My First Few Months As A Father

A lot of people have asked me about my first thoughts when I found out that I was going to be a father. It was something that my wife and I had planned so it was not a shock to me, however, the realization does hit you soon after that in nine short months, you are going to be responsible for another human being. For the rest of your life.

It’s something that I took seriously but as time went on and the date of delivery came closer, all my focus was on making sure my wife and baby were healthy. As luck would have it, my wife did not have the easiest of pregnancies and had to be hospitalized multiple times during her term, but everything turned out okay in the end and we were blessed to have a healthy baby girl, albeit, she decided to come a month earlier than scheduled.

Premature Baby!

Being a doctor in a family of doctors can have some advantages, however, not when it's your own child that’s the focus of attention. My brain kept on racing to a hundred studies that I would have read regarding babies born prematurely. As is the case with most babies pre-term, she was also underweight.

This made her ability fight off any possible infection compromised and thus my head was filled with all sorts of worst-case scenarios. I talked to other people who had been through this before and found out that what I was going through was not uncommon and was only heightened by an increased awareness of medical possibilities.

My baby thankfully did not have to stay in the hospital for any longer than necessary and was able to carry out all essential functions without any artificial aids so we took her home a couple of days after the delivery.

New Baby Madness

We had been meticulous in making sure everything that we might need for the baby was already kept in readiness long before the delivery but no one can really anticipate the frenzy that accompanies a new baby.

My wife was, of course, more in the thick of it since I never took any time off work but every moment that I spent at home was spent staring at this tiny little baby we had produced. I was very keen to be involved as a father right from the initial stages even though I was pretty nervous about doing something wrong!

READ Congratulations, You're Going To Be A Dad! How Men Can Prepare For A New Baby

Now, my daughter was never much of a crier, but there was one night that I can remember pretty early on where she started to cry and just would not stop. Everything that I had read in books to prepare me for this moment went out of the window as both me and my wife panicked. Nothing we did would make her stop. She did not seem to be hungry or need her diaper changed which should cover 90% of the crying emergencies!

Finally, after about the longest five minutes of my life, she gave a big burp and immediately started to calm down!

Changing diapers is something that was much easier than I expected and I did not have to use the gloves, mouth mask and other equipment that I had stocked in the house! As my daughter grew slightly older, I started to notice small changes and quirks in her that literally lit up my day. Like, she smiles a little in her sleep, or immediately after getting up.

I have no idea why that happens but I wait for it staring at her for hours!

Fatherhood Is All About Embracing The New

A Baby Does Change Everything 

Here is the fact that every experienced parent knows and new parents find out soon enough. Not all of it is good. There are some major changes that need to be made in your life as it starts to revolve around your baby.

Going out to dinner is just not about deciding what kind of food you want to eat but to make sure that the place is not too noisy in case we take her along, not too far for home in case we need to rush back and of course any excursion needs to be done with a completely packed baby bag with for any and all situations that might arise!

The relationship between me and my wife has also changed. We have less time for each other than we used to since all our time seems to be around our baby. It is not something that either of resents but it is the little things that we used to do with each other that are put on the backburner whenever there is any conflict of time.

Both I and my wife love to travel and we decided that having a baby would not change this one thing. In fact, we decided to take a trip across the world to the US when our baby was 4 months old. It was a fun trip no doubt, however, traveling with a baby is very different than traveling alone!

I think we both underestimated the toll travel takes and so we had to cut back our in-country traveling by a lot. It is just another small change and we will plan better next time around.

Every Day Is A New Experience

The one thing that I have learned over the last six months as a father is that I will never be fully in control of every situation anymore. There is no way to predict how a baby is going to behave with certainty and she just might decide to go along with my plans or not. There is nothing I can do about it!

READ What seasoned moms think you should know about having a new baby

Every single day I feel I learned something new about her behavior and feel better equipped be a father although not everything I thought I learned turns out to be very useful!

Patience with your baby, with yourself, your partner and those around you is key to getting through the times when everything seems to be getting out of control. Take a step back, relax and look into your baby’s eyes. Everything will be okay.