What I Learned in 39 Weeks

One week to go. Fatherhood, here I come!

I wasn't going to do this. I told myself, "No, don't become another dad writing about his plight as a new parent and droning on about how little sleep you get and how disgusting it is to wipe feces off a wailing infant." But after spending the last nine months reading dozens of books, websites, blogs, and advice columns, I feel I should share a few things about what I've learned during pregnancy while I can still afford to be idealistic and snarky.

Lesson 1: Men Suck

It's true gentlemen, we're awful. We're detached, sex-crazed, sports-watching, junk food eating, insensitive, unhelpful, immature neanderthals. Every new mom on the planet should do herself a favor right now and accept that she's on her own in child-rearing for the next several decades. Or so every book on pregnancy and early childhood care would have you believe. To be fair, there are a lot of men out there who fit this description. I know there are. I've met plenty of them. In a country where half of all pregnancies are unplanned it's not hard to imagine the great number of men who unexpectedly found themselves floundering to figure out how to be a parent. There are, of course, methods that are 99.9% effective for preventing unwanted pregnancies, but hey, science shmience, right guys? No fancy pants doctor's going to tell us how to live our lives. Save yourselves a lot of reading soon-to-be dads, all you need to understand (at least based on a lot of parenting book authors) is that you're a horribly incompetent person and that becoming a parent for you will be a process of occasionally not playing video games like a fifteen year old and doing things your wife thinks are important for your child. Bummer, huh?

Lesson 2: Women are Winos, Children are Animals, and Parenting Blows 

All useful lessons I learned from reading about pregnancy and parenting. Also, (in case you were unaware) all new parents live in large comfortable houses and will need at least one item from every shelf at Babies-R-Us. As the man you are henceforth in charge of making and managing all the money and protecting your powerless wife and child from the big bad boogie men lurking in every shadow of our oh-so-dangerous American suburbs. Godspeed.

Additionally, it is assumed that you have not bothered to get to know your partner in any capacity prior to getting her pregnant. You should do this now before the baby comes. A thoughtful gesture might be to take a break from the eight hours of football you watch on Sundays and talk to your partner about how she's feeling. You might discuss necessary preparations that should occur before the baby comes and ask her if there's any household chores you can take on so that she can rest and bond with her growing fetus. Consider not drinking every night and passing out on the couch watching Baywatch reruns in your underwear. This will remind your partner that she can count on you to be a good role model for your future child.

Be aware dad that your life is going to change. Did you know that? Parenting is hard and you have to do yucky things like clean up poopoo and peepee when you'd rather be out hangin' with your buds. Your wife will very likely be missing her life of drinking entire boxes of wine with her friends while gossiping about the latest celebrity news, so you should offer to watch your child occasionally and give her the evening off. As your child ages you will notice that he is not always obedient and appreciative of your efforts. You should try to refrain from hitting him and yelling at him as he'll have no idea why you're acting like a hostile crazy person.  He will likely just become afraid of you and cry, the way most people do when you hit them and yell at them because you don't like their behavior. Remember he has a very tiny brain and a total lack of impulse control, unlike you who have had several decades to develop into a rational adult with communication skills. Also, he does not come pre-programmed to know how to behave in the world around him. It can be very frustrating! Grr. You'll likely have to turn off the TV and teach him things. Bleh. So hard!

Lesson 3:  Everything's Expensive, Intimacy is a Pipe Dream, and It's All Worth It

If I've learned nothing else in nine months, it's that all parents--every single one--hate their lives. They have no money, no marriage satisfaction, no time for themselves, they never wear clean clothes, and more or less cease to exist as civilized humans. I will apparently achieve none of my life goals, gain weight, and abandon my values at the first sign of trouble. During every free moment I'll drink like a fish and cuss like a sailor and all my friends without kids will think me insane and disown me (at least until they have kids of their own). It's the worst thing ever, and I'll grow bitter and conservative and treat my kids as though it is their fault I chose to take on the responsibility of having children...but it's all worth it! Or so they say.

So what does a soon-to-be parent take away from all this cynicism, besides the fact that there are a lot of stereotypical people out there making it impossible for the rest of us to get intelligent input about healthy parenting? It's a tough sell, this having kids thing, and so far there aren't many people trying to spin it for me. In fact, advice both personal and professional has sounded more like war veterans preparing me for battle than loving parents preparing me for "the best thing they've ever done with their lives." What I'm telling myself is that I do a lot of things other people don't do and maybe it won't be so bad. I've run marathons and triathlons. Those were hard. I've written a couple novels. That was pretty time consuming and frustrating at times. But no matter how I try, I have nothing to compare this to. It's the first thing I've done in more than a decade that I have no analogous life experience to draw upon. I just don't know. And I have to be okay with that. On the one hand, as Chris Rock says, "Anybody can have a kid. Even cockroaches reproduce." On the other hand my every action or inaction for the rest of my life will influence this little person's worldview. Whether she ends up President or dancing on a pole largely depends on whether I show up as a dad for the next twenty years. I'm told it will be the most challenging, expensive, unappreciated thing I do with my life.

And I did this on purpose.