The Dads for Kamala Podcast

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 00:13

Hi everyone. I'm Mohan Siva Logan Abi and welcome to the Dads for a couple of podcasts. I've held several titles in my life and not all of them were on purpose, but the title I hold with the greatest pride is dad. Being a dad at this moment, it feels like I'm a part of a globe spanning club that is truly revolutionizing what it means to be a man and a caretaker of family, community, and generations. On our podcast, we share a spotlight on the dads who are out there making big moves through their family and professional lives.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 00:43

Today, I'm excited to have a conversation with Sean Daniels from Florida. Sean epitomizes the dad who cannot be boxed in by a single label. He is confronting the addiction health crisis, and he has a story of fatherhood that is captivating. Sean, welcome to the show.

Sean Daniels: 00:58

Great. Thank you so much.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 01:00

It's so good to connect. And in just learning about you and your background, I realized you're making amazing things happen every day, but really what I'm most interested in, and for folks who are listening, you can't see that Sean is sharing a space with a 6 year old. So this is someone who is clearly living fatherhood day in, day out with every breath in his office space because really his child's space. And I think many of us as dads, we know what that means. What I wanna hear about, though, is what was your dad moment of the week?

Sean Daniels: 01:29

My dad moment of the week. You know, I am I'm so blessed. I have a a 6 year old. Her name is is Vivian. And, she's so excited to go back to school, and she's so excited to learn.

Sean Daniels: 01:42

And, you know, right, we spend each night sitting there doing sight words and and trying to figure out, like, you know, I show them to her. I she sounds them out. And, it's so exhausting and so tedious, and then also, like, the most rewarding part of the day. Because I know that, like, her little brain is expanding as we you know, as she gets smarter, she better understands how to read. She's incredibly verbal.

Sean Daniels: 02:07

She's incredibly creative. And so she just wants to take off and make words into her own. So getting her to learn exactly what they mean is, is a bit of a challenge, but it's great. It's great to to be able to sit there and to do that and to just be present with her as as her, you know, as her little brain expands and then she passes out. She loves the the Grinch story about Christmas.

Sean Daniels: 02:27

So it could not be hotter in Florida. We're literally sweating all day long and then reading about the Grinch at night because it's one of her favorite stories that she just discovered.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 02:37

It's not the boundaries.

Sean Daniels: 02:39

That's right. I know. So it'll mean a little bit more when we get to Christmas, but it doesn't matter. Because right now, it's Christmas at August in a 101 degrees in humidity in South Florida.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 02:48

One of my go to jams in the doctor suicide is Fox and Socks.

Sean Daniels: 02:51

Yeah. You know, that's solid.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 02:52

I'm totally oh my goodness. Like, I I try to get better at it every time. I feel like I'm trying to channel my inner Eminem as I'm looking.

Sean Daniels: 02:59

If you're spitting it out and you're making all of it work, that you're there.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 03:03

Exactly. And we, you know, put a little rhythm behind it and all that.

Sean Daniels: 03:05

That's right. That's right. How can you not? Yeah. It's a beautiful thing.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 03:07

It's a beautiful thing. You know, Sean, you're, you're someone who clearly has merit interests. And there are many things that you do on a day to day basis. So why amidst all of that are you a dad for Kamala?

Sean Daniels: 03:22

So I guess a couple things. So I, I kind of work at the intersection of the arts and the, recovery world. So I'm dedicated to using the arts to try to end addiction in our country and, really trying to to use how do we change national narratives? There's so many great examples in our lifetime of how at one point we as a country believed one thing and then and then now 20 years ago, we believe something else. Right?

Sean Daniels: 03:50

Like, marijuana is gonna be legalized in Florida in November. And 20 years ago, if you had asked anybody if that's possible, they would have said no way. Right? So I wanna use national narratives in the arts to change the conversations around addiction, to really figure out, like, how do we stop people from dying. You know, the the stats are, of course, we've never been losing more people than we are right now.

Sean Daniels: 04:13

We're losing somebody about one person every 3 minutes. We're also, I live in Florida where in 2015, one out of every 10 overdoses in the country happened in Florida. So it really is ground 0 for where we're we're losing people and where we have a national epidemic that we're often not talking about. And so, you know, my my always my responsibility as a father is to think about what world am I leaving behind for her. I mean, I'm I'm 51.

Sean Daniels: 04:42

So, like, if if I don't make it too much longer, like, I had a good run. It was fine. You know? But for her, I think about, like, what what world is she walking into, on such grand levels of, like, is there gonna be enough water for people when they get there? And such smaller levels about, like, is there gonna be the protection and education for when she goes to college that people know what the difference between, you know, drugs that have Fentanyl in them and don't.

Sean Daniels: 05:09

You know? I I like in a bold move, I always buy these, like, Fentanyl strips for my friends' kids that are in college because I just feel like you can always sit in so many meetings and and learn about how drug use in our country amongst teens is going down, but fatalities is going up because of the drugs that they're taking. And so many people think they're taking a Xanax or think they're taking, you know, just something to help them study and are are dead the next morning. So, I try to think about, like, how I can really better the world so that when she grows up into it, it's a it's a safe place to be. And, you know, here in Florida, governor DeSantis vetoed all funding around recovery that happens in the Tampa Bay area.

Sean Daniels: 05:54

And so the work that we do is not partisan because we all know that addiction doesn't really care what political party that you're a part of, and it doesn't care what race or what socioeconomic. It gets everybody across the board. And I think, you know, for our vice president candidate, for him to talk about the fact that he had a rough encounter with the police and then afterwards decide to not drink anymore. And then now he's giving a speech at the DNC where his family is crying. I mean, that to me is, like, that is the recovery success story.

Sean Daniels: 06:25

That is really letting people right there know that, like, just because the police pull you over and get a DUI and you feel like you have to go in the day and resign from your job. Like, that doesn't have to be the end. That recovery is possible and that you can make it all the way to where it is that that he has. And so to me, like, someone with lived experience in the White House that is really making those changes,

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 06:48

I

Sean Daniels: 06:48

think is deeply important. And then I I only have a daughter, because of IVF. My wife and I had to do 2 different rounds of IVF to be able to get our daughter Vivian. And so the the idea that that type of science wouldn't be available to couples. Like, it wouldn't have been available to my mom if she had had that trouble.

Sean Daniels: 07:08

It definitely would have been available to my grandma. And so because we live in a time of science and education, it is available for us to be able to have her. And the idea that somehow that is on the table of being taken away, I think, seems crazy. And, you know, it was completely on me. I have a a low sperm count.

Sean Daniels: 07:25

And so I guess in past generations that just would have been the end of our family, would not have continued. And so because we live in science in a time of science and because we live in a a time when that's encouraged, you know, we're able to have a a beautiful daughter, and she's able to take over my entire office with all of her, with her deep Barbie obsession that's happening right now.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 07:46

Well, Barbie's certainly having a moment.

Sean Daniels: 07:48

That's right.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 07:49

Many of the the girls and women in my life, and I will certainly say that, we we're all for the better for your daughter being on this planet. And it's something to fight for. That's absolutely something to fight for. And it it's something that's really striking to me what you shared. I mean, really, there are a number of aspects to to your story that are really illuminating and inspiring.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 08:10

Just the notion of the nonpartisan nature of some of the issues and experiences that you really care about and the stories that you tap within yourself. And I think as dads, oftentimes, we're thinking about, like, what what is the what is the state of the world that our kids are inheriting? You know, when we pass that baton, when we pass that torch.

Sean Daniels: 08:31

Yeah. You know, you, the more time that you spend in the health and human services and recovery world, you, within seconds, realize that it is, like, the most American because it is everybody, and it is the most nonpartisan because I promise you that Fentanyl does not care what political party that you're a part of. Whatever candidate is interested in really tackling that, and we know that it's not just that you lock people up, and we know it's not just that you, you know, provide resources, that it really takes a comprehensive, aspect in terms of letting people of anti stigma work, in terms of getting them help, in terms of getting them resources. And The Harris administration is interested in tackling that, and they're interested in really putting all of that forward. And they're interested in making sure that all reproductive rights, are available to everyone going forward.

Sean Daniels: 09:21

I mean and also just I mean, I have to be honest. Like, I have a daughter, and so that is that is terrifying to me for to think about what world is she gonna grow up in where the that she doesn't have the same rights that her grandmother had. And so to me, like, you know, I guess it'd be like maybe that's part of it, but it's also just being a dad to be like, I look at her and think, like, I have to do whatever I can so that it's on my watch. It didn't get worse from what it had been before.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 09:52

So knowing that you're in such a dynamic space, I would love to hear you know, if you're running into dads in Florida, you know, for you, Sean, like, what what is it that you'd wanna share with other dads there as you think about this idea of of being a dad for Kamala and the importance and stakes of this election?

Sean Daniels: 10:09

Well, one of the things I I do love about where we are so we're in Tampa Bay, and, Tampa Bay population wise is larger than 22 states. We are rural. We are urban. You know, if you're out here, there's, like, giant jugs where there's nobody. There's downtown Tampa Bay, which is very urban and walkable.

Sean Daniels: 10:33

It is wildly diverse. I've never lived amongst more diverse neighbors. I've never lived amongst more of a mix of of republicans and democrats. And, that kind of on the ground, people are much more interested on the local level about their families and about, like, what's right for their kids. And, you know, we picked this neighborhood in part because it's next to an excellent elementary school and so many of the other families that we did also.

Sean Daniels: 10:58

And so when I talk to other parents and we talk about it, we we do talk about our kids, And we do talk about the idea of how are the choices that we're making really setting up our kids. You know? Of course, the election would have a huge effect on us, but it's gonna have the most effect on my daughter who, you know, won't be able to vote for another 15 years and how many things will be in place or how many things will be assumed or how many rights will be gone or how many you know, you read project 2025, and you think like, oh my god. Like, this isn't great for me, but this is terrible for somebody who, like, this is the world that they're coming into. And so it's interesting.

Sean Daniels: 11:40

We don't you know? Because in Florida, you always have to be you always have to be careful. When you start talking to someone in politics, you don't know where they're coming from. It kind of doesn't matter because if you talk about people's families and you talk about the what's coming next for them, everybody wants what's best for their kids, and everybody wants a a country with which their kids are gonna thrive in. And so I, you know, then make the argument that that is you know, the the Harris administration is is what's gonna make that possible for us, that they're interested in, making sure there's opportunities.

Sean Daniels: 12:15

I mean, we are a we are a firmly middle class home, and we live in a firmly middle class neighborhood. And so, you know, tax cuts for for the rich, it doesn't really affect us. And in fact, if there's more taxes on us, that only means that we have less to be able to provide for our families. And so on just a selfish level, that's, you know, that's why I vote the way I vote.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 12:39

What a powerful closing reflection there to be thinking about not only, what are the ramifications of this election and these issues and ideas on your own family, but also on a future that you may not see, that you may not be a part of, but to know that you are making a difference. You are making an imprint on that future right now. And I think that's just an incredible exemplification of what it means to be a dad, to do certain things that you know you have control over, and then there's certain things where you just have to have faith. And you just need to show up the right way.

Sean Daniels: 13:11

Yeah. And maybe you maybe you specifically feel this way. So my dad has been gone for a long time, And so it is a very interesting thing to be a father when you have a dead father because you are well aware of the lessons that were taught to you that the, like, the way that voice is still in your head and the way that that examples are still with you, and the way that, like, oh my god. He did so many things right, and I hope that I'm doing them right also. And you realize, like, the impact that that he had.

Sean Daniels: 13:42

You know, my dad never met my daughter. But the influence that he still has over her because, because of the way he raised me and because I'm trying to somewhat do it somewhat as good as he did makes you realize the impact that dads have for generations to come. And I think, you know, when I think about her and I think about politics and I think about you're right. The choices that we're making, we're talking about choices that will ripple for decades to come long after you and I are gone? And how do we make sure that we've set them all up well and that we put them, you know, in a in a country that is excited for them?

Sean Daniels: 14:19

And especially for dads of daughters, how have we really made sure that, you know, they have as many freedoms as their moms and grandmas did?

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 14:27

Mhmm. We are absolutely carrying the stories of others. And, Sean, thank you for sharing your story today. It has been incredible, so good to get to know you a little bit more, and I'm sure the community is absolutely grateful as well. So thank you for joining us here on the podcast today.

Sean Daniels: 14:44

Great. Thank you.

Mohan Sivaloganathan: 14:46

So friends, stay tuned to future episodes where we will continue to elevate the inspirational stories of dads who are reimagining fatherhood and taking action to ensure Kamala Harris becomes the president of the United States. Stay connected with us through www.dadsforkamala.com, where you will find our social media channels, sign up for our newsletter to hear the latest dad stories, jokes, opportunities for action, and participate in your community. Thank you. And as we love to say in the dad's for the come look community, let's testing