The2amClub
Welcome to The Two A.M. Club, where we have open and diverse conversations about parenting and partnerships across different cultures. Join us on an amazing journey as we explore the joys and challenges of raising children through the stories of parents from around the world.
Our collection of stories represents a tapestry of cultures and personal experiences. We celebrate our differences and the love we share for our children. While everyone's parenting journey is unique, we find common ground in the experiences that connect us.
Whether you're a new parent, experienced, or simply curious about raising children, The Two A.M. Club has something for you. Expect heartwarming stories, practical advice, and thought-provoking discussions. Our goal is to inspire, support, and connect with parents and partners worldwide.
At The Two A.M. Club, we value open-mindedness, diversity, and honesty. We create a community that embraces the universal journey of parenthood, where love knows no limits. Join us today and be part of a welcoming and supportive community of parents and partners.
We believe that parenthood is a journey filled with joy, challenges, and countless stories that deserve to be shared and in doing so we are collecting stories from parents about their experiences in navigating the intricate paths of parenting and partnership. We understand that parenthood isn't solely about raising children; it's also about nurturing and sustaining strong relationships with our partners.
Our aim is to weave a rich tapestry of stories that celebrate the beautiful, messy, and wonderful world of parenting and partnership. Your stories have the power to inspire and guide others on their path to growth and fulfillment. We are eager to share the triumphs, struggles, and lessons learned along the way. Whether you're seasoned parents or just embarking on this remarkable journey, we invite you to listen to the diverse experiences, insights, and advice that these stories hold.
Join us as we embark on this voyage, hand in hand, as parents and partners. Welcome to our discussioncast, where we embark on an honest and unfiltered journey through parenthood and partnership. As everyday individuals, we deeply empathize with the triumphs and challenges that come with these roles, just like many of you. Each episode of our show explores a wide range of topics and features special guests, offering a glimpse into the diverse experiences and perspectives within our global community. Despite our differences, we all share a common objective: navigating these challenges and joys in our own unique way.
The2amClub
A Father, A Son, and the Time Between
“With all time held, but before that time, silence fuels the pain and the hurt.”
They say time heals everything. It’s hard to believe that when the days feel endless, when pain feels permanent. But then—one day—it happens. The weight lifts. The air feels lighter. And life tastes just a little bit sweeter.
This episode, I’m alone—fresh back from one of the most emotional trips of my life. After more than ten years, healing finally came.
Pain is a strange companion. It grips you deep inside, whispers that it will never leave. In that way, it’s like love. The two dance together—pain and love—spinning endlessly through the ballroom of life. But sometimes, the music stops. And with it, one more dance of pain ends.
Last year, my father and I healed. This year, for the first time since our long silence, we saw each other face to face. I am a father now, but I’m still a son. He is a grandfather, but also still a father. We are different people, shaped by different roads, yet at the end of the day, we both want the same thing: love.
In this episode, I talk about loneliness—the kind that comes with being a parent, but also the kind that comes with being a child. We don’t often talk about that. We hide our wounds, afraid someone might throw salt on them, afraid vulnerability makes us weak. But I’ve learned this: the strongest people cry. They show who they are. They wear their hearts openly, not to prove anything, but simply to be—and to help.
No one is truly alone unless they choose to be. We started this podcast for parents who felt isolated. But now I see it’s not only about parenting—it’s also about being a child who grew into a parent. It’s about carrying scars, while trying to raise someone who won’t have to carry the same.
Because even as parents, we are still children inside. We still need hugs. We still need to hear, “I love you. I’m proud of you.” And when we raise our own kids, we have to remember what we needed—and give it to them.
I know I will stumble. I’m far from perfect. My son will one day tell me I hurt him in ways I didn’t see. And that’s okay. What matters is that he knows he can always come to me, he can always say, “I’m sorry.” But that only works if I show him how—by asking for forgiveness myself. By looking at my own pain, understanding where it comes from, and owning the ways it spills out.
We can’t expect our children to say, “I’m sorry,” if we don’t first show them how.
This episode is about emotions, power, rawness, tears, laughter, life—and time.
Hello and welcome to our podcast, the 2am camp. When I say our podcast, just me. Today this friend is on a business trip was a revolving door from my trip back from Hong Kong and what a trip it was. I'm I'm a super happy guy, I'm always full of joy, but this trip was. This trip was one of the most beautiful and amazing roller coaster rides ever. This has to be In a movie. This is that plot twist towards the end where all the pieces come together and everyone is just saying, wow, it was about time.
Speaker 1:It took me a while before. I didn't really know if I wanted to do this episode, even though I set up all the website and everything for it. But it was something that I kind of wanted to keep for myself, this little treasurable moment that I just selfishly wanted for me. And it's kind of hard to do this episode because in one way I don't want to share it but in another way I know I have to, because I know there's a lot of people out there that have really tough relationship with their parents and they also feel lonely and they also feel angry and they feel misunderstood or not even understood whatsoever, and I hope for them one day they come to the point where I am right now, because it's a really beautiful spot.
Speaker 1:It was hard to get here, it was. It was hard to get here. It was, it was really hard. It was hard to tell my dad a year ago that the energy he gave to me had to stop. That it affected me, it affected my wife, it affected my child, it just affected everybody around me. All that anger, everything I had pent up inside every time we would talk, I just had to distribute it to somebody, and it's always the people that are close to you that get it. They're the ones who are at the end of that stick. Not that I was ever physical or anything like that, but more the emotional anger had to be loaded off somehow to the people around you. And those are the closest people that are there. And I think somewhere you as a person, you know that these people love you, no matter what you do. But at one point it becomes super toxic, and that's what happened.
Speaker 1:The relationship that I had with my dad was a toxic one, and the funny thing was because he was always the one who cut me off. The funny thing was the fact that I cut him off. He actually had to do the work himself to try to get me back. He said that when I told him the last time we talked that I didn't want to talk to him anymore and that I hope he has a beautiful and wonderful long life. And I really meant that I love my father. I mean, you see the smile. I love him to death. He's my hero, he was my rock. He was everything I hoped to be as a man, as a father. Well, let's put it this way At 86, he's the father that I can look up to, which says a lot.
Speaker 1:I have so much that I want to say. I just don't know how to say it or how to string the words. I feel like I'm trying to make a pearl necklace, but I have this needle and string and I'm just picking up these pearls but somehow they just kind of fall back onto the table. To fall back onto the table and it's a little bit hard to put my feelings into words. But I think the only thing that I can say is that time it takes time for some things to really super heal. It takes time for things to just kind of blow over and forgiveness, asking for forgiveness and giving that forgiveness.
Speaker 1:Also, my dad was angry at me. I was never. I'm not the perfect son. Like who the fuck am I kidding? I'm not the perfect husband. I'm not the perfect son Like who the fuck am I kidding? Not the perfect husband. I'm not the perfect dad. I'm not the pretty much the perfect man. I think I have to tell myself that I'm not perfect. Nobody is. But there was only so many times that I could say I'm, and eventually either you accept it or you don't.
Speaker 1:And the thing was my dad didn't know how to say I'm sorry. He didn't know how to look at the things he had done. He was only able to pinpoint what other people did to him, and I get it. There was a lot of shit that happened the divorce, I mean fuck. He told me something. This is again me trying to express all these feelings and everything that's going inside, and maybe it won't make any sense, but I'm really trying hard to. He told me he was so angry at my mom that he threw it all on me, and I knew he did. I could feel it at eight. I felt I was abandoned when he sent me to Tahiti without telling me really why. I think that was the biggest thing. That was the biggest rift that never really fully healed until now. But when he told me that in front of my niece, I knew it was sincere, what he really was talking about. I knew that when he asked for forgiveness and saying the reason why, I knew that he really meant it.
Speaker 1:You know, we all want people to say I'm sorry, but we also need to learn how to say I'm sorry to people. You can't expect people to just say I'm sorry if you're not giving it yourself right. Everything is a two-way street in this world. I'm a really big guy on balance. I feel balance is something that is missing in the world today. Either we're too extreme left or we're too extreme right, or we're too extreme this or too extreme that, and somehow we kind of lose ourselves in the middle. And it's the same thing for forgiveness. It's the same thing for a relationship between a father and a son, or a mother and a daughter, or a son and a mom, or a daughter and a father. You know what I'm saying. You understand what I mean. I'm in a really happy space. I'm looking forward to seeing my dad over Christmas. I'm looking forward to him Meeting my son. It's really.
Speaker 1:You know, when I saw my dad for the first time, I was at the elevators at the hotel in Hong Kong and every elevator door that just dinged and opened and every foot that kind of creeped out of this door. I was anxiously waiting and then I saw his foot and I knew it was his. I just kind of fucking knew it and I ran towards him and in that moment I felt like my son running towards me when I would pick him up at school, and how he hugs me and holds me tight. I felt like a long, long time and it reminded me that we're not only parents, we're not only partners, but we are also the children of someone else. Sometimes we tend to forget that and for that little moment it felt like all the anger, all the dark spots I had in this, in this world I call the sun, just kind of disappeared and I haven't felt that in a very long time.
Speaker 1:Someone told me after I posted about my dad in a personal message why I share these very intimate moments. And I do it because I know what it's like to be alone. I know what it's like to feel like you're the only one that feels this. But it's not true. There's a lot of people out there that feel the same thing, but they don't share it. I don't know, maybe weakness, fear, whatever it is. But I do it because I know what it's like to feel alone and I really hate that. And I do it because I want someone else to not feel alone and know that they're not the only ones that go through that.
Speaker 1:Life is about sharing experiences, the good, the bad, same like being a parent and being a child, same like being a parent and being a child. These experiences and moments that that crisscross through the universe and you don't know when it will happen again or should it happen, but when it does, it's an amazing feeling. I'm really happy. I'm really happy he's back in my life. I'm happy he's in my son's life and I'm happy my son is in his life. He told me he wants to be the best grandfather he can ever be, just to try and catch up on being not the best dad. That really touched me. That's all I want. I don't need him to rectify or it's what happened happened. It's also what made me who I am today, the force I am today, the force I am, this force of nature. It's also because of that. That's who I am and it's not. You know, you can't go back in time, but I'm just so happy this year but I'm just so happy.
Speaker 1:This year has been one of the most emotional, rollercoaster years in a long time. A lot of things happened, a lot of things that I think I maybe feel like an adult now Because I I don't know maybe I became wiser or I see things differently. I was able to slow it down and to really take in everything. We had our pause in our podcast because we also didn't know what we wanted to do. Again, it's just a string of pearls that I really don't know how to this mumbo jumbo of stuff, but it's all these emotions that I just kind of want to get out there. You know, we stopped our podcast because we felt overwhelmed and we felt like there was nothing much to say anymore, or maybe we didn't know how to say things. Our neighbor dying and offering his house for us to buy, even though we only met him. Our community that we built in this beautiful, amazing city. Our neighbors writing an article on us without us even knowing about it. Me getting closer and closer with my niece again, finally having a piece of Tahiti with me now. This is also. You know, I'm just so happy to go and help her out in Hong Kong every time. She's an amazing woman who's growing and becoming herself with her amazing husband, and I'm really happy and I'm very proud and I'm also so thankful that she asked me to be part of this voyage with her. And I know my dad was also very happy to see her in Hong Kong and he was also super proud of her.
Speaker 1:Time really heals everything, but between the time where you're hurt and you're healed, it fucking sucks. You know it really sucks up until you get to that point where you're like, okay, this is all done, we're good. Right up into that moment it just sucks. Could things go bad again with my dad? Of course, right up into that moment, it just sucks. Could things go bad again with my dad? Of course I mean, nothing is certain except for death. But because I know that death is the only certainty in life, I know that I won't stop trying or letting him try.
Speaker 1:Life is crazy. It's beautiful, it's hectic. It's beautiful, it's hectic, it's organized. It's paths crossing, uncrossing, twisting, turning, going complete opposites and then coming back way later down in life which you never even thought it would, even thought he would. But with time everything really kind of I sound a little bit like my mom right now. My mom was one of those women who really give out these really beautiful, you know, these little sayings that actually I find that I'm repeating them to my son now. It's just so much that I want to share.
Speaker 1:I just don't know how to say it except for I'm happy. I'm really really happy and I think that's the most important thing. I'm in a space right now where I'm happy and solid. I'm happy and solid if that makes any sense whatsoever. I feel like this 300 year old house that we live in with a stone. You know these big stone squares on the ground that really solidify the whole base of this house. And imagine this house has gone through two world wars, the creation of the United States, donald Trump two times States Donald Trump two times, through civil war, through famine and through all that and still here and I think it's happy right now with us in this house. It's a new story in there. That's kind of how I feel right now Happy and solid.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very short podcast, but I had to get it out Because I want other people to be happy or at least know that they're not alone, or at least know that they're not alone. That's why, happy and solid, those will be the last words for this podcast, thank you. Thank you for listening. Just me alone. I hope it was at least entertaining, but I love you guys. I really do. Bye.