Parenting Is The Art Of Daily Survival

Nate is 3 months old now. I’ve been an official full-time Stay-At-Home-Dad (SAHD) for 1 month now, since Amy went back to work full-time. Things have gone well, but have been pretty tough.

Week 1 of my SAHD time had me covering more of the night-time feedings. I learned that I have a very hard time getting back to sleep after spending an hour warming the bottle, soothing while the bottle warms, feeding, burping, changing, feeding/burping some more, and soothing the little man to sleep. I’m a night owl by nature, and once I get revved up at night, my brain goes on full throttle working on the world’s problems. The baby sleeps, but I don’t. Thankfully, my in-laws provided great support so that I could bring Nate over in the afternoon and grab a couple hours of sleep. Nice.

Week 2 I got sick. I learned that there is no such thing as a “sick day” when you are a stay-at-home parent. You suck it up and take care of the baby and family. My in-laws were out on vacation, so I didn’t have that extra support, which was very much missed. Two days after I got sick, Amy got sick. Two days after that, Nate got sick, and registered his first fever. That was a tough week.

Week 3 we took Nate to the pediatrician, even though he appeared to be feeling better. Turns out that his left ear had an ear infection and Nate needed antibiotics. Babies first infection. Something for the baby book! :-) The in-laws were still out of town and I was still sick, due to lack of rest. Another tough week, but Nate’s schedule got a bit better, and he started sleeping longer (one 5 hour shift each night), which helped significantly.

Week 4 has Nate finishing up his medicine, but still not quite back to normal. Still tugs on his ear occasionally, and we return to the pediatrician tomorrow. His sleep schedule has reverted back to only 3-4 hours between feedings, which is not so good for the parents. But the in-laws have returned and I got a wonderful 2.5-hour long nap in this week! In general, I get 4-5 hours of sleep each night.

It’s pretty hard to plan next week, next month, or next year currently.

As such, it’s all about surviving today, so that you can survive again tomorrow. One day at a time.

I’m sure things will get easier when Nate “sleeps through the night”. I’ll keep you informed!

Technorati Tags: Stay-At-Home-Dad,SAHD,Stay-At-Home-Father,Parenting,Babies,Sleep,Ear Infection,Illness

Pet Names For Our Baby

Yes, it happened very quick and automatically.

We started calling Nate by names other than his own. Pet names. Some cute, some not so cute. Here’s a quick list, in no particular order:

• Sweet Pea
• Nater Mater
• Nate The Great
• Super Baby!
• Super Duper!
• Stinky
• Mr. Spittlesworth
• Boo Boo
• Big Boy or just “Boy”
• Little Man or “Little Guy”
• Buddy or “Little Buddy” – I’m the Skipper
• Stevie Wonder – when he’s tired and his head weaves back and forth
• And, of course, “Baby”

I’ll be surprised if he ever figures out what his actual name is!

What other cute pet names do you use for your little one?

Update: New names from Nate at 7 months:

Additionally,

• Mr. Potato Head
• Super Boo
• Captain Frustrato
• "Shark!" (looking for things to grab)
• Bootastic

Technorati Tags: Stay-At-Home-Dad,SAHD,Stay-At-Home-Father,SAHF,Nicknames,Baby Names,Baby,Naming,Pet Names

It’s Not a “Pacifier”, It’s a “Soother”

Amy, Nate, and I met up with some Canadian friends a couple of weeks ago, and when we pulled out the pacifier to give to Nate, our friends responded that getting your baby used to a “soother” is a wonderful thing.

I had never heard a “pacifier” referred to as a “soother” before. Upon thinking about it for a moment, I really liked the term.

One definition of the term “pacify” is “to reduce to a state of submission, esp. by military force; subdue”. There’s a forced aspect that sticks in my mind when I hear “pacify”. I suppose that’s somewhat accurate for our use of the pacifier on Nate, but I don’t want to feel that way. I’d rather feel that Nate was self-soothing.

Hence, the term “soother”, I suppose.

Turns out that “soother” is a common term for a pacifier in Canada.

In the UK, they use the term “dummy”.

Being American (or “Southern Canadian” as I sometimes prefer to think), I much prefer “soother” to either “pacifier” or “dummy”, or some of the other US English slang terms, like “binky” or “nukky” or “nuk-nuk”.

So, that’s what we are calling it from now on.

The soother.

It just sounds more tranquil and less forceful to me.

We have told the story of the term to many of our American friends, and none of them had heard the word “soother” either. Perhaps we can start a new trend.

Soothers for all!

Soothers unite!

What do you call your pacifier?

Technorati Tags: Stay-At-Home-Dad,SAHD,Stay-At-Home-Father,Pacifier,Soother,Nukky,Nuk-Nuk,Dictionary,Definition,Slang,Parenting,Baby,Infant

The Baby Björn Man-Baby Commercial

I currently carry my son, Nate, for at least three hours a day in his Baby Björn. We love it! Well, he loves it and my aching back tolerates it (and this is with the lumbar support version – he’s about 14 pounds now).

So, when I saw this commercial, I loved it as well.

Enjoy.

Man Baby, UNwrong'D - Boost Mobile TV Commercial:

Technorati Tags: Stay-At-Home-Dad,SAHD,Dad,Father,Commercial,Boost Mobile,Baby Björn,Björn,Commedy,Parenting

Tomorrow I Officially Start My New Job – Full Time Stay-At-Home-Dad

Tomorrow, my wife, Amy, goes back to work, completing her maternity leave. Nate and I have been very lucky to have her home with us over these past 10 weeks – and we will miss her dearly. I’ve never spent this much devoted (and intense!) time with her before because we have always been working independently. And, I must say, that I love her even more for both growing and delivering a perfect baby boy, and also for experiencing every detail of Nate’s new world with me during her maternity leave. She’s amazing.

While I have been at home pretty much full-time over these first weeks of Nate’s life, I haven’t really considered myself a true “Stay-At-Home-Dad”. I guess, mainly because Amy and I have been double-teaming Nate constantly. Nate has always seen two parent’s faces. Amy has taken most of the night shifts (because she is breastfeeding), and I take most of the “morning to early afternoon” shifts, to let her catch up on sleep.

However, starting tomorrow, it’s all up to me as we transition to me taking (more of) the night shift and, naturally, all of the day shift while Amy is at work.

And, yeah. Right now, I’m not exactly sure how I will pull it off, even though I secretly know that I will be fine.

Even though Amy and I have been double-teaming him, the last 10 weeks have still been extremely difficult and exhausting (due mostly to lack of sleep). Now, with Amy gone back to work I do fully expect things to be harder for me. I also hope that Nate and I will form some new routines that will make it all work somehow. I look forward to working it out with him.

Things will also be harder on Amy, too.

We continue to breastfeed, so Amy is lugging the pump and gazillion accessories to work tomorrow. And dealing with all the ramifications of that in the workplace (packaging the milk, cleaning the parts, bringing a change of clothes just in case, finding privacy, etc) and transporting the goods home safely.

Amy will certainly miss her new boy while she is at work, and this first week will be a very tough transition for her. Role reversal is tough, but in the end, I know that we will both end up stronger and better people for doing it and making it work well for our little man.

My Stay-At-Home-Dad status is a conscious decision for us.

And it all starts now.

For real.

I am very excited. I truly do believe that this is the most important job that I have ever had. I’m super proud to be a Stay-At-Home-Father!

So, I better get to bed.

Encouraging words for Amy (and I) certainly welcome in the comments!

Technorati Tags: Stay-At-Home-Dad,Stay-At-Home-Father,SAHD,Parenting,Role Reversal,Maternity,Maternity Leave,Breastfeeding,Dad,Father