Five Observations Since Becoming a Dad

I was able to add the most important job to my resume a couple of weeks ago when my wife and I welcomed our daughter Josephine to the world late in the evening of Sunday, November 26th. I developed a tremendous appreciation for my wife and all women after seeing what she went through for nine months with all of the changes to her body, the hormonal fluctuations, and all of the various sacrifices made along the way. Not to mention the labor and delivery process and the ongoing recovery, which is one that is both physical and mental.

I was also completely smitten by my daughter from the moment I met her and I wrote her a letter from the hospital as we were there recovering with her with the hope that I will be able to give it to her someday. In fact, I may continue to write these letters to her as she grows older so that I can document our relationship.

People had been asking me in the months leading up to having Josephine whether or not I was nervous about having a baby. What I told everyone was pretty much the same thing, something along these lines: “Billions of people have been able to figure this out, I think we’ll be OK, too.” And that’s exactly how I felt. Selfishly, if there was anything I was actually nervous about, it was the sacrifices I would need to make as a father and losing a lot of my freedom and autonomy. Even going on a simple dinner date with my wife these days is something that would need to be planned far in advance. I can be a bit stubborn and I value my independence to go off and do certain things when I want to do them, so obviously needing to prioritize another person before myself puts all of that on its head.

Having a baby was the best thing that has ever happened to me so far, and as I have been spending time at home with her and my wife over the last couple of weeks, I’ve found myself really enjoying the time. I am in between jobs at the moment, and for the first time in my life I have actually caught myself thinking about whether I want to take a career break to focus on being a father. I am not sure whether or not that will be the case, but let’s just say that – ironically – having a dependent has given me less urgency to push into a less-than-ideal work situation. I value my free time so much more than I used to that whatever job I end up taking really needs to be a slam dunk for me.

With that being said, I wanted to share five brief insights I have gleaned since becoming a dad a little over a couple weeks ago. We can all take this with a pinch of salt because I still have a long way to go, but I think the advice could be valuable for others who go through the same thing someday. Without further ado, here they are:

1. It’s not as bad as they say it is

When you are preparing to have a child – especially your first one – everyone you know who has had a kid before you will tell you about how much your life is going to change and how those first weeks and months are going to be absolutely brutal. Now, I say this tongue in cheek because I know it is a lot harder on women than it is for men (generally) after birth, but I really think the “hype” on how hard it is ought to be toned down a bit. Are there some sleepless nights? Absolutely. But as I will get to in a later section, teamwork makes the dream work. And if you have a good partner, you figure out how to work together to divvy up responsibilities and handle it.

I was worried about the sleepless nights, the crying, the diaper changes, or just flat out doing something wrong or hurting the baby. Even when I held her for the first time, I was really nervous. But after awhile you get used to how to do that and all sorts of other things. Diaper changes are really not so bad.

Don’t get me wrong – it’s definitely a shift. There’s a lot of sacrifices we have to make, and someone always needs to be watching the baby. If anyone is sleeping, the baby has to be sleeping nearby and away from our pets. You have to be very mindful of what is going on and your priorities change drastically. I’m not downplaying any of these things. But if you’re preparing to have a child, you welcome this change, and therefore it ends up not feeling so bad.

2. Teamwork is critical

My wife and I played a card game together months before we had our newborn that helped us align around the different responsibilities that each person wanted to take on. I’ve decided to try to handle as much of our personal affairs as I possibly can: cooking, handling the dishes and laundry, doing the trash and recycling, running errands, or so on. Of course I help with the baby too. We have to be in constant communication about who is doing what and when and we try to map out our days in advance.

This of course also extends to evening shifts. As I’m writing this, I’m on the “night shift” so my wife can get to bed early and I’ll do all things related to the baby and our pets before my bedtime around midnight. We rotate as needed. Admittedly, the night shifts are a lot harder for her since she often has to feed the baby, so I just try to step up wherever I can and focus on what is in my locus of control. In any event, to put it succinctly, you really need to be proactive about your communication and try to offer help wherever you can, even for little things, like grabbing someone their water if it’s out of reach while they are holding the baby.

3. Little things don’t matter much

The months leading up to my daughter’s birth were some of the darkest of my life. The reason for that is because of the upsurge in rampant anti-Semitism here in the United States and abroad. You could say she came at a perfect time because she has helped me to gain some perspective and take my mind off the darkness in our world a bit.

Here is an example of that. This past Saturday morning, I was walking to the gym wearing an Israeli sweatshirt. Someone walking past me saw it, glared at me, and spat at me. Normally I would have confronted this individual. I decided in this instance to let it go.

Why is that? I think when you have a child, your sense of responsibility evolves. You have a responsibility towards another person not to land yourself in a conflict where you can get injured or put in jail. But you also get some perspective. To be clear, all of this stuff is not “little stuff” at all, but it certainly pales in comparison to what is now my number one focus, which is to be a good role model for my daughter and a good partner for my wife. Frankly, I don’t have time any more to get into arguments with stupid or hateful people. And that’s a good thing.

4. Cherish the little things

When we were in the hospital with Josephine, we made a remark to one another that she would never be that small ever again. We cried.

Every day we have with her, there are little moments of joy in all of the cute little expressions she makes and the mannerisms she is developing. As each day passes, a new bit of her personality comes out, and as time goes on, that will continue to be the case.

But these changes are minimal. She can hardly see us and mostly recognizes us by our voices. So you have to be patient and you learn to be appreciative and grateful for all of these little moments you get because you really don’t know when it is all about to change. She’s already grown an inch since she was born and she will only keep growing. 

5. Be OK with nothing

I’m someone who always tries to keep busy and does not do well with being bored. One of my biggest vices is being on my phone too much, which is something I am trying to get better at.

With a newborn, you found yourself often in moments of stillness with a baby. Sometimes I am up at 6am to be with the baby for a couple hours before my wife wakes up. In those moments, I’ll just hold her on a chair. It’s almost a bit meditative except you can’t fall asleep with the baby in your arms. This has forced me to learn how to be OK with nothing and to be more present.

Being present is something I’ve been wanting to work on for a long time. I often worry too much about mistakes I made in the past and then I have anxieties about what may be in my future. During this time, I’ve really learned to just appreciate the “right now.” In what would otherwise be a stressful time for me in the midst of a job search in a terrible job market, I find myself not really having anxieties about things that used to trouble me, perfectly happy to just spend time with my family.

The time you are feeding or burping a baby or changing a diaper or just sitting with them is time you are not on your phone or doom-scrolling through social media or worrying about things that you ought to be doing. You kind of come to grips with the fact you are doing the most important thing you could possibly be doing, and so in that nothingness, there really is a lot of something.