Dad is the New Mom (and Vice Versa)

To be fair, statistically speaking, the title of this blog is completely untrue. Of stay-at-home parents, only 3.4% are fathers, and that's up from 1.6% in 2001. That said, dads care more today than ever about the things that historically only moms have deemed important. More than half of fathers say they would stay at home if their spouse made enough to allow for it, and most dads I meet are doing everything in their power to rearrange their careers to get just a little more time with their kids.

Whether because they must or because they choose to, both parents work in 59.1% of families with two married parents and children. Leaving around 41% with a stay-at-home parent (whether out of choice or because one parent is unemployed), and, as previously mentioned, only 3.4% of those are men. So, while it is a privilege, as a stay-at-home dad I am far and away a minority, which makes me a bit of an anomaly while toting my little lady around town in the middle of the week.

Parks on the weekend are full of dads. FULL of dads. Moms, if they are in the 41% staying at home all week, likely remain at home on a Saturday, as I often do, splitting their few hours of free time between getting chores finished that are impossible to accomplish with a babbling, pint-sized dust devil spiraling at your ankles, and pretending to relax while staring mindlessly at the internet and enjoying an uninterrupted meal. 

During the week, the parks are all but devoid of fathers. It's mostly moms, a fair amount of nannies, and me. And because it's just me, I am being watched like a lion wandering into a pride of lionesses caring for their cubs. Many are skeptical to say the least. For starters, if I am not constantly near my daughter, I look like a creep hanging out in the middle of a "work day" watching small children and mothers at a playground. Mothers and nannies meanwhile sit on the periphery chatting up a storm or staring at their iPhones, their children enjoying some time to themselves. In addition to avoiding looking like a pedophile, I have to avoid looking like a home-wrecker. Not only are moms protective of their children, they are protective of other moms. A man engaging moms on the playground instead of playing with his child, raises eyebrows. I'd like to say I'm better than these cynical moms labeling all males as aggressive, sex-driven threats to their children, neighbors, and marriages but in all honesty I too would cock an eyebrow if I saw a man sitting alone at a park in the middle of the day, or too involved with other people's kids or their moms (safety first, after all). 

Additionally, I must keep my cool at all times in public settings with my daughter. This, of course, is a good thing. Patience and responding calmly are necessary skills to have as a parent, but we all have our limits. If I see a mom lose her cool in public, I think nothing of it. Such an act, depending on the severity of said loss of coolness, is a daily occurrence and elicits looks of compassion: "Poor mom probably hasn't slept in days and obviously has her hands full with that kid." A loss of coolness from a man can be downright frightening. Most of us in my generation were raised to believe that dad is boss and kids listen or feel dad's wrath. I think my generation of men are becoming a bit more artful than our fathers at talking to our children, but it certainly is something we have to work at. Fortunately, my daughter rarely pushes me to the point of raising my voice, but she is reaching the age where she understands the word, "No," but feels the need to test whether it is a hard "No," (such as, "stop right now because you're about to kill yourself) or a soft "No," ("Please stop dragging the laundry I just folded all over the house because it's really annoying."). However, if I were to respond to her testing the way I hear moms respond to similar situations, people would flee like I was an escaped gorilla. There is no love for the frustrated father. He is scary, he is potentially dangerous, and he is to be avoided. 

On the peer front, stay-at-home fatherhood is largely viewed as laziness. It is, at the very least, not considered a job. Whether it's the constant replies of, "Oh, that must be so rewarding, you're so lucky," through tones of feigned sincerity that want to say, "Well, isn't that nice, you've found a way to avoid the hellish world of work," or overtly suggesting jobs I could be considering--as though I am not staying at home with my child but simply unemployed and hiding it in the guise of "staying at home with my child"--people on the outside don't get this familial distribution of responsibilities. It makes their brains hurt. It challenges their understanding of gender roles. It elicits thoughts, if not whispers, of, "That poor woman. She has to support her child and her deadbeat husband. That's so much pressure on a mom." People believe that working moms are doing everything, regardless of whether dad stays home. They don't get why dad isn't fulfilling his responsibility to support his family. They don't believe a man is capable of running a house and raising a child, and many think dad has lost his balls as they try not to cringe at his talk about nap-times and cute new behaviors his little girl is exhibiting. Women will tell you that a man playing with his child is like female porn, but that applies to working dads--dads with infinite energy and joy while spending time with their children on their one day a week--not the tired stay-at-home dad who is tasked with finding another day's worth of productive activities and may not always seem over-the-moon about being at a park for the fifteenth hour this week. 

On the home front, it is difficult for mom and dad to stick to their chosen set of responsibilities rather than defaulting to the roles they were prepared for by society. My wife runs her own business and is incredibly successful at it (part of our aforementioned privilege that allows us to choose to have a stay-at-home parent in the first place), but I run the family finances and constantly have my nose in the financial end of her business. Why? Because men are raised to believe we have an obligation to support our family financially and we cannot seem to let go of that ingrained need to play a role in the making of the money. On the other hand, my wife spends time she could be putting into her business pouring over parenting resources and sending me suggestions of things to do with our daughter. She worries constantly about whether I am overworked and puts more pressure on herself to give me "time-off" rather than taking time-off for herself. Why? Because women are, despite their progress in the professional world, largely still prepared by society to be homemakers who nurture their family and allow their husbands to focus on their careers. We all want to believe these stereotypes and gender roles have disappeared, but anyone who has children and a partner will tell you, they're alive and well (or, unwell, depending on how you want to look at it). 

I say all of this not to whine, but to enlighten (because I really do enjoy being a stay-at-home parent). Stay-at-home dads are a growing breed and even those of us who are not capable of staying at home full time still want bigger roles in raising our children. The general public discourse suggests that everyone wants this from men, but the behaviors on the ground are not as supportive of this redistribution of work. Women are fighting in the workplace for equal pay and equal opportunities while fighting the view that they are bad mothers for not staying at home. Men are fighting on the playground and at social functions to be taken seriously as nurturers  and homemakers while maintaining some shred of masculinity. Both genders are completely capable of taking over the traditional responsibilities of the opposite gender, but, both moms and dads need support in doing so. We're undoing thousands of years of indoctrination here. Women should not be pitied or judged as bad mothers for taking on the bread-winning role of the family and men should be given the same compassion, support, and respect that is given to women who give up careers to raise their kids. Just as women need to talk shop with men in their shared profession, men who stay at home need to be included in shop-talk with women who are running a household and raising kids. Men talking about the day-to-day development of their child, or complaining about mundane chores and the isolation of caring for a non-verbal (or semi-verbal ) communicator, still need to be considered men (if only for their ego's sake). And, a working women who talk to working men about the pressures of work instead of to other moms about their day-to-day life with the kids should be considered just as feminine.  

Currently, I don't see these things happening, and to be fair, they are complicated situations to navigate. It's hard for a working woman to talk about her career without making a stay-at-home mom feel judged for not working. Likewise, a stay-at-home mom might have a hard time talking about how glad she is that she gets to spend so much time with her kids without making a working mom feel guilty for wanting a career. With men, it's even harder, in my humble opinion. Men, in general, are far less sensitive to how they are making other men feel. In fact, I don't find that most working men care a thing about what a stay-at-home dad does all day. It's all they can do not to shake their heads in pity if I dare talk about my amazingly domestic and mundane life (never mind trying to convince them I enjoy what I do). Meanwhile, stay-at-home moms seem to inherently know not to ask another stay-at-home mom what she's been up to. The conversation immediately turns to where their child is developmentally, what they are feeding her, what she said the other day that was hilarious, and listening sympathetically as the other complains about going stir-crazy without other adults around.

It's a strange dance this blending and reallocating of traditional roles. It can seem like a petty predicament when placed in the scope of other social issues, but if we want true equality and true freedom for families to distribute responsibilities as best works for their goals, everyone involved needs a little love and understanding from their communities. Shouldn't the goal be happy, healthy, well-adjusted families? Does making money have anything to do with being masculine? Is feeding, clothing, changing, bathing, reading to, playing with, parenting (etc) a child not something a man can do? Is competing in the workplace and supporting a family financially not something a woman can do? Because it's happening, and many are having great success with it. What we need now is some acceptance from the rest of society. 

Raising the Woman the Girl is to Become

Sloane turned one last week. One year old. One very short, very fast year in which she went from a pink, wrinkly, flailing poop factory with no sense of the world around her to a walking, babbling, little girl who no longer lets mom and dad feed her and can retrieve an item from another room simply by asking her to go find it (I'm still working on "Find dad's beer?" We'll get there. We must). In many ways parenthood--especially stay-at-home fatherhood--has met all my worst fears and greatest expectations. On a good day, Sloane wakes up at 6:30AM, takes three naps, laughs and smiles and plays (sometimes with me, sometimes perfectly happy on her own), entertains herself in the car, plays with other kids on our outings, and makes me feel like the most competent person on the planet. On a bad day, she wakes at 5AM (ready for the day!), skips naps, becomes overly tired, refuses to eat, clings to me demanding attention, wails in the car as we try to drive somewhere to have fun (and then falls asleep before we get there, forcing me to turn around and go home), and makes me question why I possibly thought having a kid was a good idea. Some nights I sleep eight hours straight. Other nights we all wake up every few hours. Some days, after she's in bed at 7PM, I look at our battle-zone of a house--bedazzled by talking toys, brought to you by Fisher Price--and have to decompress for half-an-hour before I can even consider picking up. Other evenings I feel so jazzed from a fun day on the town and a pre-bedtime, slap-happy laughfest rough-housing around the living room that I blow through cleaning and dishes and kick back with a nightcap to appreciate my good fortune.

And this is my life now. I don't pack up a backpack full of life's necessities and lead teenagers on multi-week trips through the mountains. I don't drive cross-country on a whim just to have an adventure. I don't stay up all night studying, or stressing-out about a deadline. I go to parks and the zoo and baby storytimes and swim lessons. I haul a child to the grocery, entertaining her while dodging other shoppers and looking for healthy food in a sea of processed crap. I cook dinner while playing peek-a-boo and placing finger foods on my daughter's highchair only to watch them be immediately flung to the floor. I drink more, exercise less, try to ignore the upcoming, never-ending expenses of supporting an incapable human, and avoid sounding like a total drag to my childless friends who use me as their walking, talking birth-control--a clear image of why they chose a dog over a kid.

I am dad. Hear me grumble.

That said, I am realizing more and more the responsibility that comes with this mundane, rewarding, challenging, joyous job. I'm not managing an account, or writing a set of instructions, or climbing the corporate ladder. The repercussions of my actions don't result in company money lost, or a demotion, or customer dissatisfaction. I'm raising a human being. FDR was a human being. So was Hitler. So is Bill Gates. So was Jeffrey Dahmer. And so are the billions of people existing in between these extremes. The way I talk to my daughter, the way I carry myself day-to-day, the things I teach her, the worldview I paint for her, the values I instill in her, the discipline I push, the experiences I offer will all culminate in an adult who succeeds or flounders, who is harsh or kind, who is ignorant or informed, or is compassionate or cold, who is trustworthy or deceiving, who is greedy or generous. Moment to moment the interactions shaping my daughter seem so commonplace that it's easy to forget they're significant. But they are. And I have to stay mindful of this.

As an adolescent I had the good fortune of going to an all-boys Catholic high school where the faculty had a motto: "Teach to the man the boy is to become." I think about this often now. I see the obsession our culture has with what to feed our kids and how to stimulate them properly at each phase of life, and how much to coddle, how much to back-off, do we cry it out or keep her in our bed for five years? Do we breastfeed for life or start her on a bottle straight out of the womb? Do we dress her like a princess or a rugby player? Spoon feeding or baby-led weaning? Was that piece of fruit organic? And are we screwing her up when she sees a TV?! Will she become a sociopath if we don't give her a sibling?!! Holy shit, I think she just ate refined sugar!!!! Oh, the horror!

It's all a bit much, no?

Don't get me wrong, development is important, as is nutrition, as is education, as is fostering a safe, secure, stimulating environment. Let's face it, in America, the alternative to obsessing over new parenting strategies and human development data and the like is not giving a shit at all. The default child of American culture is an obese, uninformed, superstitious, aggressive, bigoted, entitled scumbag (and boy, are there plenty of them). Many of today's parents (if they're doing anything at all) are just repeating the patterns of their parents who repeated the patterns of their parents and their kids will be the same awful, unhappy people their grandparents were but on an exponentially worse scale in an exponentially less healthy culture (C'est la vie. Ain't that America. Let's move on). I believe there's a middle-ground. What I know for a fact is that I've met women who were dressed in pink as kids who grew up to be hardcore academic powerhouses in ripped jeans and flannels (apparently in 1995) and people raised on hotdog casserole and Mountain Dew who grew up to be triathletes and health nuts. Conversely, I know kids who grew up with a stay-at-home parent, went to private school, received every resource in the world to become a stable, successful person and became a drug addicted spouse abuser who can't hold down a steady job. So, there's no formula to this thing; parenting is a game of odds.

What I have realized and think about daily when considering how to raise my daughter, is that poorly-raised kids work right alongside well-raised kids. Well-raised kids sometimes work for poorly-raised kids; they have to compromise with these people; they have to fight these people ideologically in the political arena; they have to stand up to them in the PTA meetings when they want to implement their grandparents' ideas and patterns into the educational system; they have to confront them on the playground when their kids are stealing the toys of the polite kids who have been taught to share, and in the business world when they're stealing your money, because you were taught to share. In fact, well-raised kids seem to be in the minority in the adult world. I'm baffled by the number of people around me falling to pieces under the pressure of being a grown up. People I thought of as care-free and capable are suddenly tingling with stress and losing their composure. People who preached integrity are giving in to temptations of money and sex and power. Emotionally deep individuals are as shallow as they come. Commitments mean nothing. Friendships are fleeting. Communities are groups of enablers instead of people empowering each other. It's all a guy can do to hold tight to a set of values in this environment. It's even harder to imagine filling a young child with hope for a bright future when the world around her is telling her the opposite.

So, I beseech you parents: What kind of men and women do we want to raise? What kind of values will serve them? And, perhaps most importantly of all, is GMO food rotting our children's bodies?!!

The Stork Of Course

Shameless Plug: If you are enjoying my blog, check out my new novel The Stork Of Course.

Sleep Training: The Storm Before the Calm

After six months of crappy, no good, very bad sleep, my wife and I have begun sleep training Sloane (aka: crying it out; aka: the Ferber graduated extinction method; aka: this shit better work).

Day One

I had been researching cry it out, but begun the process hastily yesterday morning when nap number one at 9AM was going downhill fast. I thought, "Why not? What am I waiting for? It's Wednesday, it should take three days, Allison is working until 8PM all week, coming home after bedtime so she won't have to endure the decidedly greater pain of motherly empathy. I should just do this. We will be getting good rest by the weekend." I had no idea what I was jumping into. As of right now, I have endured about thirty hours and six sleep routines of infant crying that I am positive will leave me with PTSD. Seriously. She's playing on the floor smiling right now and I can still hear the screams in my head. 

Before I get to how this has gone down some context is in order. Sloane is six months and one week old. Bedtime takes 60-90 min every night. She has slept a six hour block maybe twice in her life with a half-dozen five hour blocks, and still infrequent, but more numerous four hour blocks. Three hours at a time at night is the norm, often with hourly pacifier replacements when she realizes, unconsciously, that the soothing sucking rhythm of the binky has stopped. Being new parents, we have done nothing until now to encourage her to behave otherwise. Bedtimes were simple in the beginning. She would sleep anywhere anytime she was tired. She slept on the floor of our living room during March Madness with a room full of Louisville Cardinal fans cheering, cussing, and celebrating their team to a National Championship. However, as she has grown, she has begun, as all animals do, using what she has to work with to get what feels good. In this case, wailing to get held, pacified, entertained, fed, or soothed during times that she should be sleeping. Lest you think me insensitive for implying these are not valid infant needs, we do provide this nurturing during waking hours, but as our pediatrician and all research we've come across suggests, she should be sleeping for at least six hours uninterrupted at this age. She isn't because we respond to every cry with a warm embrace, bouncing, shushing, and other pleasant services no one in their right mind would turn down if offered during a fitful night's rest. 

Naps are no better. Sloane's eyes get heavy and she goes into warrior mode (appropriately so since her name literally means warrior). She can fight it for an hour at least while rubbing her eyes, yawning, and flailing on the floor whining between short periods of play. During the day I've taken to strapping her to my chest in her Ergo carrier until she falls asleep on me and I can transfer her to her crib (many times unsuccessfully). 

So, that's what we've been dealing with and our doc told us Tuesday that it's time to break her of these habits for the sake of family sanity. I agreed whole-heartedly. Mom was not as enthusiastic given the cold-natured process required to get us to a full night's sleep. Fortunately for us, my testosterone-induced, sociopathic lack of human empathy (according to those against crying it out) is determined to bring us through the storm to calmer skies. Which brings us back to day one. 

The first nap of the day took about thirty minutes of wailing with me checking-in every five minutes. This was prior to my understanding of the definition of "Graduated Extinction," meaning I should have checked at five minutes, then seven, then nine, etc. until she put herself to sleep. Fortunately, nap one usually requires the least amount of soothing in general. In all honesty, it often takes thirty minutes anyway (yes, thirty minutes is the least amount of soothing), except I'm usually engaged in the aforementioned bouncing, shushing, pacifying, etc that exhausts me more than her. All in all, nap one wasn't too bad compared with the norm. 

Nap two was a little rougher at forty-five minutes. I altered my process after an online refresher course during nap one on proper technique, so I actually practiced the "graduated" part of the Graduated Extinction method. The crying came in waves working up to hysteria, then back to passively lying on her back with her teddy bear listening to lullaby versions of "Gin and Juice," "Don't Stop Believin'," and the like, before returning to hysteria. At this point I was seriously reconsidering my choice, especially when our overly concerned felines began crying at me as well as if to say, "Why are you being such a dick? Help that kid for crapsake!" But I endured and she slept sans pacifier for over an hour. 

Nap three sucked. Nap three sucked because nap three never happened. One hour and fifteen minutes of crying with "graduated" check-ins while trying to prepare dinner over a hot stove in our un-air conditioned apartment, which was already at eighty-five degrees (baby's room is cooler, save your judgment) brought me to the brink. Baby, who always sleeps at this time of day when she has her pacifier and I carry her around for half-an-hour in the Ergo, was still wide-eyed without these sleeping aides. We started nap three at four-thirty, three hours before her bedtime routine starts at seven-thirty. At five-forty-five, going to sleep would have thrown us all off for getting to sleep at bedtime. So, we returned to the living room floor to play, knowing bedtime would have to start a little early. 

Bedtime

I thought for sure after fighting sleep for over an hour and skipping a nap that Sloane would knock off without issue after a bath and feeding. I would have been surprised if we got as far as me serenading with my guitar, which is part of our normal 60-90 minute bedtime process. And I was right...kind of. I bathed her, changed her into nightwear, gave her a full bottle, and she fell asleep right there on the Boppie with no fussing. I transferred her to her crib without waking her and off she drifted into dreamland...for about thirty minutes. At seven-thirty, as I was getting some dishes done and preparing to crack a beer to decompress from a day of torturing an infant (and myself), when Sloane realized, as she often does, that she was not sucking on a pacifier. 

"Screw it," I said. "I can't go through this again so soon. I'm giving her the binky if it helps her sleep. BUT I will not replace it if she drops it." I compromised with myself and placed the binky in her mouth. It worked briefly until she predictably dropped it and the crying began again. 

At this point I texted Allison, who was getting off work and crying just at the thought of her daughter's struggles. I told her she may want to take a detour on her way home. I had eaten some dinner by now and was feeling revived (though I, perhaps fortunately, never made it to the beer). Inning four. Put me in coach. I'm ready. 

This cycle lasted fifty minutes. I retired to the basement where it was cooler with the video monitor and dessert in hand. I returned to the nursery at five minutes, then seven, then nine, then eleven, then thirteen. She was asleep. Eight-twenty. I told Allison she could return and finally opened that beer. 

Ninety-minutes later she awoke for her next feeding, which was fine and expected. Allison breastfed and she immediately returned to slumber--to my amazement, without her binky. Progress. 

She awoke again at twelve-thirty for another three-hour feeding and again we obliged. This would be the last of the night though, we agreed. After midnight, it's self-soothing til dawn. A six hour block, we agreed. And Allison retired to the basement to sleep on the futon, where she could be somewhat removed from the cries, and perhaps more importantly, removed from me as I dug deep for the strength to endure whatever the next six hours would bring. 

Four hours and fifteen minutes with no binky, no crying, no nothing. Those with restless infants know, this amount of uninterrupted sleep is like getting a deep-tissue message while Iron and Wine personally lull you to a state of nirvana in a holistic spa. However, for those keeping score at home, there was still an hour and forty-five minutes left until our agreed-upon six-hour block was complete. Baby was not in on this agreement, and so, we started again. 

Inning five lasted forty-five minutes. I groggily rubbed Sloane's back and spoke to her gently at graduated increments, letting her know I was nearby and that she could do this on her own. Mom stayed strong in the basement, holding up to her commitment not to let her motherly instincts bring her upstairs and undo my day's doing. I say it lasted forty-five minutes, but after thirty-five, she began to fade, putting the ear of her teddy bear in her mouth for relief. She was adapting. 

I lied awake for an hour after that, trying to soothe myself back to sleep. I never felt so close to my cat, who seemed to know that lying across my back and purring, allowing her repetitive vibrations to radiate through my rib cage, was exactly what I needed at that moment.  

Sloane slept nearly two more hours and Allison got up to feed her at six-forty-five, allowing me to get some much needed shut-eye. But, as mornings go, first nap starts an hour after wake up. At 8AM, day two began. 

And so far, day two has been great. First nap, ten minutes, one check-in, no pacifier. Sloane put herself to sleep and slept for a full hour. Second nap, fifteen minutes, two check-ins. Improvement, but no less stressful. Let's hope this ends soon. Day and a half left, right? Right?! 

The Witching Hour Cometh

Six o'clock and it's all smiles. Baby plays in her gym, blissfully full on mom's life-sustaining milk, grasping at the bugs with cellophane wings, the multi-textured ball, the stuffed elephant just out of reach. A nap is coming. All day she cycles--feed, play, sleep, change, repeat. It's pleasantly predictable, a healthy routine for her and dad both. By six-thirty she is calming, enough so that dad can begin dinner. He cuts the onions, minces the garlic, chops the vegetables. From across the room he can see baby's eyes getting heavy. Her energy is waning. Her once active arms drooping. The excited kicks and squirming stop. Dad can relax. "It's break time boss." He grabs a beer, turns on the news, and begins sauteing the onion and garlic.

Every evening brings hope. Maybe tonight will be it. Maybe the curse of wretched fits and inconsolable wails of infant insolence will cease. She will graduate to a more mature form of miniature mortal. The clock strikes seven and baby's eyes are fluttering, barely open now. Dad sips his beer and lets his focus fall to dinner and Robert Seigel.

Then, turning to add the quartered zucchini to the fragrant pan of sizzling roots it happens. Baby's pacifier hits the floor and with it dad's hopes of dinner time sanity. Baby's head thrashes violently. Her mouth pouts as the lack of sucking motion rouses her from her near-slumber. Dad puts his half-full beverage on the counter and stirs the vegetables hastily, knowing time is short. He wishes he had not been so naive. Why would tonight have been different? How can he make such a rookie mistake night after night? Perhaps it is the regularity of the rest of the day. From sun-up to early evening the cycle seems too concrete to vary. But it does and dinner must stop.

Dad turns off the stove as baby becomes possessed by something from the psychological netherworld--the infant equivalent of psychosis. Her eyes still watery with fatigue, she looks up helplessly at dad wishing as badly as he does that she could maintain control. But the witching hour has cometh. There's no remedy, no amount of feeding, or soothing, or shushing that will cure it. There is no solving the problem or providing for a need, there is only endurance of spirit. Dad wrestles the wriggling bewitched babe to her car seat and the car seat to the stroller. He glances sadly at the half-cooked meal strewn across the counter top and the wounded soldier standing guard. It will be eight before he gets back. Fresh air and vibration in the outdoors are all that take the edge off the frantic flailing. If nothing else the cries for control dissipate in the cool evening air that provides some relief for dad. If only he had grabbed a snack, some sustenance to aide in maintaining his mental acuity and patience. But alas, it has begun. Deep breaths, fast walking, perseverance. It will end, eventually. And tomorrow will bring new hope. The witch will leave her and dad's smiling cooing child will return. They will play and sing and bond, tomorrow. But for now...for now...he waits.

Cultural Conundrums (or Evidence-Based Parenting)

Much to my surprise, babies do come with instructions these days. In fact, there are libraries full of manuals, tips, tricks, charts, product research, double blind longitudinal randomized studies, development aids, myth debunkers, opinion pieces, parenting techniques, activity trackers, and the like. Before we were even discharged from our healthcare co-op birthing center (how very west coast of us, I know) we were given the quick and dirty on what to expect from the coming weeks. For example, babies have been breathing through a cord for quite awhile by the time they are born and though they will occasionally start panting like a dog in the deep South for no apparent reason, it doesn't mean they are having an anxiety attack; they're simply learning to use lungs. New parents have a lot of questions and concerns and unlike my parent's generation who had to call the doctor every other day for answers (or hope it worked itself out), we are now able to type a few words into a handheld device and find the answer (or an answer) immediately. For this I am grateful.

That being said, the information out in the world on pregnancy, human development, and parenting is about three parts total bullshit to one part evidence-based reality. This is most apparent when walking through the aisles of baby brain videos at your local Babies (being marketed to irresponsibly because people are gullible and don't know any better) R Us department store. According to John Medina, a molecular biologist and research consultant at the University of Washington, there isn't a single video or television show on the market that has proven effective at helping babies' brains develop. Not one. In fact, some of the more popular ones (anyone still using Baby Einstein?) have even had negative effects. Why? Because TV turns us into zombies. No kidding. When a baby is placed in front of a television, no matter how educational the show appears to be to us as adults, her brain shuts down. Synapses literally start dying and neuropathways close up shop under the impression that they will no longer be needed. It's passive. She has no way to interact with the information being spewed at her, and even in the cases where the show encourages interaction, it's rarely useful interaction that engages critical thinking, problem solving, or creativity. As cute as call and response with a big purple dinosaur may be it isn't likely to help your child, say, solve the global climate crisis you will be leaving her (or fit a square peg in a square hole for that matter). The best book I've seen on child development so far: Brain Rules for Baby by the aforementioned John Medina. For those who love the nuts and bolts science of what will and won't work for your baby's development, check it out. No woowoo nonsense, no ideological child rearing techniques, no "I've been a mom six times over and let me tell you something" opinions--just the facts ma'am. 

I'll have you know I didn't take a break from cleaning vomit off my everything just to point out that there are a lot of BS things parents do (and buy) while completely ignoring the evidence backing whether it works. Rather, I am writing to ask the question, "So what?" So by the time my kid is twenty she's a brilliant straight A student, who's emotionally stable, physically fit, socially aware, and happier than a hipster at a Buffalo Exchange. How many people fitting this description do we all know currently sitting in a cubicle making spreadsheets for a hard ass frat boy with obsessive compulsive disorder and a sociopathic drive to get rich because his dad never said, "I love you"? How does one raise a happy, healthy, intelligent woman knowing full well that the world doesn't give a fornicating flamingo about being happy, healthy, or intelligent? If we did we would have teachers making six-figure salaries, a health care system that keeps everyone in tiptop condition, and fields of windmills and solar panels all functioning on a smart grid that would put your iPad to shame. But we don't, because these are not our values. So, what's a dad to do when these are his values? Do I raise a daughter who can compete with all the shit-for-brains bullies out there running the world, or do I raise her to be someone who fights tooth and claw to solve the problems being passed on to her (even if what she has to say is contrary to what most want to hear)?

Robert Burns says, "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men, gang aft agley (often go awry)." That is to say, that the fact that I plan to raise my daughter to be the kind of person I wish everyone would be, using suggestions from academics rather than folksy grandmas and grandpas who raised kids forty years ago, really has little bearing on whether it will work out in her favor down the road. And can one really be happy and healthy when unemployable and stigmatized for having values more suited to, say, Norway than the United States?

Thus begins twenty years of compromise--setting aside the evidence so my daughter isn't shunned from birthdays with TV character themes of shows I've not allowed her to watch. Setting aside the evidence so she can eat crap at other people's houses without being called "weird" for being fed healthy food at home. Setting aside evidence so she can have some cultural literacy of what people in her country do and believe instead of raising her to oppose interests that lead to stagnation, obesity, superstition, paranoia, fear, and hate. Compromising, not so the world is a better place, but so she can survive. This is my cultural conundrum. 

Eat, Poop, Love

She's here! Our sweet bundle of joy arrived last week, and lest you think this post too cheery for a first time father of an eleven day old, let me assure you it has taken the full week and a half to find the time and mental acuity to write it.

The transition that has taken place over the last week has been something like losing a limb while blissfully intoxicated. The immediate life adjustment, adaptation, and acceptance is intense, but the warm flood of Oxytocin that overcomes you when looking at your child certainly takes the edge off. Why no one has synthesized this hormone and sold it on the street is beyond me. It's like meth but instead of losing your teeth and stealing from your friends, you tear up with joy while an underdeveloped, wriggling, emotionally unstable family member vomits down your back and yells at you while pooping her pants.

Yes, the proverbial shit has hit the fan, and as I learned two days ago, if a fan is near enough to a baby's changing table, the literal shit may possibly hit the fan as well. I should be clear, I'm madly in love with this eight pound product of our spring vacation to Maui. She's gorgeous. Perfect, in fact, and my wife and I both feel incredibly lucky to have had such a smooth pregnancy and delivery. However, I want to give a little more specific advice to soon-to-be parents then, "Get your sleep now!" (though, seriously, you should. You're about to lose your mind from sleep deprivation).

As I mentioned in my previous post, you can save yourself a lot of time and effort and toss your pregnancy books in the trash right now. This is all you need to know: Partners, you're job is to stay cool and be supportive. Period. That's it. You start reacting to this process like your partner is in her right mind and you've failed already. Stay cool, be supportive. Period.

Ladies, from what I've gathered, the best you can do is eat as healthily as your pregnant body will allow, exercise until the day your baby comes peeping out of your lady-bits, and resist the urge to romanticize the delivery process. I know I'm a man and probably shouldn't be telling women how to view the birth of their child, but I was there; I saw some stuff go down. It's not the mystical, miraculous day at the spa that some women like to portend it to be. It's more like going through a twenty hour bout with food poisoning while possessed by something of Exorcist proportions and tripping on a drug some guy (hopefully your partner) slipped in your drink nine months earlier that's just taken effect. But, biology willing, you'll live to tell the tale and have a new child that--I kid you not--will make the challenge of labor slip away instantly. I've never seen my wife so peaceful and content (did I mention someone should sell this stuff?)

So, moms and partners, don't spend nine months reading about where the fetus is in her development, or the delivery process, or worrying about every horrible thing that can go wrong, or every wives tale remedy you can engage in to make your baby a superior natural specimen. You have no control over these things. The doc will tell you if something is wrong. Eat well, exercise, avoid stress, hope for the best. Boom. Dozens of pregnancy books summarized in a four point plan. My advice? Read about the twenty years after delivery--the part you can control and may not have time to read about.

Other observations from eleven days of fatherhood:

1. Babies leak from every orifice all of the time.
2. They move their mouth and headbutt you like a rugby player when they're hungry. 
3. They scrunch their legs to their chest and turn bright red when they're pooping (followed by a dazed look of satisfaction, followed by crying if dad doesn't hop to it). 
4. They squirm around and squeak like a dog toy when they need to be burped. 
5. They look through you instead of at you. 
6. They like shushing sounds, lots of motion, and Yo-Yo Ma. 
7. They WILL vomit on everything you own.
8. They will occasionally wait until you get their diaper off to complete their bowel movement or urination. 
9. Sometimes they will roll around in said urine until they have successfully coated their back up to their neck. 
10. You will bathe your urine-covered thrashing ball of fleshy extremities, and you will smile while doing it.
11. Sleeping for two hours straight feels amazing after sleeping for forty-five minutes at a time for a week.
12. You will buy Crocks for back support and you will not feel like a total dork wearing them. 
13. You will do laundry every day despite not leaving the house for a week. 
14. Your wife's boobs are now "breasts." They belong to your child. 
15. Marathon runners and triathletes have nothing on women who've given birth. 
16. Evolution has equipped us with some badassery beyond belief.
17. Friends who bring food after you have your child are awesome. 
18. It will take three days to write a 500 word blog post.