Help! I'm about to be a daddy.

[mrjwhit]

Alright DW (dear wife) and I have been successful at doing the deal. It only took us 1 month. We stopped using the condom, used an ovulation test, and breakfast in bed. We got confirmation from our doctor that we will have a little bundle in June 2007. Well, now I have a question; what in the world do I do now?

[natobasso]

Here's a great site for parenthood itself: http://www.askmoxie.org.

This forum is a great place for questions as well. I find for dad's there are a lot of resources out there. Start on askmoxie.org to find a few of them.

I can be here for you as well to answer specific questions. It's funny because it only took 1 month for my DW and I to conceive as well so congratulations! I was excited and stressed at the same time.

One thing I can say is that everyone has an opinion or horror story regarding pregancy (those who haven't yet experienced it seem to be the worst "experts" in this regard!) so try to tune them all out.

You will start by looking inside yourself to find any shortcoming that might need to be fixed before the baby gets here. For me, I realized I needed to reorganize my priorities and be a bit more responsible in the chores arena. Once I did that, I moved deeper and thought about what I missed not having a dad growing up. I want to be the dad I never had.

Hit your parents up for info too if they were good parents, that is. They are a wealth of untapped information and will happily gush to you about how great you were to raise. He he. Seriously, though, involve them as much as you can. They are great baby-sitters.

My crux issue is that I'm a musician and don't want to give up my dreams of playing around the world. I haven't reached that goal yet, but knowing my wife is behind me (and vice a versa) really helps keep me relaxed that my life isn't over because of our child being born.

Your thoughts?

[preggers]

Congratulations to you and your dw! I have a few things to say from a woman's point of view that is, you probably already do these things seeing you are here asking for some tips, or you've already done what I suggest.

Support you wife along the journey. Help out more as she gets uncomfortable, do more chores, pamper her, focus on the good things going on. Paint her toes.

Talk now about how you'll care for the baby. I say this because I have a participating husband and we both take care of our babies. However, I know some friends who found that their husbands don't do baby stuff like changing diapers, waking in the night, walking around to soothe and this has created tense situations and exhausted moms. With my situation, neither of us always knew/know what to do but we rely on each other to figure things out so neither of us is overwhelmed or resentful.

Enjoy the ride!
Patti

[mrjwhit]

Thank you all. I can't wait until it really hits us this Wednesday. We get to hear the heart! You'll have to pick me up off the floor!

[natobasso]

That first ultrasound is amazing, and I can vouch whole-heartedly for pitching in every way possible before, during and after the birth of the baby. This includes doing all chores and feeding your DW water as she breastfeeds. Women get very thirsty when they do this. ;)