talked to people before about this concept of the greediness of a career and certainly a practicing attorney is possibly one of the most greedy careers that you can have. Your time is never your own when you are practicing as a lawyer. Did the decision to be a full time writer and to do the podcast, did that have anything to do with the kind of transition to being a parent? Because you mentioned, you know, Harlan's six and you mentioned this kind of happened in, you know, 2019 ish is when you really kind of went out on your own. So yeah, were those two things related?

David: Somewhat because after I left Above The Law in 2019, I took a two year detour into legal recruiting, headhunting basically. And I did that from 2019 to 2021. And that was a more traditional job with more traditional hours. I did go to an office and I think by that point, Harlan was of course getting, in some ways, more demanding.

In some ways they get easier, and in some ways they get harder. But Harlan was, of course, more demanding, and we knew we wanted to have another kid. And so, I think it definitely contributed to my decision to leave recruiting and return to full time writing. But, I would say that the major driver for that was actually, a terrible near death experience I had with COVID 19 in March of 2020.

I was in the hospital for three weeks, including a couple of days on a ventilator. And it really just put things in perspective for me. And it just kind of made me realize, and again, it's cliched, but I felt it very viscerally that just life is too short. And I realized that even though I enjoyed recruiting and it was certainly lucrative, I really missed writing.

And so that's when I started my newsletter, Original Jurisdiction, in December of 2020. And after doing it for free while juggling it with recruiting for a number of months, in May of 2021, I moved to doing it full time. And it took a little while to build up an audience to the point where it's now a viable source of making a living.

But now that it's set up it's great.

Adam: That's awesome. And so I know we're not here to dispense legal advice. This is not a legal podcast. And I wouldn't recommend getting legal advice from a podcast, nor I'm sure would you. But I did want to ask, I realize that there are a lot of legal considerations when you become a parent and yours probably started even earlier because the surrogacy process there's a fairly hefty set of legal documents that surround that, but setting that aside, what are some of the more important legal considerations that parents start to think about, like after you become a parent?

David: Well, a couple of things. I think for folks like us who became parents in a less traditional way, we had to establish our parental rights from the get go, and our boys were both born in Colorado, and fortunately in Colorado you can get, through legal process with the help of a lawyer, something called a pre birth order, which means that in advance of the birth, the surrogate relinquishes whatever parental rights she is deemed to have under the law, and the non biological dad steps in to become the other parent.

And as a result, when the child is born, at least in Colorado and certain other states, you can have both names on the birth certificate of both dads or both intended parents. You don't have to go through a kind of procedure of second parent adoption or anything like that. So for people who do go through that journey,

that is a consideration. You do have to just make sure that you cross your t's and dot your i’s on that in terms of making sure that you are the legal parents. And then the second thing I would mention, and this is pretty obvious, but it's kind of funny, even though we're both lawyers, I'm embarrassed to say Harlan was around for several years before we got around to doing this.

You have to establish a will and you should have all of the other documents associated with that, including healthcare directives and proxies and all of that, because it's no longer just you, you know, God forbid you drop dead, you have people depending on you now, you have another human being. And so we had to, do a will and all of these healthcare documents.

And we had to talk to Zach's brother to say, hey, in the terrible event that we both passed away, would you be willing to take care of our kids? Things like that. So it was definitely something that we dragged our feet on, which is kind of funny because we're both lawyers. We know lots of trusts and estates lawyers, but it was good to finally get it done, but for any listeners who haven't get it done, just do it.

Adam: Yeah, it feels like, dragging your feet when it's your profession is a common thing that I hear about. It's like the doctor or the nurse that decides that smoking is going to be the thing that they do, right? Like they know better and yet they can't quite get there. So yeah, I think the same was probably true of me and my wife.

I think it took us a little while to get our act together and to do that because I, you know, I think calls into question your own mortality. Right. And so it's an uncomfortable thing to start to think about. What if I wasn't here anymore? Who's in charge of my kids?

So yeah, definitely very, very important. And I want to go back to what you mentioned about the surrogacy and that pre birth order. That's only in a handful or a small number of states as I understand it, right?

It's not sort of the norm in a lot of the country that you can be deemed the legal guardian or the legal parents prior to the birth of the baby, is that right?

David: Yes, I think that's right. There is one surrogacy agency, Creative Family Connections, I think, that actually has a map where you can go to any state and see what their laws related to surrogacy are. One thing I would mention, though, is under the Constitution, states are supposed to give full faith and credit to the edicts of other states.

And so sometimes you can have a situation where you get a pre birth order in one state and it might be honored in another state. So we had a weird situation with Chase, where our surrogate, Holly, lives in Wyoming, which does not do pre birth orders. Luckily, she lives near the border of Colorado, and so our plan was for her to deliver in Colorado.

And because the intent of the parties was for her to surrogacy contract under Colorado law. And she moved out there a week or two before the birth, just to make sure that she was in the state when it happened but one thing that was interesting that our Wyoming lawyer told us was, look, in the unlikely event that she goes into labor and delivers in Wyoming without getting the chance to go to Colorado, we can take that Colorado pre birth order that you got a few weeks or months ahead of time, and we can actually present it to the Department of Vital Records in Wyoming.

So again, kind of a little legal nerdery, but you're right that it's not in every state but sometimes you can present it from another state.

Adam: Oh, wow. That's fascinating. I had no idea about that, very interesting. So I want, to go back and talk a little bit about you becoming a dad. Tell me about the earliest memory that you have after becoming a father?

David: Gosh, oh wow, that’s tough. I remember going to the hospital to pick up Harlan, and one thing that ended up happening was, our surrogate Kelly, what happened was she actually near the end of the pregnancy got preeclampsia, a high blood pressure, which is a very dangerous condition potentially and so they had to induce and so Harlan arrived a little bit early and we were not already in Colorado.

So we actually were not present for his birth, even though it was our intention to be present for his birth. We technically arrived I think at 11 PM on the day of his birth and we got to see him and I just remember, we still have these pictures of us in the hospital. He was in the NICU because he arrived early.

I just remember thinking, oh my gosh, he's so tiny. He was just so fragile. He weighed a little over five pounds, maybe. And I just kind of thought, oh my gosh, we're going to be taking care of this human being. Like, how do you, how do these, how'd these creatures survive? Like it just seemed crazy to us. With Chase, it was different because first of all, we had been through it already.

And second, he was a much bigger boy. I mean, he, right now he's a big kid and he's very sturdy and I don't worry as much about him. But with Harlan, I just remember thinking, Oh my gosh.

Adam: Yeah, five pounds is pretty, it's pretty small. I mean, I think my guinea pig may weigh more than five pounds.

David: Yeah, it was like five pounds and five or six ounces, something like that.

Adam: yeah, yeah. Wow. So. When you think about becoming a dad for the first time, and even maybe the second time and you know, the first time it sounds like you'd hop on an airplane and fly kind of rather unexpectedly or early, what are some of the emotions that came up for you or for you and Zach, when you kind of first realized that it was real, it was a real thing.

David: Well, here's a funny story, actually. We transferred two embryos in our first transfer, and one was a male embryo, genetically tied to me, and one was a female embryo, genetically tied to Zach. And the IVF doctor and the embryologist said that the female embryo was the much more robust or higher graded embryo.

And so, you know, Zach, We assumed that that would be the one that would lead to a pregnancy. And when we found out that Kelly was pregnant, but with a singleton, not twins, we assumed it was a girl. So for 20 weeks, we thought we were having a girl and we were thinking about girl names.

And Kelly sent us some little pink booties as a gift. And that was really our mindset. But then we went out to Colorado for the 20 week ultrasound and we're in the room and the ultrasound technician says, uh oh, and uh oh is never a good thing to hear at an ultrasound. And then we said, what? And she goes, you told me you were having a girl.

This ain't no girl. And so it turned out that kind of made it real for us. We said, oh, he was sort of like the little embryo that could, male embryo which the doctor gave very little chance of leading to a pregnancy or a birth was actually the embryo that it implanted. And is now our six year old son.

So that was just really weird. I guess, it was the emotion of surprise. We just were so shocked. But I think it also just goes to show that even though we have these amazing technological advances, there's still so much we don't know and can't control about this process. Human beings we’re always trying to control everything around us.

But with this process, you just realize, and just even generally, even couples who are having kids the old fashioned way, it's just, you can't control these things, there's just so much that happens, both joyful and sad.

Adam: Yeah, even when science is involved, there's a fair amount of serendipity that happens. So, you know, you became a dad six years ago. What are some of the more surprising things that you've discovered as a dad?

David: Hmm. Oh, that's a tough, that's a tough question. You know, huh. I mean, obviously, again, this is, I'm sure other guests have told you this, it's very cliched. I mean, just, it is definitely more work, I think, in some ways than you anticipate. Like, that is just definitely harder. And a lot of it is the so-called mental load or the emotional load, just the quote unquote work of thinking about them and making sure they're okay and worrying about them when you're away and all of that.

You know, but I mean, one thing that I, really enjoyed that I didn't really think about beforehand was just how much fun it is to watch a young mind develop. And when Harlan asks questions, you read a book and he doesn't know a word and he said, what does that mean?

And you explain it. And then a week or two later, he uses that word correctly in a sentence. It's just really cool to see how their minds work and to see how quickly they can pick up information and how they can deploy it in fun or interesting ways. So for example, the other day we were at a playground and Harlan wanted to go on these monkey bars in this section of the playground that was kind of an adult playground. They were monkey bars, but I think you could use them for chin ups and things like that. And it was really high off the ground because this particular area of the playground was meant for adults as a fitness challenge, And so I said to Harlan, well, I don't know, I can lift you up there, but it's really far to the ground and aren't you worried about falling?

And he said, no, no, no. The floor, the ground had a padded mat. He touched the ground and he said, this is relatively soft. And I just thought, oh, that's a good use of relatively. This padding they put on the floor of the adult playground, it wasn't exactly a pillow, but it was relatively soft. So I thought, oh, good use of that word.

Adam: That's pretty amazing. As I don't know that I would consider a six year old using the word relatively like,

David: Yeah, he used it and he used it properly.

Adam: Yeah. That's awesome. That's awesome. So one of the things that, lot of people talk about is that you can't really anticipate what it's going to be like to have kids until you have them. And yet a lot of people dispense a lot of advice when they find out that you're going to become a parent. And so, I'm curious to hear from you, if you could rewind the clock six years back, so Harlan's not born yet, about to be born, and you've got, you know, you mentioned all the grandparents are around.

They're probably dispensing advice. You've got friends dispensing advice. So what advice would you give your younger self six years ago, if you could go back in time  and do that?

David: So I guess I have two pieces of advice. One is a piece of meta advice and that piece of advice is take the advice that works for you and ignore the rest. Because as you mentioned, everyone is going to offer you advice. Anyone who's had a kid and you know, my parents, my in-laws, friends, and some of the things are going to work for you and other things are not because every family and every kid is different.

And some people will swear by the advice they give you. They would say, oh, this is the way to sleep train your child. Or this is what you need to feed them so they'll grow. Or this is the enrichment program you need to enroll them in. And I just say, look, listen with an open mind and try lots of things out, trial and error, enroll your kid in different activities, try different foods for them, whatever, but at the end of the day, follow the advice that works and ignore the rest and don't feel bad about it.

The advice advice, I guess I would say is, don't be afraid to ask for, and if necessary, pay for help. I think demands on parents are higher than they were in our parent’s age, and especially I would say for dads, because I think there used to be this thought of, oh, the dad's just the breadwinner, and he just shows up on the nights or weekends, and he just works hard and makes money, but there's now an expectation that, no, whether you're a dad or a mom.

Or a working parent or not, you're expected to go to things you're expected to be involved. There are many more emails that go home and have assignments where the parents are supposed to be involved. We can't just outsource this to a nanny or a tutor and there's a lot of work. The demands are higher.

And so what I would say is don't be afraid to ask for help or pay for help, because I think some, some parents want to be sort of like the superhero parent, like I can do it all. I don't need anybody's help, but you just get overwhelmed and there's no shame in calling up the grandparents at the last minute saying, hey, Harlan has to have an emergency dental appointment, but Zach has to be in the city and I have a podcast interview.

Would you mind taking him? Like, don't feel guilty or even on the side of, you know, help in terms of nannies or babysitters or what have you, we dragged our feet on that because I think it can sometimes be hard to hire because you think this person is somebody you have to trust a lot, and so we kind of delayed for a long time, but once we actually plunged in and found folks we trust, including a roster of potential babysitters, it's great now. Like if we need help, we don't have to just depend on say the grandparents. We have multiple people that we can turn to for help. So it is like that old saying, it takes a village to raise a child. So I would say get help, including if you can afford it, pay for help and don't feel bad about it or guilty about it.

Adam: That makes a lot of sense. I wanted to go back to what you just said about kind of finding help. You mentioned you have an au pair, and I'm very curious about this. We also have at one point in our lives had an au pair, you have to interview these folks like you're interviewing an employee and you can definitely make mistakes when you're finding childcare. So have you developed any particular approach that helps you kind of ask the right questions or figure out like, how good is this person going to be as a caregiver when they're not a blood relative of mine or something like that?

David: Sure. So lawyers love hypotheticals. And so I think sometimes it's good to give them hypotheticals. Well, you're dealing with one baby and then suddenly the fire alarm goes off or whatever, you can kind of say, well, would you do and put down the baby or go deal with the alarm, you know, like just kind of see how they would address a particular situation. And then again, just kind of going to seeing how they are, au pairs are different, of course, because you have to interview them for over Skype or FaceTime. But for a nanny or a babysitter, we like to have them come in person and kind of do a trial for a couple of hours or a day, and I work from home a fair amount of the time and Zach can as well, and we can basically see how they do, and we can see how they interact and how they treat the kids. And look, you know, it may be different because we're there and they want to make a good impression, but I think you can still get a sense, especially over the span of a couple of hours. And you can see their demeanor and how they handle things if the kids get difficult or whatnot.

So I think those are two practical pieces of advice.

Adam: I like the on the job interview essentially. And this is a thing, by the way, that a lot of Tech companies are starting to employ with actual hiring of full time people is doing sort of like a pretrial or something like that. So I love that idea. All right, let's talk about parental guilt.

So this is something that if we were a podcast talking to moms, you might hear this topic asked a lot, but very few people ask men about this. And I don't think men talk about this very much and yet they still feel it because you brought this up in our prep for this call. So tell me about this feeling of parental guilt or feeling like you're not good enough as a dad.

David: So this is something that we deal with a lot, that Zach and I deal with a lot. We always feel that we are falling down on both the parenting thing and the job thing, that there's just never enough time or we're not doing a good enough job at one or the other or both. And I would also say that for me, I definitely agree with you that there's a gendered component.

This is something that moms talk about a lot, but in our relationship, Zach does a lot. I think we split things, you know, pretty evenly in many ways, but I guess I'm closer to the mom in the sense that I am the one who's home or in the vicinity. I sometimes go to a nearby coworking space. So if something arises during the day, I can rush to it.

I'm the one with the more flexible schedule. I do work fewer hours. I do deal with more of the logistics in terms of the household and dealing with our caregivers and buying the groceries and things like that and so I think in some ways I come closer to playing the mom role, and I do have that guilt.

I just always feel bad that I'm not doing a good enough job at either my job or being a parent. And, this is one other interesting thing. So before Harlan arrived, I had in my head the openness to the idea of being a stay at home dad. I thought to myself, you know, I had a friend who was a teacher and she loved her teaching career and she planned to go back to it, but then after her daughter was born, she just knew in her heart, you know what?

I actually want to be a full time parent. And I was open to that. I thought to myself, you know what, let me see how this is because empirically I won't know what it's like to be a parent until I'm a parent. And when Harlan arrived, you know, there's a lot of slow time when you have a baby, they sleep a lot, they're not talking to you, et cetera. They're crying, they're pooping, what have you. And to be honest, I was bored out of my mind for long stretches of my paternity leave or my parental leave. And I was bored out of my mind for long stretches until he could talk. And I also realized that I really enjoyed my career and my career is very important to me.

And I came to the realization that no, I did not want to be a stay at home dad. And even that made me feel bad. Like, well, like, it is a great thing to be a stay at home parent. It's a really noble thing and a wonderful thing, and it would be a great thing for our family, and yet, I don't want to do it. So, I felt bad about that.

Adam: Mm hmm. That's really interesting. When you have those times, those moments where you're feeling that guilt or you're feeling like you're not good enough, what do you do to kind of pull yourself out of that funk? My guess is scrolling Instagram is not the answer.

David: Ha ha ha ha ha.

Adam: That might actually make you feel worse.

David: Well, you know, it's funny. In general, I think it is not good to compare yourself to others. I did it for much of my life, and I think it led to all kinds of unhealthy psychology and pathology. But, whenever I feel not good enough, I think about all the parents out there who are either A, struggling just like me, or B, doing an even worse job than we are.

So, I just kind of think, you know what even if we are not having the best day today as parents, and maybe I lost my temper or something like that, I do know that there are parents out there who are again, not doing as good a job. Which is really sad, because kids are so precious, and they're really just such an you know, precious resource for really society, the nation.

And so when you think about parents mistreating their kids or neglecting their kids or, you know, not adequately providing for them or what have you, it really makes you sad. At the same time I do think though, well, you know, I'm trying my best. I'm doing what I can. I have a friend, Carly Aroldi.

She also has a podcast, a parenting podcast. And I just love the title of Carly's podcast. And I often think of it and the title of her podcast is Good Enough Parenting. So I don't have to be the perfect dad. I just need to be good enough.

Adam: Good Enough Parenting. We'll link to that in the show notes, I'll have to check that out. That's really interesting. Have you developed any particular frameworks or guardrails or systems that really help you and Zach as parents? 

David: Sure. So one thing, and this is again, nothing new. We do try to have routines or schedules. So we have a bedtime routine at 8:30 we take Harlan up to his room, and we take turns reading to him, and while one of them is reading to him, the other one is giving Chase his last feeding of the evening before we put him to bed.

So, one, I think have a routine, have a schedule. Two, we do set limits for things, and children in a weird way appreciate limits or rules because they like something concrete. I thought initially that Harlan was going to rebel against our rules, but he's actually taken to them really well. So we limit his screen time with a time limit each day and we limit his intake of what we call treats like cookies and ice cream.

We used to just let them have a treat whenever we wanted. Now we have specified days, which are treat days and non treat days. So I think having rules, concrete rules that the kids can follow is helpful. So those are two things I would mention have a schedule or a timetable and have clear rules.

And maybe this is the lawyer talking to me. Lawyers love clear rules.

Adam: Well, I think that that’s good schedule and kind of clear rules. There's something about kids that they really thrive when they sort of know what the expectation is, right? Like, I find that that's been beneficial for us as well. How has your parenting style changed from Harlan to now your eight month old Chase?

David: So, this is again, I'm so, you know, so familiar, cliched, but we are a lot more relaxed. We're not afraid that, I mean, knock on wood, he's very healthy, but like, we're afraid, not afraid, he's gonna die on us. And we are a lot less, I guess, kind of, OCD or anal retentive or whatever you want to call it.

So for Harlan, we had this app called baby connect where you could log everything. And I made all our caregivers log everything religiously. Oh, he pooped at this time and this is what it looked like. And he ate this many ounces and his temperature when he was sick was this temperature at this hour. And I just,

I drove everybody crazy, but I was just, it was like billing hours for a lawyer. I was just insisting that everybody update BabyConnect all the time. And now with Chase, we didn't even bother with BabyConnect. We're just like, whatever, you know, he cries, check his diaper, feed him, don't feed him.

Like we are just, you know, we are really, much less, you know, sort of just, you know, you could argue, well, oh, are we not as good parents? We're less vigilant, but I think we're kind of more relaxed and maybe in some ways more healthy.

Adam: Yeah. That's really interesting. I mean, everyone sort of goes through this. If you have a second kid of just, well, we were really particular on that first kid and He or she, or they are fine. And, you know, there's probably some things that didn't matter as much that we did or things that we paid too close attention to.

So maybe we can just, you know, take the foot off the gas a little bit about that. That's a really, really good perspective. So I have found that partnership is super important when you have kids. You would probably agree with this assessment, but it is also one of those things where it's really hard to agree a hundred percent of the time with your partner or with your spouse.

So what is something that you and your husband don't necessarily agree on when it comes to parenting?

David: That's interesting. I would say that I am, in general, much more lax and I honestly think Zach's approach is very good in a way. He's the one who has come up with a lot of our rules, and he's the one who enforces them, and I can sometimes be a bit of a squish, which is why Harlan often comes to me to ask for things rather than Zach.

So I just think that in general, and this is not unusual, there's usually one parent who's more of the disciplinarian or what have you. But I just am much more relaxed, which is kind of funny because people who know us would probably say that we're both a little type A and we're both kind of very, controlly in some ways, but I think when it comes to kids I am some ways, the more relaxed one, which is just weird because I'm very not relaxed about all these other things that I handle for the household.

So it's just, yeah, it's funny, but I guess that's one point of disagreement and I'm usually like, just like, let him do it. It's fine. And Zach is the one who wants to hold the line. And intellectually, I realize Zach is right, but sometimes in the moment, it's just so much easier to give in. And yeah, and you know, in defense of my view, one thing that parents know is you have to pick your battles.

You can't make your kid do everything perfectly. And so sometimes you just got to throw your hands up and say, okay. I know that, yeah, I don't want to set a bad precedent, but you got me.

Adam: Yeah. One of the things that I think is interesting and I wanted to ask you about this from the perspective of a two lawyer household. So lawyers are very into obviously logical appeals, right? And sort of following the logic chain or the legal chain, you can't always make logical appeals with children.

And so, in fact, most of the time you can't, right? Not until they're, I don't know, I haven't found the time yet. And my kids are even a little bit older. So how did you wrestle with like, well, the law is very straightforward and kind of by the book and we follow the precedents and things like that.

And then you have a kid, or two kids and kids are just like, nope, there's no rule book. There's no precedent. There's nothing like that. Was that a hard thing to wrestle with for you or for Zach?

David: Yes. It was definitely a tough adjustment, especially that age around two or three. People speak of the terrible twos, but for Harlan, I would say it was the terrible threes. Now that he's older, we actually can have negotiations with him or explain why we have a rule or offer a reward or threaten to take something away.

But when he was two or three he just did not care. He just wouldn't do the things that we were asking him to do. And it was endlessly frustrating. And we didn't really have a good answer to it. And I don't know when Chase reaches that age, if I will still have a good answer to it. One thing that I'm not good about, that Zach is much better about, is I can have a temper, and I will sometimes raise my voice, and then I'll often realize I shouldn't have done that, or I'll apologize, but sometimes in the moment I just almost can't help myself.

I sometimes feel almost like my blood boiling, like a physical reaction when Harlan does something that drives me up the wall, and so, I'm just gonna try to be better about that with Chase and just take a few deep breaths or, you know, step outside and just whatever, let a yell out in the backyard or something.

Let's just, I need to find ways to blow off steam without taking it out on my kid.

Adam: I think that's really good. I wanted to ask you parenting can be frustrating. It's inevitable, right? Like kids are designed to test boundaries. It's how they learn, right? They're like the raptors testing the fences and Jurassic park. So when you start to get drained or you feel yourself getting frustrated, what are the ways that you kind of collect yourself, recharge your batteries, like hit the reset button for you?

David: So definitely sometimes just stepping away. Like I just kind of have to, you know, take a walk around the block or something like that. I think that can definitely help. Honestly, sometimes and again, this can also turn into a crutch or a bad thing, but sometimes I can maybe reset myself by just doing a little bit of work.

I'm taking my mind off things. And it's one thing that's interesting. That's both good and bad, especially for somebody like me. And I expect somebody like you is because you don't have a traditional job where you schlep into an office, the boundaries between work and life are just much more porous.

And so when Zach comes home, he works very hard and he takes calls from partners and clients after hours and on weekends all the time. But generally, when he comes home, unless something is really blowing up, he can often kind of take it easy. Whereas for me, I might be chasing after something, trying to publish a story, or just I feel like in some ways I'm always working, but sometimes it can just be a good little reset.

You know what, let me just do something different for 20 or 30 minutes, and work also will calm you down because you're not really supposed to lose your temper with people you're dealing with professionally, and so that can sometimes be helpful.

Adam: Yeah. I love that. Last couple questions for you. What would you say is a mistake that you've made as a father? 

David: Ah, gosh I mean I'm sure we've made so, so many I mean, I would definitely say kind of going back on the theme of rules and discipline. We were, I think a little too late to set up rules or boundaries and we would let Harlan eat sweets whenever we wanted and he could do the iPad whenever we wanted. Because one reason I will say that's a mistake is it's a lot harder to put the genie back in the bottle. It's a lot harder to impose a limit after you have had no limits. So whenever you are letting your kid do something new, whether it's eat a new food that they love, or use a certain device, or gaming system, or what have you.

I think it's good to have the boundaries and the limits set up up front, rather than trying to impose them after the fact.

Adam: That's a really good one. So we've made really incredible strides, obviously in the last, I don't know, decade, decade plus around same sex parenting and things like that.

But also I'm wondering, you know, Harlan is getting to the age where and probably was there earlier where he's aware that, like, his family maybe looks a little bit different than some of the families that his friends have. And I think you start to realize this maybe when you go to school and you meet other kids and stuff like that.

How have you talked to Harlan about having gay parents and about sort of thinking about that? And as he, I know New Jersey can be a fairly progressive place, especially where you live, but has he run into any challenges or come home with questions or anything like that for you and Zach?

David: Yeah, that's a great question, Adam. So we've tried to be very open with him about how he came into the world. He doesn't necessarily understand everything about how surrogacy works, but we talk about how there was a nice woman, and you were in her tummy for nine months, or less than nine months. But we do explain that, and he's FaceTimed with Kelly and things like that, but we do explain to him that families come in different shapes and sizes.

And some people have one mom or one dad or two moms or two dads or a mom and a dad. And so he's kind of accepted that explanation. But there have been a couple of times where he's really kind of wondered about the lack of a mom. And one time he got into an argument with us and he's, we said, well, you don't really have a mom, you know, there was an egg donor and there was a surrogate.

He goes, no, no, no, no, no. He said, if I didn't have a mom, I wouldn't exist. And so we're like, okay, like, you were in Kelly's tummy. So I said, I, we said, you can think of her like a mom. And he said, no, no, no, no, not like a mom. She is my mom. He was just very intent on this. And you know, eventually he let it go, but it was just interesting.

I think a lot of two dad couples have a situation because again, you know, the mother is just such a crucial figure in the traditional family and kids who see other moms getting involved the lives and school activities of their friends will wonder where, well, where's my mom or you have Mother's Day or things like that, but overall it's been great. As you mentioned, we live in a very progressive community. Nobody's given us grief. Harlan, as far as we know, hasn't been bullied or teased or anything like that. And we have some wonderful friends in town who also have, you know, our families with unusual or different structures.

So, overall it's been great. We feel really lucky to live here.

Adam: Yeah. That's awesome. That's awesome to hear. And I think really interesting what you mentioned about Harlan too. And it's it sort of goes to, you know, I think representation and what kids consume. We still have a long way to go until, you know, there's a YouTube series with two dads and surrogate children and things like that.

And it's just not always something that they see on a daily basis and in the things that they consume. And so we still, I think, have a ways to go until that is, you know, just something that's just a normal part of their consumption and understanding.

David: Yeah, that's really true. There are a couple of children's books, for instance, that we read him, and the children's books sometimes make me feel bad. There's this one book called My Two Dads, and the two dads are so perfect and patient, and they do all these great activities, and yeah. They look really good.

They're very handsome and they're really well dressed and we're in sweats and we haven't shaved and we look terrible. And so sometimes you're like, wow, like going to going back to the guilt or the feeling of inadequacy. It's like, even as gay parents, we can be sort of made to feel bad.

Adam: Oh, man. We need we do just like, you know, normal books about my two dads, right? They don't have to be supermodel, you know, perfect

David: Yes, exactly.

Adam: Superman or anything like that. Okay, last question for you before we get into our Lightning round rapid fire. How can people be helpful or follow along in your journey where should they go to keep track of what David's up to?

David: Yeah, sure. So, I have a Substack newsletter, which is available at davidlat. substack.com. People can either visit it on the web or subscribe for email updates, and every week I do a weekly news roundup, and I begin the weekly news roundup with a personal update. So, often I mention my kids, because I think part of normalizing gay parenting is just talking a lot about your kids, so I consciously do that.

So I am reachable there, and I'm on social media. I'm on Twitter at David Lat, although I've kind of, I'm only just returning from a hiatus. I'm on Instagram at DavidBenjaminLat. I am very active on LinkedIn actually, which is kind of the popular social network for lawyers. It's lawyers, a safe space. They feel a little intimidated by some of the others.

I'm on TikTok, but I'm just a lurker. So again that's how I can be reached.

Adam: All right, great. Well, we'll link to all that stuff in the show notes. So, Are you ready for the rapid fire round?

David: Sure. Let's do it.

Adam: Here we go. What is the most rapid fire? Indispensable parenting product that you have ever purchased.

David: Well, we didn't purchase it, but we rented it. We did turn to the Snoo. I know it's very controversial, but.

Adam: My brother just borrowed one from a friend for his newborn, and I think that is the way to go, for sure. Renting or borrowing, that's it. All right, finish this sentence. The ideal day with my kids involves this one activity.

David: I would say being outdoors. Again, it's kind of funny. I'm not a big outdoors guy, but they just love being outdoors in the fresh air. And now that spring is starting, we're doing that.

Adam: Okay. The best piece of parenting advice you've ever received is what?

David: I would just say relax it's going to be okay.

Adam: What is the most frustrating thing that has ever happened to you as a dad?

David: This is a minor annoyance, but sometimes when you're a two dad couple, people, bystanders, just assume you're incompetent and give you lots of unsolicited advice. So that is kind of annoying.

Adam: Yeah that's really interesting. What is your go to dad wardrobe?

David: I would say a zip up hoodie and sweatpants.

Adam: Same. How many parenting books do you have in your house?

David: Probably about three.

Adam: Okay. And how many parenting books have you actually read cover to cover?

David: .75 maybe.

Adam: That is the first fractional discussion of a parenting book on this show. So that's awesome. What is the favorite ages for your kids?

David: I would say right now for Harlan, age six. I'm gonna be honest, Chase is super cute, but he's really boring right now.

Adam: He's in the potted plant phase of life as I like to describe that age. Have you ever used your kids as an excuse to get out of a social event?

David: Oh, all the time. You know, first we had the pandemic. Oh, you know, it was such a high standard for going out and doing things. And now it's our kids.

Adam: All right. Not that you have a lot of this, but have you ever finished off your kids homework?

David: Yes.

Adam: That's okay, we'll allow it.

David: Yeah, don't ell Ms. Tepper.

Adam: Yeah. Have you ever accidentally mixed up your children's names?

David: Oh, all the time. All the time. And my brother in law and sister in law, their two kids have names similar to our kids, and I mix all four of them up.

Adam: That's amazing. How long can a piece of food sit on the floor in your house and you will still eat it?

David: Oh I think we adhere to the ten second rule, but maybe it's a flexible ten seconds.

Adam: I love that. What nostalgic movie can you just not wait to force your kids to watch?

David: Oh, gosh, it's a sign of my age that this is nostalgic, but maybe something like Clueless?

Adam: Oh, good one. Yeah. How often do you tell, probably Harlan, back in my day stories?

David: Oh, all the time.

Adam: What's your favorite back in my day story to tell?

David: Often things about technology, like landline phones or something like that. And he thinks every screen is a touch screen. He goes to the airport with the arrival and departure screens and he starts swiping at them. Like, it's just so different.

Adam: What is the strangest place that you've ever found a diaper?

David: Oh, gosh. Nothing terribly exciting. Probably under the couch. Not a dirty diaper.

Adam: I've heard under the couch. I've also heard the glove box of the car.

David: Oh, ha! We have one on the floor of our car right now. And part of me was going to pick it up, and then part of me thought, you never know when you're going to need an extra diaper. Just leave it there.

Adam: That's true. There you go. How many times have you said go ask daddy this week?

David: Oh my gosh. All the time. Again, kind of as I was saying earlier, Adam, I'm the pushover. So Harlan comes to me often, but I really want Zach. I can be very indecisive, so, and Zach is much more decisive. So, all the time. Every day.

Adam: All right. And then finally, I know, you only have two kids, but you do live in New Jersey. What is your take on minivans?

David: Oh, ha ha ha ha ha. This is a point of contention. I love minivans. We grew up with one minivan after another. My parents would just replace the model with the exact same model. First it was Chrysler or Dodge, and then it was Honda. And they love their Odyssey, even though they're just grandparents and empty nesters.

They love having it when we visit them or when Harlan visits them. Zach would not be caught dead in a minivan. That was one of the things I said, oh, we're moving to the suburbs. We can get a minivan. He said over my dead body. And so we have an SUV and they're not as good for the environment, I think. But this was one concession I made.

He won that battle. But I love minivans.

Adam: Oh wow. We got a, some contentious household discussion on minivans. I love it. Great. Well, hopefully that doesn't introduce any arguments in the household on this show. But thank you, David, very much for joining me on the podcast today. It was a pleasure having you and learning all about you and your family.

David: Thank you, Adam. This was one of the most fun podcasts I've ever done.

Adam: Thank you for listening to today's conversation with David Lat. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe, share, and leave me a review on Apple or Spotify. It'll help other people find this podcast. Startup Dad is a Fishman AF production with editing support from Tommy Heron.

You can join a community of over 10,000 subscribers and stay up to date on my thoughts on growth, product, and business. and parenting by subscribing to the Fishman AF newsletter at www.fishmanafnewsletter.com. Thanks for listening. See you next time.