Becoming Daddy

November 21^st marked a very important change in my life. As I’m sure most of you who are reading this can guess, that was the day that our daughter Lily was born. I woke up in our living room a little before 4am to Christina telling me that her water had broken. In case you were wondering, I wasn’t sleeping on the couch because Christina was mad at me or anything. We had taken to sleeping in the living room because the couch was more comfortable and more supportive place to sleep for Christina’s expanded belly; I joined her because sleeping in our bed by myself was too lonely. She got the couch, I got the loveseat.

I had wondered once or twice whether what would happen if Christina went into labor in the middle of the night. Would I be alert enough to take care of everything? Would I be too tired to drive her to the birthing center? I’ll admit that I had often hoped that she would go into labor while I was at school just so that I could make a big scene and rush out of the classroom. Well I got my answer: adrenaline does amazing things to your awareness when you need it too. All of a sudden I was up and alert and running around our apartment grabbing all of our essentials—clothes, snacks, pillow, baby stuff. Fortunately I had thought ahead enough to install our car seat ahead of time. Christina’s labor progressed pretty quickly at first going from little sporadic contractions to stronger, minute-long contractions in about 30 minutes. So we grabbed all of our gear and informed our midwife that we were on our way.

I’ll skip the details of Christina’s delivery since she covered them pretty well already. So what have I learned in the last two months? Well, other than how to change a diaper, I’ve learned that this little girl has changed my life forever. It’s amazing how the littlest things she does just make my heart melt. My two favorite things in the world are holding her close to me and seeing her smile up at me. Although sometimes I wish I could live in those moments forever, it’s wonderful to know that I get to be there as she grows up. I get to be her Daddy.