I post a lot of pictures on Facebook of my kid…A LOT. The funny part is I always try to catch him doing something interesting. Whether that is smiling, frowning or just being silly, the pictures are of a split second in time when he is exposing some emotion he is feeling at the time.
Video: Daniel Learning His Motor Skills
January 28, 2012 By 2 Comments
Over the past couple of days, we have been working on helping D grab toys and work on basic motor skills. He started grabbing for stuff on his own…so we just started encouraging it by sitting him in his Bumbo with some hard toys around him. So far, he is doing really well with it. It is amazing to watch him really think about what he wants…then go after it.
We are starting to get into that fun stage where he becomes less and less of an infant and more of a baby. Things like tummy time, interaction with my wife and I and activities like this are starting to be a lot more fun for him and us. I am really stoked about the next couple of months. From what I have heard, 6 to 9 months is something really special.
Video: Daniel Telling Us About His Day and General Observations
January 27, 2012 By 2 Comments
Lately, Daniel has started to become really responsive to us talking to him. With his motor skills getting better and his ability to try to communicate really taking off…it is hilarious to have conversations with the little guy even if we have zero clue what he is saying.
Obviously, at 16 weeks we are a long ways off from him actually saying a word, but this interaction seems to go a long way in encouraging him to make sounds and move around. Plus, he seems to love it and we get to see him smile a lot.
Video: Shit New Dads Say
January 24, 2012 By 8 Comments
So lately, the cycling community has seen a couple of viral YouTube videos go around that are “Shit xxx Says” which is a playoff of old Shit My Dad says lines. I got the idea to poke a little fun at myself and other new dads out there by making this clip sequencing “Shit New Dads Say”. I probably missed some classics but I am sure anyone who has ever gone through the new dad experience can relate.
Being A Father Rocks…
January 23, 2012 By 1 Comment
I know…catchy title right? Like anyone that is a dad didn’t already know that one before. You’ll have to excuse me. I am still new to the game.
I spent this rainy weekend in Atlanta hanging out with my family. We didn’t do anything really special. Mainly we just hung out at the house and went on a few adventures (gun range on Saturday and out shopping with my parents on Sunday), but for some reason it is different now.
My wife has been transitioning back to work, so time at home is her time to snuggle up on the couch with Daniel and play with him when he is awake. It is growing up quickly so she is trying to remember this time as best she can with being away from him so much during the week.
The Big Day: We Meet Daniel For The First Time
October 21, 2011 By 5 Comments
Wow…Monday got here quickly. The weekend just seem to fly by and now we were in crunch time to get everything ready to leave that evening to start the inducing process.
- The bags were packed.
- The dogs were taken care of.
- We knew what time we had to be there.
I was trying my best to get some things sewed up with work as I was taking a week off starting the next day. Jenn and I also decided to go ahead and take a look at the Kids R Kids down the street from our house as that is going to be the daycare he ends up going to in January. It was a busy day…but that was a good thing as sitting around staring at each other waiting to leave would have dragged on for what seemed forever.
After everything was done and we had some dinner, we waited for clearance to head to the hospital. Around 8:30pm, we got the go ahead to get our room at 9:00pm. We packed up the remaining items in the car, put the dogs up and headed out. As we were leaving the entrance to our neighborhood with the empty car seat in the back, I looked at my wife and said, “You realize that will not be empty the next time you get in this car.” A tear came to her eye with a smile…and we were off to complete our family.
The Inducing Process
In all reality, the inducing process really kind of sucks. I wish there was a happier way to say it, but you end up hanging out in the hospital a lot and my wife was put through a laundry list of things just to force her body to do something it wasn’t really ready for yet.
We got our room at Northside in Dunwoody (the baby factory, they deliver more babies in a year than any other hospital in the country) and tried to settle in. First up on the list was a medicine for Jenn that gets her body ready to have a baby and have contractions. This medicine was going to settle in over night so she could then get the Pitocin which would actually start the contractions. Side effect of the overnight med…contractions and cramps. This started the fun 18 hour process for my wife. Not only was she really nervous about the upcoming day (understandably so), but now we are using meds to start the process.
Jenn got as much sleep as she could over the course of the night while hooked up to all of the monitors and with the cramps going. At 6:00am, the nurses came in prepping everything to start the Pitocin at 7am. By 7:30am, contractions were in full swing already. Here we go…no turning back now!
Apparently…unknown to us before this time…the contractions from inducing are actually more painful than those that you get naturally. There is some technical reason behind this that they tried to explain to us that involves how the chemicals hit your brain and what chemicals are actually formed during the process. The short story, it was going to hurt but that didn’t really matter too much as we had already decided that Jenn was going to get an epidural. The pain should have been minimal thanks to the aid of the drugs…or so we thought.
What started then was the longest day of both of our lives. My lucky wife does not react well with epidurals and by that I mean they don’t work. Throughout the entire day, she was in nothing but pain as numerous doctors and anesthesiologists came in to try to figure out what the hell was going on. The only relief she could get was about an hour at a time with a kicker they would put into her IV stream that was another pain med. Other than that…the epidural wasn’t doing anything. Half way through the day, they even tried to redo it (that wasn’t pleasant) and that didn’t even help. She was going to have to try to work with the periods of relief until Daniel finally came.
Get Ready To Push…
About 11:30pm that evening, our midwife came in and told us Jenn was ready to push! Finally! After this long process we are ready to have Daniel! I say we…but I am really just there for Jenn to break my hand at this point.
We started the pushing process. Jenn was doing great and getting the hang of it quickly, but then things started to go wrong. The midwife asked the nurse to take Jenn’s temperature and it had peaked up to over 102 degrees. To make matters worse, Daniel’s heart rate was now floating around the 185 bpm range. The mid wife called the doctor immediately. It was time for an emergency c-section before things got much worse…and quickly. The midwife looked at Jenn and said, “This breaks my heart that we have come this far, but we have to get him out now.”
We have to get him out now…
The entire process of getting ready for the c-section and getting her in the surgery room was incredibly fast. Once they made the decision to go forward with it for the health her and Daniel, she was under the knife in under 15 minutes (12:15am). They allowed me to come and sit by her head as they started the process. At 12:32am, Daniel Merrill Sutton made his first entrance into the world. I looked over the curtain and saw my son for the first time. About 30 seconds later, he cried and my wife got to hear him.
Everyone always seems to talk about this emotion moment where everyone shares a good cry once the time comes that your baby is born. We didn’t have that but that is ok. Once they had Daniel out, all eyes were back on Jenn as they tried to get her closed up…but that wasn’t going to be easy. One of the symptoms of Preeclamsia is that your platelet numbers come down. This means your blood doesn’t clot. The doctors and our midwife were now struggling to get my wife to stop bleeding so they could finish the process. I also now had to leave her and go with Daniel as they finished the process of cleaning him to get him ready to go to the room. I brought Daniel to Jenn so she could hold him for a second before we took off.
The next hour and a half was a long one. I was trying to enjoy the process of cleaning Daniel up and getting his vitals, but all I could really think about was Jenn still laying on the table. Luckily, D was a really healthy 7 pounds 1 oz at 20.5 inches long (great job buddy for being 3 weeks early!), so now all attention was on getting the glue that holds my family together sewed back up. Finally, after what seemed like forever, they rolled Jenn down to post op and I had everyone happy, healthy and tired in the same room.
The most stressful day of my life was now over. Our son was born, my wife was taken care of. All of the crap of the past no longer mattered. The constant trips to the infertility doctor, the miscarriage from earlier this year, the entire birth process…none of that mattered as I enjoyed taking pictures of my new son with my smiling wife laying in the bed next to him. At that moment, everything was calm and we had our miracle baby.
Everyone Has A Different Road To Take
When we finally got up to our room (around 4am), I got a free 5 minutes to sit down and think as the nurses had Daniel and my wife passed out.
Everyone’s road to this moment is different. Some people seem to get pregnant just by looking at each other and others go through a really hard time to this point. During the labor process, some are able to just pop them out while others have more difficulty.
The reality…
None of that matters. It is no longer about the hardships you went through to get to this point. You are now a parent holding what you have worked so hard for. In one split moment, you are now ready to lay everything on the line for someone that you have only known for a brief moment. As a person who has never really believed in “love at first sight”…I can tell you that is exactly what happens.
Your thoughts shift from the past to the future as I started to think about roads we will take from this point forward…not the roads that got us here. Everything changes and the future is looked at completely differently than in the past.
The only reason I really share the events leading up to this, the birth and the pregnancy process that we went through is to share our story. There are those that will have it easier and those that will have it harder. That is just the way life goes. This is the road that lead us to this day and it is the road we had to take. When I held my son for the first time, none of that was on my mind. All I could think about was the adventures we would be taking as both of ours lives continued to move forward.
Daniel was here…my wife was starting her recovery…and we were a family. It was the best day of my life to this point even given the stresses. My first real picture taken of Daniel after the birth is above that I posted to Facebook with my iPhone. The second…oh the irony! The life as “The Clueless Dad” begins…
Daniel Merrill – 7 lbs 1 oz – 20.5 inches – born at 37 weeks on 10/5/11 @ 12:32am
Nesting: From The Mind Of A To Be Dad
June 30, 2011 By 1 Comment
Nesting is not a new concept by any means. There is something that turns on inside of a woman once the pregnancy really sets in. It takes her over like a whirlwind and all of the sudden…everything in the house has to change! There is a baby on the way…we have to be ready!
I believe it is nature’s way of making sure there is a bed for the newborn. Without it…we would probably just lay him on the counter.
Nesting From The To Be Dad’s Perspective
While nesting within women is well documented, what is talked about far less is what happens in the mind of the dad as he gets ready to be responsible for another human being. As men, we are wired to provide. The hunt and gather instinct is still alive and kicking even if we are not grabbing the nearest sharp stick ready to stab a big buffalo.
At least for me…the instinct to provide and the need to make sure the heavy lifting is done before the baby was born kicked in as soon as my wife “popped” (sorry babe…I know you hate that term!). Once she was really showing, the pregnancy suddenly became real and my list of things to do increased dramatically.
Financial Nesting
In a first natural reaction, I started thinking about how the hell we are going to afford to care for another human for the next 18 years?! This isn’t one of our two dogs that just needs 2 cups of food twice a day. This baby is going to need diapers, clothes, schooling, college, a car, his own room…and the list goes on and on. We are used to providing for ourselves, but now we are taking on a very expensive addition!
Luckily, other than the diapers and immediate needs, we will take on each event as it comes and try to plan for the future (ie: an early start on the college fund that will probably cost 500 grand by the time he is 18 with the way tuition is heading). But…the thoughts that are running through my head as my wife gets ready for being a mom is what my plan is for income production over the next 18 to 22 years. Are my career goals in place? Do I have a plan if something happens?
As the man, a lot of that responsibility weighs on my shoulders as the mom needs to be able to focus on being a mom for the first years of our son’s life. Is she going to work through the process? Absolutely…she would go crazy if she didn’t, but the reality is that I need to have my plan in place regardless of that.
Structural Nesting
After the shock subsides, I started looking around the house thinking about what needed to happen before the baby was born. We had a room…but it was not ready. So I used the colors my wife picked out and painted/fixed the room so it was ready for furniture. My wife ordered the baby’s furniture and it got delivered. That day…I assembled it (with the help of the dogs of course) and made it ready for decoration.
The way I see it…I am putting the structure in place…my wife will make it home. Heavy lifting…check. Decorations…I wouldn’t know where to start…
Ironically, I also started thinking about what needed to be done to the house that required a lot of construction. The last thing I was going to want is a lot of loud noises during the first 6 months of my son’s life, so if we were going to do anything, it needed to be now.
For awhile now, we had planned and saved to redo the kitchen my wife has hated since we moved in and the backyard. Last month, we found a great father/son company to redo the backyard and next month we are biting the bullet on the kitchen. Whoever thought white on white was a good idea for kitchens should be shot.
Some of these things are coming a little bit earlier than we had planned, but they were going to be next to impossible with a baby in the house…so now was the time to do it.
Life Restructuring Nesting
Like it or not…life is about to change drastically. It will be a great thing and we are extremely excited about it, but there needs to be plans in place in an effort to maintain sanity through the process for both myself and my wife. We are both planners (slightly obsessive about it), so we started talking about our needs and how those needed to be incorporated into life with the baby.
I firmly believe that a baby should not be your life. It is just my opinion and others might disagree, but there is life outside of the house…and without it we will go insane. The beginning weeks of a child’s life are extremely intensive from what we have we and experienced with friends and family. Without experiencing it first hand, I am not going to even pretend to know what it is like, but there is one thing I do know…I do not want that intensity and 24/7 need to parent to take away from who my wife is as a person. I married a wonderful woman and I do not want that to change.
Lately, my wife and I have been talking about what we are going to do when the baby is born. While I completely realize that plans change and adapt once you are in a given situation, we are planning on having small blocks of alone time or time with friends for each other during the beginning stages of parenthood. Even if it is just 30 minutes for lunch with a friend or an hour for me to ride out of the driveway on the bike, we need to be able to decompress to insure our own mental health.
This will be a change from being able to do what we want when we want…but I feel it is necessary throughout the process. I do not want us to feel like we are prisoners in our own house. That will not be good for either of us. So we have a plan! Now we’ll see how that plan plays out come October.
See…We Do Nest In Some Form
If you would have told me I would be having these thoughts today a year ago…I probably would have laughed. If you told me dad’s nested…I probably would have laughed even harder.
But the reality is that we have as much of a role as the mother in this…and it is a partnership. So we have to do our part in making sure the house and our minds are ready for this new addition that is on its way and ready to change everything that we consider reality at this point in time.
It is exciting and stressful at the same time, but we are looking forward to it.
My First Father’s Day… Well Kind of…
June 20, 2011 By 4 Comments
Yesterday was a pretty cool day. While our little boy hasn’t made his first appearance into this world yet, my wife did try to make it a special day together as we eagerly wait his arrival later this year.
When we woke up, she surprised me with a card and a pair of baby clothes around the daddy theme.
Needless to say…they put a smile on my face to start the day. I don’t know if all guys are this way…but during the pregnancy process…it is sometimes hard to wrap your head around what is really happening. Your pregnant significant other is going through a lot of physical changes that bring her close to the process. As she starts to feel the baby move and grow, she can feel the human aspect to pregnancy when the guy is kind of in the dark until you can feel the kicking external to the stomach.
We do things like painting rooms and preparing the house, but it is little reminders like these clothes that bring the “daddy feel” to the process as we get ready to welcome the new addition to the family.
After our morning together, we went to church and out to brunch with my parents to celebrate Father’s Day with my dad. Following a great breakfast, we took my new “family station wagon” up to the north Georgia mountains to get a little bit of driving in.
As if motion sickness isn’t a great excuse to go eat, we ended up in Dahlonega, GA for some food on a balcony as we watched the cars drive by. Later that night, we curled up with the dogs and ended the day with some relaxing couch time.
Yesterday wasn’t my first true Father’s Day as my son is still nestled comfortably and growing, but it does mark the first Father’s Day when it wasn’t just about my dad in my lifetime. I spent a wonderful day with my wife and got to think about how every Father’s Day from this point forward was going to be different. Not only would I be celebrating with my dad, but I will be celebrating with the family my wife and I are starting as a father.
Everything is going to be different from this point forward as my wife and I enjoy a lot of “lasts” without a child. It is going to be a wild adventure and we are going to enjoy the hell out of it. I am looking forward to the Father’s Days to come as we start this much different road in our lives. I am also very grateful to have a wife and best friend that knows how to make days like these feel special.
Happy Father’s Day to all of the dads, grandfathers and to be fathers out there.
The Massive Influx Of The “I Wants”
April 13, 2011 By 10 Comments
The weeks leading up to the end of the first trimester are pretty much a roller coaster emotionally for you and your other half. It means a lot for the safety of the baby and your percentage chance of going the distance to get past that pivotal date. All focus is on getting past that point…and getting to tell everyone about it.
So what happens to the brain of a guy once that is complete?
For me…without even really realizing it…my brain went into major “I want” mode. I’m not kidding either. It is as our subconscious suddenly realizes that several months from now is the end of our gadget/fun car/get anything we want stage.
It’s not that it completely goes away…as I know plenty of dads that get to fill their hobbies and gear needs still, but you get hit with a brick wall that it is no longer a priority. The baby and the mom now take center stage and you have a few short months to get in anything you can while still be able to provide for the new member about to join your family.
Ironically, it wasn’t until I sat back and really thought about why I was having these feelings that I realized what was really going on. I can’t speak for all of the other expectant fathers of their first kid out there…but it was and still is really weird for me.
So what do I want to try to get in before the baby is born?!
A wicked white Mitsubishi Evolution X…and why do I want it?
- I want to be the fastest dad in the carpool line.
- I am on my second truck in a row so I really want something fun that is easier to park.
- It has four doors and a nice backseat (along with about a million airbags)…so it is baby approved.
- And most importantly…my subconscious is telling me I will never be able to have anything like this ever again!
Now I just have to convince the wife that a lower car payment and more power is a good thing. How do you think I will do? “Hey babe look! I can even get a Recaro car seat to match the seats in the car!”
The Reality…
What I am going through is probably pretty normal. I am pretty sure that when it comes to this kind of stuff I am not the first nor will I be the last. Do I have to have a fast car right now? No…but I want one.
The reality is that everything will be fine and priorities are going to shift away from stuff to family. These are all good things but the testosterone in me does not want to let go of all things fast, technical and mine.
It’s Amazing How Your Mindset Changes Instantly
January 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment
There were certain changes that happen around the house as soon as I found out my wife was pregnant. I was preparing for doctors visits, looking around the house for what we had to change in preparation and even started getting some of those chores done that had been on the to do list for years. All of the sudden, you have a purpose behind everything as you know the 9 1/2 months are going to go by pretty quickly. Everything is changing and changing quickly.
I Will Protect What Is Mine
What I really wasn’t prepared for was how quickly my mindset changed about my wife. Of course I started looking at her like a future mother and enjoyed the fact that she was now carrying my kid, but the protection angle turned on almost instantly.
Last night, over 6″ of snow dumped on Atlanta and we have a city that is not prepared for this kind of weather. We woke up checking the weather and emailing her boss to make sure her office was closed, but almost instantly after my eyes opened for the first time…I knew I wasn’t going to let her drive to work. In the past, if she really had to go to the office I probably would have given her the “be careful and call me when you get there” speech and sent her on her way, but this time around it was different. She was not leaving our house and I would talk to her boss about it if I had to.
When I told her the news, she almost stepped back for a second. “What do you mean?”
“You are not going in to work today. I don’t feel comfortable with you two (it is really small at this point but still counts!) out there. You are staying home no matter what.”
“Ok…let me make sure everyone that works under me is ok.”
Luckily, the roads and weather were so bad that anyone that couldn’t walk to work didn’t end up going in, but my stance on the matter was a new one for sure. Technically, I should be just as worried about my wife driving in those conditions regardless if she was pregnant or not, but now I really felt the need to put my foot down. It was a crazy realization and I guess that is just something that kicks in as future fathers realize the consequences of dangerous actions.
So what did we do instead? We watched movies, drank hot chocolate and took the dogs for a walk in the snow. It was a great, safe day in a winter wonderland that only comes around once in a blue moon for Atlanta. Judging by the look of the roads right now, I have a feeling we are having the same conversation tomorrow morning as well.
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