Joseph Peck

This episode is dedicated to and about military dads. If you’re actively serving or a veteran and you’re trying to find purpose and balance in fatherhood, you’re going to want to stick around for this episode. My guest will share his story and journey from being a soldier to being a veteran dad.

Joseph Peck is a successful Vice President, Financial Adviser and father. But before that he was a soldier and he’s here to share his journey into fatherhood.

To learn more about Joseph Peck or connect with him.

Email: josephgpeck@gmail.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joseph-peck-a81932116/

Special thanks to InGenius Prep for sponsoring The Fatherhood Challenge. To learn more about InGenius Prep or to claim your free consultation, visit: https://ingeniusprep.com/get-a-free-consultation/?utm_campaign=2024+Podcast+Email+Marketing&utm_content=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_medium=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_source=Fatherhood+Podcast&utm_term=Fatherhood+Podcast

Special thanks to Zencastr for sponsoring The Fatherhood Challenge. Use my special link https://zen.ai/CWHIjopqUnnp9xKhbWqscGp-61ATMClwZ1R8J5rm824WHQIJesasjKDm-vGxYtYJ to save 30% off your first month of any Zencastr paid plan.

Transcription - How Veterans Find Purpose in Fatherhood

---

This episode is dedicated to and about military dads.

If you're actively serving or a veteran and you're trying to find purpose and balance in fatherhood,

you're gonna want to stick around for this episode.

My guest will share his story and journey from being a soldier to being a veteran dad in just a moment so don't go anywhere.

Before we begin, I'd like to thank our proud sponsor of this episode and the Fatherhood Challenge in Genius Prep.

In Genius Prep is the world's premier admissions consulting firm, proud to be officially recognized as the country's top college admissions consultants.

Helping students prepare for admissions to top schools through individualized educational programs that increase chances of admission by up to 10 times.

In Genius Prep students work with former admission officers to differentiate themselves from other competitive students in three areas colleges evaluate students.

In academics, extra curricular activities and personal characteristics.

Just this past admission cycle, Genius Prep students have secured 110 offers from Ivy League schools, 268 offers,

from top 20 schools, and 904 offers from top 50 schools.

In Genius Prep's student success lies within the fact that in Genius Prep is an all-in-one consulting firm

offering every service a family needs, whether it be test prep, tailored candidacy, building mentorship, academic mentorships,

the leadership and innovation lab, soft skills courses, writing courses and other customized programs to develop their application persona to the most effective and authentic extent to share with colleges.

Just click on the link in the episode description to book a free strategy call with one of Genius Prep's college experts.

Or you can visit in Genius Prep.com that's in Genius Prep.com and let them know you came from the Fatherhood Challenge.

Welcome to the Fatherhood Challenge, a movement to awaken and inspire fathers everywhere to take great pride in their role and to challenge society to understand how important fathers are to the stability and culture of their families environment.

Now here's your host, Jonathan Guerrero.

Greetings everyone, thank you so much for joining me. My guest is Joseph Peck. Joseph is a successful vice president and financial advisor and father, but before that he was a soldier and he's here to share his journey to Fatherhood.

Joseph, thank you so much for being on the Fatherhood Challenge.

Hey, it's my pleasure, Jonathan. Thank you for having me.

Joseph, what is your favorite dad joke?

I have been telling this joke even before I was a father when I was in high school, I was giving a presentation and the computer stopped working, the PowerPoint stopped working and it was me and my partner working on the presentation, standing up there, staring at about 60 adults.

And I pulled this joke out and it has never ceased to fail me. It is hands down my favorite dad joke, so this is the way it goes.

There are two muffins in an oven. One muffin turns to the other and says, oh my gosh, we're in an oven.

The second muffin looks at the other one and says, oh my god, you're a talking muffin.

[Laughter]

Yeah, that is awesome.

Thank you. Thank you for sharing that with us.

I love that the way this show starts, so thank you.

So Joseph, please share your story from what made you want to join the military and what was your experience like while you were in?

Absolutely. I wanted to join the military pretty early on since I was in early teenager and I really just wanted to serve the country.

I was kind of hot-headed like a lot of young men are.

I wanted to do things that were exciting. I wanted to travel the world. I liked confrontation.

So I was very much stereotypical, I guess you could say, for the kind of person that would have listened to the military.

I decided to and listened to the Air Force and that's what my grandpa did.

My grandpa was in listening to the Air Force and I got put into the pharmacy position.

So I was a pharmacy technician for the first several years.

That was okay. It wouldn't have been my first choice as a job to be in the military.

But I did that for several years. My wife and I had our first child while we were there.

And we decided, you know what, we want to go back home. I'm out of Arizona.

We wanted to go back to Arizona and at the time, the Air Force was doing a program to where you could go from active duty to the reserve

and you could finish out your contract in the reserve.

So doing one weekend a month and two weeks of the year instead of being full time.

And so I did that. And as soon as I got back to Arizona, they called me up and said,

"Hey, you're going to go to training. You're reactivated for six more months."

And I went to golf port Mississippi and I trained to be in the Civil Engineering Department,

the Civil Engineering Group, to where I did construction for the military for the next six years.

And being in the reserve, I was activated off and on. I would do six months. I wouldn't do anything.

I'd go back to civilian life. I'd do two weeks, go back to civilian life, deployed for six months, go back to civilian life.

And I did that until 2022 when I finally got out after 10 years.

What was your transition like into fatherhood? What were some of your personal struggles and how did you deal with them?

My transition into fatherhood was a lot different than most. My wife and I have known each other since we were in high school.

And we got married at 19 and 20 and we had our first son at 21 and 20.

So I was very, very young. Being a dad, I was working 12 hour days, gone all the time.

So it was very abrupt transition into fatherhood.

You know, I would say the most difficult thing for me personally, of course, was that I was gone all the time,

but it was coming home to my wife who had, she, she, she was uprooted from her entire community to come be with me and marry me,

you know, on the other side of the country from where she lived.

And being coming home to see that she was really isolated and she didn't have a community and she, we were,

we didn't have a lot of money, we had one car, she really couldn't go anywhere because I was at work all the time.

The most difficult thing for me was the complete and total responsibility of two living beings

that I was now completely responsible for. And I hadn't thought of that before. I was excited to become a dad,

I was excited to be a good husband, which I tried to be and I wanted to do all these different things.

And then it kind of smacked me in the face that, hey, you're 21 and you have a ton of responsibility now

to put food on the table but also be an emotional support, right? And be a mental support and be pretty much my wife

and my son's entire community because we were very isolated.

That was, that was a heck of a struggle and the transition was bumpy and you know, I'm not going to lie,

it was bumpy but it's a team effort in my opinion, right? Between me and my wife, it was a complete team

effort to transition into parenthood and I can't speak for everybody but as far as myself and my wife,

we really became very, very co-dependent. We really depended on each other and we leaned on each other

a lot. In some ways it seems like really that transition actually brought you closer together.

You know, I would absolutely agree. We talk about it frequently nowadays because that was,

you know, a long time ago. All of the bad things that happened and, you know, there was a lot of

drama when I left active duty and went to the reserve, family drama career drama. There was a lot of

things that happened that led up to that decision and, you know, the events around that decision

and the events around that action and it really grew us closer to get it because to be quite honest,

we didn't really have anybody else. It was just us too and I think it really did make us stronger

than ever and it made our bond with our son very incredibly strong and it made the unit that we

were, the small, you know, three person unit, it made us unbreakable and it ended up paying off

dividends in the future, absolutely. And now we have four boys so I've got four sons and I like to

think that we are very strong as ever just because of all of the diversity we went through.

That's interesting. I thought I just heard you refer to your family as a unit. Interesting.

Oh, absolutely, absolutely. I think that, I think that nowadays, especially because,

from my point of view, the nuclear family is absolutely under attack. The nuclear family isn't

what it used to be and it's very much going away. You have to be very defensive in my opinion.

And that's not to say that we're a unit. Nobody's allowed inside of our inner circle and everybody is

warbled. No, no, no