For fathers: remember when you first became a daddy?

[Shooternewt]

Two kids, the first regular delivery, second was c-section. Both types of delivery are interesting in their own ways.

The good c-section story: I was in the operating room behind the curtain talking to my wife (curtain on midsection so wife cannot see herself being cut open). Her doctor, the one cutting her open, is talking to her assistant about where she is going that evening. She is going to her 3 year old daughter's friend's birthday party at Chucky Cheese.

This started a 3 way debate between me, the doctor and her assistant about which is better, Mr. Cheese or Peter Piper Pizza. We all agreed on PPP because they serve beer. My wife's reaction to this coversation was one of complete beliderment.

The conversation ended when daughter #2 appeared and I got a great sight of things that should not be decribed. Good times.

[FishNChips]

Awesome thread! Thanks DB for starting it...

have 2nd due in Late July / Early August.

First was a scheduled C-section. Little girl was in the breach position and never turned over. Sonogram pics show her using the placenta as a pillow. Apparently she just got comfy and didn't want to move.

It was a bit surreal to have a scheduled delivery. We got up, went to the hospital and 4 hours later we had a baby.

The delivery was smooth. Things I vividly remember :
Took my wife into surgery and I waited in a hallway just outside the OR while they prepped her. I was all alone and I remember just praying - for my wife, for my daughter, for wisdom as a dad.

Anaesthesiologist had a crossword at his station and I heard him working on it.

Delivery room nurse saying "she's going to be tall, look how long her fingers/toes are" and me thinking "come on, you can't tell that." (she's 95th percentile height for her age - I guess you can tell that)

My bonding was the next day : my wife did a lot of sleeping to recover from the surgery. So I held my daughter, changed her diapers, sang to her (poor thing). I vividly recall sitting with her tucked up in my arms, watching the first Sunday's games of the 2004 NFL season.

excited to meet #2!

~FishNChips

[RayPowers]

My ability to remember details long term is virtually non existent, so to try to describe the day my son was born is impossible. I bonded with my son fairly quickly, but I was not ready to be a father, even at 32. I had very little patience at it, and my son was very colicly (sp?), and I spent many a night up at 3am walking around a screaming baby trying to comfort him, wondering what the hell I was doing in this position. My wife worked a normal 9-5, but I owned my own retail store, so could modify my hours as needed, which meant I was the one who ended up taking the baby late at night because I could sleep later. I definitely loved my baby, but I'm pretty sure I hated him at the same time when I was on another four day sprint of virtually no sleep while he puked everywhere again (he had really bad acid reflux early on).

When he hit about two, and I could really interact with him, the bonding became rediculously intense, and I can't imagine life without him now that he is four and we can actually converse beyond two word sentences and do things together. I just started teaching him how to dribble a soccer ball and basketball, and he already has tried tee ball, and is in swimming class. I think he's going to be a big sports kid. I wasn't but, he's his own (very little) man, and can go whichever way in life he wants. He's kind of whiny though, and I haven't figured out if that's just the age, or if there's a way to help him learn to approach things better that he doesn't like.

Contrastly, my daughter and I are still having problems. She turns three next weekend, and I still don't feel like I have bonded well with her. We talk, I love her a lot, but she is very frustrating because she is a very defiant little girl (my son was nowhere near as bad), and since I am the disciplinary force in the household, she has a huge perference for her mommy over me, because I am perceived as the bad guy.

We (my wife and I) have moved pretty far in trying to fix that impression, but it's still there, and we have good and bad days. Its not a joyous thought to think that I love one more than the other, but emotionally, its much easier to deal with my son than my daughter. But they're both very young, and I am more than willing to put in the work long term to make our entire family as close at it can be. My wife thinks I need more one on one time with her, but I think I don't have a lot of one on one time with my son, so I don't want to suddenly start spending time only with her. I think I just need to quality time with both of them, and make her see that I love her just as much as her brother, and I find them both to be wonderful and special (little) people.

Wow, uh, yeah, guess I felt like sharing today or something.

Ray

[SuitedSixes]

My wife must have been about 3 months pregnant when she started running a high fever so we went to the hospital and they ran some tests and decided they needed to run an ultrasound to check on the baby. For some reason the person who administers the thing couldn't say anything about what she did or didn't find.

I just remember waiting in the room for the doctor to come in and being amazed how I could love and care for someone so much that was not even born yet. Everything was fine and I have never felt such relief.

September 11, 2001:
We were in the waiting room for our first real ultrasound appointment watching CNN. Both of the towers were still standing, but you could see people jumping out of the smoking buildings.

They called us back and we saw the grainy display of the heart beat and found out that she was going to be a girl. While others look back on what was, collectively, the worst day in the history of our country I remember the undescribable joy that I felt when I saw her beating heart. She has continued to have the ability to make bad days better for me ever since.

February 24, 2002:
My wife wasn't due for another two weeks, but she was getting (more) pissed (than usual) and wanted to get out of the house. The PGA golf tournament was in town so we walked the front nine there, went to Chili's for molten chocolate cake, and went home to watch the end of closing cermonies of the Olympics.

February 25, 2002:
I was supposed to go to work at 5:00 AM, but my wife woke me up at 3:30 thinking she was having contractions. I timed them for awhile and she decided she needed to go to the hospital. On the way over, she realized she hadn't bought any of the things that she was supposed to (robe, slippers, etc.) so we stopped at Wal-Mart. We get all the things we are supposed to and go to check out. Some guy is buying golf clubs at 4:30 in the morning and they can't find the price so we wait behind him for about ten minutes.

We get to the hospital and they check my wife out. They decide that nothing is going to happen for 24-48 hours and send us home. My wife swears that it is happening now, but they tell use to go home. We get home by about 7:00. We go back to sleep, but my wife has me timing the contractions so I am literally, sleeping in 10 minute intervals. It gets down to 5-8 minutes so we head back to the hospital.

It is indeed happening. I sleep on and off through the rest of the morning. I call her friends because she was supposed to have a baby shower that night. The guy who gives the epederal is my new best friend.

About 2:00 in the afternoon the head starts to come out so they rush to find the doctor. He makes it in in time. He asked me if I wanted to cut the cord, and I told him that was what I paid him for. He made me do it anyway.

When she was out they handed her to me and I remember saying, "Hello Kianna, I'm your daddy. It's nice to meet you."

I remember being torn between paying attention to my wife who kept telling me to go check on the baby. I took a bunch of digital pictures to post on the internet for family and friends, including a nice one of my wife's junk that I didn't realize was my wife's junk until it had been up for a few hours.

My wife specifically said that she didn't want anyone else there and no video cameras, so of course, my aunt and uncle show up univited with a video camera.

I just remember being wiped out by the whole thing and just wanting to sleep. I didn't buy flowers for my wife, which I have since learned is important. And I was scared to death of the little kid. I was just sure I was going to break her somehow.

THE END

[WDC]

I can remeber mine. WE had just closed on a house with the baby 3 weeks away. My wife goes to her doctor's appointment when it is decided that because of her high blood pressure and gestational diabetes that they are going to induce the baby early. Since I am unavailable, they decide to ambulance her to the hospital. When I get home there is a message that she is in the hospital and will be induuced in the morning. I give her a call and we decide that before I come see her that I must go buy a criba and other baby furniture and set up the nursury sop that is what I do (taking time out to watch the eighth inning of Ken Burn's baseball documentary because I have yet to miss an episode). Worked all night and got the nursurty set up.


After a short nap, I go to the hospital. They are just about ready to give my wife the inducing med and break her water. We go throgh the labor stuff and because of the hifgh blood pressure they will not let her do all this avant gaurde birthing technique business that she learned. They made her stay on her back and wait.

Later that afternoon her entire family arrived and they all wanted to be in the room for the delivery. Finally we decided that her sister could come in but, at my wife's insistence, I kept the others out.

Anyway, we progress into early ebvening and the ninth inning of Ken Burns baseball documentary is just about to come on when the baby decides he would like to watch. Long story short I missed the last show and I have never seen it yet. But on with the story, the little tyke comes out and they throw his tiny arse in an incubator and take him almost immediately to baby intensive care. They say as a precaution and I can go see him in 15 minutes.

I hang out with my wife for a little while when my mother-in-law barges in and starts yelling at everyone aboiut something. I get into my second real fiight with her when I tell her to leave ( the first was when I told her I would not cross a picket line so she could have the wedding reception at some cheaper hotel).

After about 10 minutes I go up to baby intensive care to see my son but he is not there. The lady at the desk doesn't know anything about him being sent up and I strat freaking out some. I go back down to my wife and there she is holding the baby. Apparently they decided he was healthy and didn't need observation on the way up to intensive care and brought him right back down. Ok, alls well.

The first time I remeber bonding with my son was later that night. I heard a baby crying in the hallway and knew instantly that it was him. They were bringing him down for a feeding. I stepped into the hallway and walked up to the nurse and took him from her. He stopped crying right away. Of course i started to cry because I figured one of us should be.

[FishNChips]

[ QUOTE ]
my son was very colicly (sp?), and I spent many a night up at 3am walking around a screaming baby trying to comfort him, wondering what the hell I was doing in this position...I definitely loved my baby, but I'm pretty sure I hated him at the same time when I was on another four day sprint of virtually no sleep

[/ QUOTE ]

colic - the dirty little secret of some newborn babies. Our little girl was colicky (sp) as well and there were nights that I was wondering what the return policy on her was. 2 things amaze me about this time in our lives : 1 - that we survived; 2 - how little of it I actually remember. I know that the first 6 months were incredibly hard and that she cried a lot and didn't sleep much during the day (she still doesn't), but only a few specific memories remain and they are actually endearing (me soothing her by dancing with her while Nora Jones played on the stereo (over and over and over again)).

~FishNChips

[RayPowers]

I remember that I would walk circles around the dining room/kitchen area in the dark, with my eyes closed (because I had memorized the space better than a blind person ever could), at 3 am, bouncing slightly with him over my shoulder, patting his back, counting steps down from 1000. I am reasonably certain that I would be asleep more often than not as I did this...

Ray

[FishNChips]

cradled my daughter along my arm (like carrying a football) and rocked her gently as I walked. The worst part was that even if I got her to sleep I couldn't put her down because she would wake up and we'd have to start again. I couldn't even sit down with her many nights...

Amazing what we'll do for those little buggers!

[MikeNaked]

My wife's first words as her daughter slides out and she sees her bluish, slimy, squirming, crying body for the first time:

"Oh my god, it's so weird! It's so weird!"

Hehehe, she's never gonna live that down.

[PokerBob]

i am not a father, but i am daddy.