Positive thinking for a new Dad; from F to A*.

What on Earth do I do with it?!

Yes, these words actually came out of my mouth when my son was born 3 years ago. 3 days of blood, sweat and tears (along with a lot of other things you don’t see on TV), my wife finally gave birth to our boy. Nothing could ever of prepared me for the labour, nor the ‘aftermath’ of it (quite literally a blood bath/opening scene from Saving Private Ryan), but especially the feeling of pure helplessness and confusion, like the feeling you get turning up to an exam having done no revision. Apart from this time there was no waiting 6 weeks for my results, this was real time with no second chances; a big fat F was coming my way…

The crying was relentless. What does he want? He can’t surely be hungry already, or the fact that he’s just spent the last 7 hours being squeezed through a hole that last I checked was definitely too small for him to get through; either way I did not have a scooby what he wanted, which became a running theme for the next 12 months. It got to the point where Mum, who was still being stitched back together at this point, took him and he immediately settled. Bless him, at least now there was a bit of silence whilst he and mum cuddled together. As I sat down feeling slightly confused, the worry started setting in... They never tell you what YOU’RE supposed to do, being the dad. What can you do? Smelling like I hadn’t washed for about 6 years didn’t help the situation much either, the room we were in was about 30 degrees and looked like a bomb had hit it. These next few minutes and hours I felt like the biggest spare part, not knowing what to do or when to do it. Hopefully, this will resonate with many Dads out there who, like me, were really unprepared and naive to think "this'll be a breeze"!

Getting home was a task in itself. The worst part wasn’t even paying the £20 car parking ticket, but was the fact that he was not the biggest fan of his car seat. After what seemed like hours and a half dozen cable-ties, he was in. Safe and sound, straight into the back of my Honda Civic, which, by the way is an awful car to put a baby in. I had promised the wife a Chinese when we got home, which was the first thing I hadn’t disappointed her on since he was born. Straight into the living room, plonked him down and tucked in. Heaven. Plate full of beautiful food, cruising with Jane Macdonald on the tele; this was going to be a great night. I hadn’t had so much of a piece of crispy chilli beef when it started… again. The mrs jumped up (suspiciously quickly considering she was still half inside out) and tried settling him down. Not a chance. That carried on for the best part of 2 hours. 2 cold plates of Chinese food and my sky box paused on 4 minutes, this was the start of a whole new meaning of “feeling knackered”.

Long days turned into even longer weeks. Working full time was something I enjoyed very little before he was born, let alone going into work now with all the Mums who have teenagers smirking at you and saying things like "It gets worse; my boy didn't sleep through till he was 13!". Great, cheers for that Karen. But there is one thing I wished I did from day one. Something hard to do when you're tired constantly, and that is to stay positive. Positive? Are you taking the ****? I would like to see you be positive after 2 hours sleep over a weekend. Sure, you're right, but how much easier do things get when you can crack a smile whilst covered in sick, and laugh off a poo-disaster at 3 in the morning? Staying positive taught me a lot and allowed me to start enjoying being a Dad a hell of a lot more than moaning about being tired or fighting over who's turn it is to change him. Trust me, positivity is key.