Two years ago my book on parenting was published – Four Lessons From My Three Sons: How You Can Raise a Resilient Kid . Noted at the time was that I wrote it for two reasons:

First, my last son left for college so I suddenly had a lot of free time. Sound familiar to all you empty nesters? No longer was I attending games and practices and school events, nervously pacing sidelines and hallways muttering like a maniac.

Second, I have a bottomless ego - ha! - and figured I had some good advice to offer parents. And why not?! I’d been around kids for more than two decades in every situation under the sun known to the American Dad. So yeah, to borrow the most quoted line the book, I knew what I had to do: “Just get the ball to Louie!”

At all of 70 pages the book is short and loose and hard and fast. In addition to all the hijinx I wrote about, I spared no one and nothing – stupid jerk kids (chapter 3), crazy wokeness (chapter 5), and my sons’ failures and my own failures (chapter 4). Throughout the laughs and funny phrases and real-world wake-up calls, I held steady to the four ways in which I wanted my sons to flourish: Conduct, Confidence, Resilience and Ambition. Indeed, they are as important now to a 25-year-old as they were to a kid of six.

Two years later, I am stunned – and humbled – by the book’s reception. I’ve been interviewed by major-league journalists, book excerpts have been published on a wide range of parenting websites, and yours truly has spoken at numerous conferences giving my unfiltered take on All Things Kids. Absolutely best of all, I’ve heard from hundreds and hundreds of parents who read the book, told me a wide range of tales about their kids, and how the book gave them ideas about parenting styles. Indeed, I heard from a number of parents who had their kids read the book and then discuss it. It was one of many superb insights that were wayyyy outside the narrow parameters of my mind.

From all the conversations and feedback, several themes emerged which told me that I could have done better in writing Four Lessons. And yes, just like I told my sons, when you run into adversity and justified criticism, man up and take the pain. Assess, advance adapt.

Hence, following are a few general comments based upon – and here’s a switch - a ton of advice that I received and some frank admissions of my own shortcomings

The Evil Screens

By far, the most frequent conversations with parents were about screens – phones, laptops, televisions – what I will derisively call the “glowing rectangle.” I noted in the book that my guys were totally limited in screen time; they didn’t receive phones until they were 16 and could drive and that they received one hour a week to play video games. Yes, I know Covid has upended a lot of households, most of all the virtual teaching of kids. What I said again and again in my parent conversations that while here’s a reason for screen time for class and homework, the moment those are complete the wise parent takes away the laptop, phone, and video games. Before Covid, American 8-to-12-year-olds spent 4 hours and 44 minutes on screen media each day and teenagers a whopping 7 hours and 22 minutes. Does any reasonable parent think this saturation is anything but appalling?!

So I will reiterate: Take the screens away! No excuses, no negotiation. These items are yours, not theirs. You bought them, you pay for the service. There is nothing more damaging to a kid who is already going through the crucible of isolation than for him or her to get on a phone and be subject to the madness of social media and so called “entertainment.” Nothing raises more the panic and anxiety than constant streams of sensationalist and often vulgar information. Rip it out of their hands and be wise enough to offer alternatives.

“Fat Kid Nation”

I could be diplomatic here but Nellie is not sophisticated enough to offer fairy tales so I’ll lay it on the line. A surprisingly large number of parents voiced concern about obese and overweight kids they see – and sometimes, have. One Dad said “It’s fat kid nation out there.” A Mom sent me a study from Kaiser Family Foundation: 32 percent of kids between 10 and 17 are overweight or obese. Unbelievable.

Now, my exposure to heavyset kids had mostly been seeing them on teams against which my sons played in football and lacrosse (sometimes even at swim meets, which I always found startling). Anyone who knows sports knows what to do with a heavy kid on the field: You drive right at him relentlessly. Your offense and defense goes right through him because he’s quickly gassed and making errors. Yeah, again not PC but any kid in uniform – and in any parent in the bleachers – knows that’s how it shakes down.

Hence, I wish I’d addressed this in the book – that parents have got to seize control of a kid’s diet and force him to exercise every day until he or she drops. Fat kid nation, indeed.

Ambition and Teachers

I got some blowback for my seeming criticism of the teaching profession and the salaries made by teachers. Even as I added in the book that teachers at every stage of my life had given me priceless guidance, I apologize for my seeming insensitivity. So to humbly clarify, the point wasn’t about teachers – it was about earning power. You recall my eldest son said he wanted to be a teacher and because I am all about shock treatment - did I tell you I’m unfiltered? - I drove him to a neighborhood where with a teacher's salary, he would be destined to live. TO reiterate the book: Teaching is an honorable and near heroic profession. It’s also the least appreciated. And moreover, the problems of bad parenting or nonexistent

parenting always get dropped on teachers. They are paid way below what they deserve. If my kid had said he wanted to enter another profession known for low salaries, I would have taken him to the same neighborhood. But he didn’t. I wrote the truth.

Too Late?

Parents of older kids told me they wish there was a book for kids who were 18 and older, who had gone down a wrong path or no path at all and needed to be forcibly guided back to a better path. We all know the struggles of the Millennials and Generation Z; many self-inflicted. Such a large percentage of these two cohorts still live at home, are in debt, poor health (44 % of older Millennials age 32 to 40 already have one chronic condition) aimless, shun useful employment, lack follow – or as my Dad used to say, “Can’t put a key in a lock.” Of course – if you get trophies all your life for having a heartbeat, you’re going to be slack-jawed loser crouching in your parents’ basement.

I have a set of defined ideas for such a book and if there is an overwhelming push from my loyal public – ha! - I will write that book. Yeah, it’s like in Caddyshack where Judge Smails in his talking to Danny Noonan: “I know how hard young people have it today, and I want to help.”

A Final Word

Now, a word about my three sons, which is after all, how this whole crazy thing started. By design and perhaps you don’t recall, I mentioned briefly their accomplishments (on page xi) as a way to suggest validation of my parenting style. Sure, I may be an over-the-top Dad but I didn’t feel it relevant to wax on throughout the book with examples of their personal diligence. But OK, now it can be revealed that two of them received the Certificate of Merit in 8th grade for one week of perfect attendance.

The eldest is now on his second deployment as a Naval officer to the Far East; the middle kid is a Naval officer on his second deployment to the 7th Fleet in the Pacific; the youngest is finishing up his third year at West Point. Enough said.

In the two years since the book was written, all three have had occasional triumphs and occasions of major-league adversity. That’s the way life works; as I said repeatedly: No one gets a free ride. I will add that the two eldest were in two separate and particularly tight situations in their military jobs, during the midst of which, as they told me later, they managed to pull out the old phrase heard from an unemployed Dad on a football field long ago: “Yeah, it’s the end of the world.” For both, it wasn’t; it never is. But aha, the staying power of the Lessons – and the phrase!

To reiterate what was in the book’s Introduction, I wrote it because I knew that even some part of my two decades of experience with my three sons might help parents raise alert, rugged, and resilient kids in this increasingly confused and unsettled world. As I said back then, my parenting tactics worked for my kids. They can work for yours.