Well I have some big news for everyone, but I'm afraid that will have to wait until tomorrow.
In the meantime I thought I would share with you a few memories from over a year ago.
You see just before giving the Moo her bath and bed, we spent some time together encouraging her to crawl, she's so close now! I can't wait to see her make that first move forward!
Anyway, after and while running my bath I thought I would have a look in my 'dad book' and see if it has any advice for this stage of development. I then discovered that after the first 6 weeks the book ends and leaves you to fend for yourself.
That said, flicking through it's hallowed pages, I was flooded with memories of the first time I read it, which of course would have been over a year ago.
Now the funny thing is, I always wanted a child, a youngling to teach my hobbies and tutor the merits of Cameron's Aliens over Scott's Alien, but when the news hit, that one cold March morning, I remember my reaction exactly: ...fuck...
Like I said, I had always wanted a child, and we had been 'trying' so to speak, but that news hit me like a tonne of bricks.
I also remember my walk into work that morning. It was the first time I think I ever genuinely prayed to a god (the second time being shortly after getting home the day Moo was born).
The prayer was a simple one, to give me the strength to be a good father and a better husband than I had been to date.
I would like to point out that I am not a religious man, I think that there is a chance that -a- god exists, but there is just as much of a chance that a god doesn't - and if one does, there is more of a chance that our minds are too primitive to truly understand it. But at this time I was willing to go out on a limb.
You see for the first time ever in my life I was truly scared, but it wasn't for me, myself and I. It was for the unborn child that my wife was holding.
- the irony is that I now know, the fact I had that fear, the fact I was scared for the little Moo, that was the sign that I would do my best to be a good dad, and no matter what I would not let her down (if I could help it).
But at the same time, I am a man, and when a man gets frightened he retreats into his cave and as the weeks passed on my wife noticed me getting more and more withdrawn.
We tried talking it through, but as far as I was concerned, she didn't know how I felt, she couldn't because she was a woman.
Now I don't mean that in a sexist sort of way, but instead that it was the same way that I couldn't fully understand how she felt because I'm a man. We can try and learn and be supportive but there's only so much.
It was then we went shopping for a dad-book for me, and then we found it.
This book was written in a non-assuming manner with some humour to boost, but even more importantly, it was written for men, by a man!
This book taught me so much, most importantly that everything I was afraid of, everything I was scared and concerned about, that's what every man feels.
- that niggle in the back of your head to run? Normal!
- the mourning for your 'free' life? Normal
- the self loathing for having these thoughts and feelings? N.O.R.M.A.L!
The irony of course? This was everything my wife had been saying all along!
But what was this book:
Sure it's pretty damn useless once your kid is past 6 weeks, but up to that point, it's a freaking life saver!
- Your friendly neighbourhood Doctor Loxley
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