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Every time his kids say "Dadosaur," this dad turns into a dinosaur, and it's absurdly hilarious

Their dad's 'commitment to character' has been shared more than 500,000 times in just two days.

@olivemannella/TikTok

We all need a little levity in these trying times, and since we're largely sequestered to our homes, viral videos have become temporary saviors of our sanity. Since the pandemic started, we've seen talking dogs and dancing dads and time traveling comedians lift our spirits and make us laugh.

But these Dadosaur videos we're about to show you? Oh my goodness. They're so outrageously silly. So over-the-top ridiculous. And yet they are just so endearing and hilarious at the same time.

TikTok user @olivemannella is the daughter of Frank, who instantaneously transforms into a screeching, destructive dinosaur any time one of his kids says the word "Dadosaur." And he GOES for it, much to the delight of his children—and the dismay of his wife.

Joey C. Miller shared a few of the videos on Facebook, and they've been shared 500,000 times in two days. Just watch:


@olivemannella No Karen's were harmed in the making of this video... the saga continues 🦖 @frankiemannella @clmannella @elliemannella ##keepingbusy ##dadosaur ##fyp
♬ original sound - olivemannella


@olivemannella Dadosaur takes out the trash... almost 🥴🦖 ##dadosaur ##stayhomestaystrong ##keepingbusy ##fyp ##foryoupage @frankiemannella @clmannella @elliemannella
♬ original sound - olivemannella


@olivemannella Dadosaur ruins Easter pictures 🙄 ##happyeaster ##fyp ##foryoupage ##petlife ##dadosaur @frankiemannella @clmannella
♬ original sound - olivemannella


@olivemannella Dadosaur ate the Easter cake 😂 @frankiemannella ##fyp ##foryoupage ##happyeaster ##dadosaur ##petlife
♬ original sound - olivemannella

Despite Mom's earnest protests, you know this is one of the reasons she married the guy in the first place. Any man who can have this much fun and make this much of a mess of himself just to make his kids laugh is a keeper.

Keep bringing the silliness, Dadosaur. And if you want to follow for more dad fun, head over to @olivemannella's page on TikTok.


This article originally appeared on 4.17.20

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He said sleep deprivation wasn't a big deal but these parents had very different reactions

It's almost like there's a reason men and women experience the early postpartum months differently.

Unsplash and girl fieri/X

It all started with a (kind of) innocuous post on X.

User Santi Ruiz prefaced his post by saying that he didn't want to "stir the parenting discourse pot."

He was, to put it lightly, not successful.

Responding to another user who had written (now deleted): "Sleep deprivation is for like four months and then you just sleep normally most nights."

Ruiz added on in a quote repost: "The sleep deprivation is fine. It’s totally fine. You suck it up and then it’s over. Grow up."

(Definitely sounds like someone who "doesn't want to stir the pot!")

With the pot sufficiently stirred, Ruiz's post began making its way across the X parenting universe, racking up over 1 million views (to just one thousand Likes... talk about being ratio'd.)

First on the scene were the blue-check dads excitedly agreeing.

"It's all fine. Literally, grow up," one wrote.

"Seriously, I get that it's not fun but stop being so soft," added another.

Another dad chimed in that he just drinks green tea for energy and feels great!

Another posited that if it was really so bad, there wouldn't be so many couples with more than one child!

Reading the replies, you got the sense that these guys really had no idea how the other half lives — or their other half, to be specific.

Luckily...

The moms of X quickly showed up to set the record straight about sleep deprivation being "not that bad."

Clearly, there is a disconnect between the experiences of the average dad in the early post-partum months and the experiences of the average mom.

Shocking, I know!

Could it be... that there's a difference between being the one who carried and birthed a baby and (in many cases) is responsible for feeding it with your body, versus just being there to help out as much as you can?

The stories women shared in the replies and quotes were heartbreaking.

Torture levels of sleep deprivation, hallucinations, and even becoming physically ill.

And probably most frightening of all was the revelation that becoming deeply sleep deprived could lead to a person harming their own baby in extreme cases.

It may come as a shock to the "just drink green tea and take a nap" guys, but chronic sleep deprivation can exacerbate postpartum depression, make you more irritable, increase anxiety, and even make you hallucinate.

For moms, you can pile that on top of the fact that postpartum recovery from the physical and emotional trauma of birth is a process that can take months — and is slowed and hindered by lack of sleep!

Sleep deprivation isn't just something parents deal with for a "few months."

While some people are blessed with babies that sleep early and often, that's not overly typical.

Many babies don't consistently sleep through the night until around 6-12 months old.

But that's not even the whole story.

Breastfeeding moms may have to breastfeed in the middle of the night for 6-18 months or even longer! Some bottle fed babies can stop night-feeding earlier (3-4 months), but many will go for 6 or more months.

Not to mention there are a laughable number of common sleep regression ages — developmental periods where your normally good-sleeper may have trouble. Some experts say there are six or more of these setback stages before your child even turns 2, which feels like a cruel joke when you're living through it.

That is a really long time to have your sleep disrupted every single night!

Even when the disruption becomes relatively minor, it can have tons of adverse mental and physical health effects when it goes on for such a long time.

Surprisingly, "suck it up" is not a credible treatment for chronic sleep loss.

There is one good thing to come out of this discourse: Everyone's mileage may vary. Some people's kids are great sleepers from an early age. Others aren't.

The OP may have wanted to stir up controversy for some extra followers, or maybe he just put his foot in his mouth based on his own not-so-bad experience.

But you can learn a lot by examining the discourse firestorm that came after.

If you truly want children but are scared of sleep deprivation horror stories, just know that it can be managed with the right support. It can be extremely harrowing but it's not a reason to deprive yourself of a family if that's what you want — you may not have it as bad as others have! A lot of the people chiming in to agree probably weren't ill-intentioned, just fortunate.

More importantly, maybe let's not invalidate other parents' experiences and feelings.

Saying that the sleep deprivation wasn't that bad for you is fine, but telling other people they're being soft and to grow up is mind-blowingly oblivious and unnecessary.

Tired parents need all the support we can get — and more importantly, maybe someone to watch the kids so we can take a nap.

parenting
Family

Dad found out his son bullied a kid at school and came up with a brilliant teaching moment

"I told him that we have the opportunity to make things right."

@thehalfdeaddad/TikTok

Dad on TikTok shared how he addressed his son's bullying.

What do you do when you find out your kid bullied someone? For many parents, the first step is forcing an apology. While this response is of course warranted, is it really effective? Some might argue that there are more constructive ways of handling the situation that teach a kid not only what they did wrong, but how to make things right again.

Single dad Patrick Forseth recently shared how he made a truly teachable moment out of his son, Lincoln, getting into trouble for bullying. Rather than forcing an apology, Forseth made sure his son was actively part of a solution.


The thought process behind his decision, which he explained in a now-viral TikTok video, is both simple and somewhat radical compared to how many parents have been encouraged to handle similar situations.

“I got an email a few days ago from my 9-year-old son's teacher that he had done a ‘prank’ to a fellow classmate and it ended up embarrassing the classmate and hurt his feelings,” the video begins.

At this point, Forseth doesn’t split hairs. “I don't care who you are, that's bullying,” he said. “If you do something to somebody that you know has the potential end result of them being embarrassed in front of a class or hurt—you’re bullying.”

So, Forseth and Lincoln sat down for a long talk (a talk, not a lecture) about appropriate punishment and how it would have felt to be on the receiving end of such a prank.

From there, Forseth told his son that he would decide how to make things right, making it a masterclass in taking true accountability.

“I demanded nothing out of him. I demanded no apology, I demanded no apology to the teacher,” he continued, adding, “I told him that we have the opportunity to go back and make things right. We can't take things back, but we can try to correct things and look for forgiveness.”

@thehalfdeaddad Replying to @sunshinyday1227 And then it’s my kid 🤦‍♂️😡 #endbullyingnow #talktoyourkidsmore #dadlifebestlife #singledadsover40 #teachyourchildren #ReadySetLift ♬ Get You The Moon - Kina

So what did Lincoln do? He went back to his school and actually talked to the other boy he pranked. After learning that they shared a love of Pokémon, he then went home to retrieve two of his favorite Pokémon cards as a peace offering, complete with a freshly cleaned case.

Lincoln would end up sharing with his dad that the other boy was so moved by the gesture that he would end up hugging him.

“I just want to encourage all parents to talk to your kids,” Forseth concluded. “Let's try to avoid just the swat on the butt [and] send them to their room. Doesn't teach them anything.”

In Forseth’s opinion, kids get far more insight by figuring out how to resolve a problem themselves. “That's what they're actually going to face in the real world once they move out of our nests.”

He certainly has a point. A slap on the wrist followed by being marched down somewhere to say, “I’m sorry,” only further humiliates kids most of the time. With this gentler approach, kids are taught the intrinsic value of making amends after wrongdoing, not to mention the power of their own autonomy. Imagine that—blips in judgment can end up being major character-building moments.

Kudos to this dad and his very smart parenting strategy.


This article originally appeared on 3.24.23

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fatherhood
Family

Woman's viral posts about her dad's 'discussion agendas' are hilarious and inspiring

Packers football, family updates, and of course, General Discussion.

Photo by Giovanna Gomes on Unsplash

Kenzi Enright's dad, Riley, has been getting together with the same group of guys every Friday night for years.

Neither of them ever expected that the meetups, officially known as "Board Meetings," would eventually make them both Internet-famous.

One night in late 2022, Kenzi's dad invited her out with the boys and caught her off guard when he handed her a printed agenda full of discussion topics for the evening.

On deck for the night?

  • Jordan Love
  • World Cup
  • China and Russia
  • After Christmas party with the boys
  • and General Discussion

Kenzi found it so hilarious that she shared the agenda on Twitter, where it instantly went viral.

Some people found the structured approach to hanging out impressive, while others just thought the over-the-top dad vibes were adorable.

Kenzi began sharing the agendas almost every Friday — and has kept the gag going for nearly two years.

The formal discussion topics started as a joke.

Riley and his friends found a coaster at their bar table one night with some hard-to-read writing on it, and one of them joked that it must have been a previous group's agenda.

From there, the group began discussing their own agendas for the evening before meeting up, and soon, Riley was printing them out before each Board Meeting.

Sometimes the guys include little notes like "Please be on time, we have a lot to get through," or "Please take good notes." Sometimes there are guest speakers on the docket, including Kenzi.

After the initial laughs and virality wore off, Kenzi's dad and his friends found they actually liked having an agenda for their meetups. So they decided to keep it rolling.

By now, Kenzi has posted over 60 updates — with an audience of thousands eagerly awaiting each one!

The agendas may have started as a joke, but they serve an important purpose — and hold a valuable lesson.

"We found ourselves going down some rabbit holes. Political things and whatnot would get in the way, and life would get in the way of things," Riley told People.

"We found ourselves getting away from the fun and into kind of depressing things. So we made a vow to each other — no politics, no depressing things. We're just going to get together and have fun."

According to the agendas, The Board discusses a wide range of topics, from sports (the Green Bay Packers make a lot of appearances on the lists), to pop culture, to home repair, family, life updates, and more.

The gang has a lot of fun hamming up the discussion guides, but the fact that the joke has lasted this long is pretty amazing.

It's no secret that there's an epidemic of male loneliness in America. A 2021 survey found that a shocking 15 percent of men reported having no close friends.

The isolation is even more pronounced in younger generations, with a survey from 2023 discovering that a staggering 65% of men ages 18-23 agreed with the statement "No one really knows me well."

The same study found that 40% of all men surveyed showed depressive symptoms.

Guys everywhere can take a lesson from Riley and his friends, and from the commitment they show in getting together every single week and talking openly about real issues — something so many men struggle to do.

Your own Guy's Night Out may never go viral, but it might be a surprisingly important piece of your long-term mental health.

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