Single dad reveals his parenting secret — and it involves getting silly and goofy with kids

Solo parenting can be a mammoth task and there's no two ways about it. However, while parenting all alone can be extremely draining, a little play with the kids at the end of the day might do good to both the child's and parent's oxytocins. A father, Brian Recker, known on Instagram as @berecker talked about the one thing that he still does even when he is exhausted. 

"I am not the most naturally playful dad, as a solo parent by the time I've fed everyone and cleaned up everything, met every need, I'm kind of over it. They don't prepare you as a parent for how often your kids make you get up from where you're sitting," he said at the beginning of the video. He then says how by bed time he has very little desire to get on the floor and play with his kid and wrestle. "But I saw a study the other day that said that kids get a huge oxytocin spike when they play a rough house with their dad, the same as they cuddle with their mom," he said. "So I put on a silly voice. Tonight I went Bane from Batman, and I swear to god the second they knew we were playing, they started to giggle," he added. 

He then said how he "body slammed" the little kids and how they loved every second of it. "Then they gave me some great cuddles and went right to sleep," he said in the video. "So, dads this is your reminder, play with your kids, life is going to beat all of us down but your kids deserve to see you get a little silly," he said before ending the video. 

"It works just about every time and often magically turns bad situations around, and yet I often fail to use it! It takes emotional energy that sometimes I just don’t have the reserves for, the good news is, *you* get the same oxytocin boost as your kids, so when you do muster the willpower to get goofy, you never regret it and feel good afterward. Good luck out there folks," he captioned the video.

Many took to the comment section to talk about the importance of playing with kids. "As a single mom, I find that my daughter loves it when I rough house with her as well, so not sure gender matters as much as the fun, laughter, and connection," wrote @natashajovin. "And just a reminder that moms can wrestle and rough house too! My girls and I love it" added @latashataylor. "I love this!! just a reminder I needed to make a little bit more effort to get silly with them and want to play with them even after a really long day," read a third comment by @mamaolivek. "Crying that I try so hard to do both for my son (solo mama) but I’m so tired at the end of the day. I feel like he’s missing that carefree roughhousing that he needs," expressed @raisingwildone. 

You can follow Brian Recker (@berecker) on Instagram for more parenting content.