I was a workaholic. I used to spend my days at work and my nights agonizing over work deadlines. On weekends, I brought work home. In addition to work, I was marathon training, writing a novel, volunteering at church, and trying to maintain a social life with my friends and colleagues.

Like all workaholics, I was in denial. I felt that if I only planned my time better, everything would work out.

Then my son Kyle was born and things changed. Suddenly, working late meant that I would not see my son all day. I was on my way to work before Kyle got up and arrived home after his bedtime. I promised myself and my wife that I would spend more time with Kyle on the weekends but my schedule did not allow it. When I was with Kyle, he’d cry rivers of tears demanding he be handed back to his mother. "So much for fatherhood!" I told myself.

I was not happy with this situation but I did not know what to do. I was the sole bread-winner in our household and I felt that my being successful was the key to putting food on the table. But at what cost?

The turning point came when my wife sat me down and took out a box of poker chips. She asked me questions and then started laying down chips.

"What time do you finish work?" she asked.

"Well, my contract says 5pm, but..."

"It takes you two hours to drive home and eat dinner." She interrupted. "So you can spend time with Kyle from seven till his eight o’clock bedtime." I wanted to protest but she ignored me. "If you multiply 1 hour by 5 days, that makes 5 hours a week." She stacked 5 chips to signify 5 hours.

"And on weekends, you have 16 waking hours a day so that’s 32 hours in 2 days, right?" She added the 32 chips to the first 5 so there were 37 chips in total.

"So this is your free time every week – 37 hours. But that’s if you leave work on time. Most days, you stay late, and you work from home on weekends too – so that’s at least another 10 hours spent on work." She subtracted 10 chips from the 37 chips.

"So you have 27 hours left."

Feeling defensive, I said “Yes, but what about my running, writing, volunteer work, social life?”

“Of course you have a right to your own free time.” Then she asked how many hours I needed for each activity and then deducted the chips from the total. Ok, I said, “9 hours for marathon training, 4 hours for writing, 3 hours for volunteer work, 4 hours to cover any household chores and errands,…” I went on naming activities till there were only 3 measly chips left.

I sat there staring at the 3 chips and she said, “This is the time you are spending with Kyle and I tell you most of the time, you are too tired to play with him. Kyle does not know you. You are a stranger to him.”

Still in denial, I rationalized that it would one day work out but as the weeks progressed, I realized that I was out of control and my son was growing up fatherless.

In the six months that followed, I began to change my life. I was firm about leaving on time and eventually changed my career path to allow me to work from home. In addition, I substantially scaled down my hobbies and volunteer work.

My son, whom I had failed to bond with, began to feel connected to me. Most surprisingly, I loved being with him.

These days, we go to the playground everyday to meet his friends and I read to him every night. We have “Day out with Daddy” days, when the two of us just take long MRT rides and explore new places together.

My favourite day was when I took him down to Raffles Place to see my old workplaces. We walked by the river and ate chicken rice lunch at Maxwell Road Food Centre. It was a really special day and Kyle came home and told his mummy, “I have a really good Daddy. He always takes me out to nice places.”

I am a modest person and do not feel comfortable with accolades so I told myself, “Surely there are better fathers out there.” But to hear it from Kyle made me feel like the luckiest person in the world to have such a wonderful son and caring wife.

Now, our bond is unbreakable - we are not only father and son, we have become best friends.