Yesterday, on Thursday August 23rd, I experienced the most euphoric moment that I have experienced so far since learning I was going to become a father. The moment occurred while I was driving around the parking lot of a Wegman's grocery store. I was circling around the lot getting frustrated not finding a spot that suited my tastes. Then, however, I saw it-I saw a couple of the "expectant mother" parking spots tucked up close to the front of the store. I then realized that, for the length of this pregnancy and while I am with Carly, I can park at these very parking spots. Wegman's is already one of my favorite places in the world to visit. Now, for the better part of seven months, I can park right up close to the building. I can hardly envision a life that is more gratifying than this.
After all that excitement I had to get up the next morning (today), go to work, and then head to our first pre-natal appointment at 11:15. I'll admit, I was pretty freaking nervous for this. I knew this would be the first real step in the pregnancy in what becomes a fairly regimented schedule to and through the birth of our child (and if I have any say in it, the entire life of our child). For me, the appointment was fairly boring. I sat in a waiting room for the better part of two hours while Carly visited three different doctors performing various tests, examinations, and surveys. It was kind of awkward for me as I didn't really know what I should do or what I was expected to do, if anything. I want to be as involved as possible in this pregnancy but I also don't want to come across as overbearing. Each time Carly's name got called I kind of just waited to see if the nurse would invite me in or not. All three times the nurse neglected to give me any notion that I should follow Carly so I just sat back in my chair and continued to thumb through the "Shape" magazine that was nearby (they really need some men's magazines in those places for guys like me).
When Carly was completely done with everything we were given some exciting dates. On October 5th, six weeks from now, we get our first sonogram done (I won't look for permission from the nurse on this one-let it be known that I'll be there for that) and April 15th, tax day, is the tentative due date for our baby. For you, the readers, understand that each time we get a sonogram done I'm going to make sure to post pictures of them up on this blog.
It has now been exactly two weeks since Carly made a phone call to me that almost put me to the floor while I was working in the cooler. Since that time we both have had a tremendous group of family and friends that have given us an amazing amount of support, encouragement, and advice. One interesting idea that some friends of mine shared with me a few days ago was to, with each paycheck, purchase a gift card to places like Babies 'R Us and Toys 'R Us from Giant Eagle. If you really think about this, in my opinion, its genius. First off, its a way of putting aside money for the baby without having the temptation of being able to spend it. Secondly, with Giant Eagle's "Gas Perks" we are able to save money off of gas too. If we purchase just a $25 gift card each week we could end up with about $700 in gift cards by the time the baby is born.
This leads me to this: if anyone has any advice, stories, or "words of wisdom" that you also would like to share please feel free to do so. There are a variety of options you can utilize to do so; you can choose to post in the "Comments" section, you can message me or Carly in Facebook, or even send me an email at babyBlogED@gmail.com. I really hope this blog can, not only be a narcissistic vehicle of mine (haha), but also maybe something that current and future parents can use as a resource. In addition, I hope that everyone, not just people who are in the parent world, is able to enjoy the anecdotes that I share.
Until my next splurge of thoughts on my impending parenthood, I wish you all pleasant reading,
---Ed
Friday, August 24, 2012
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Breast Milk Bags and Nipple Butter
I know I just wrote the whole "holy shit, she's pregnant" post a couple days ago and I honestly don't anticipate having something new to discuss everyday. However, there have been a lot of things that have gone on and my mind has turned inside out about a hundred times since Carly broke the news to me eleven days ago.
First, I'm still kind of in freak out mode. I can't stop worrying about things ranging the whole spectrum from the current health of the tiny legume-sized being inside of my wife to how the hell we are going to afford college for him/her. Inside that spectrum of worries includes things such as: what kind of crib do we get?, will he/she be smart?, I hope he/she isn't an ugly baby/person, will this person become a productive member of society? among countless other worries. Close friends and family have told me that worry kind of goes away when the baby is born and that you kind of begin to live more for the moment at that point. We will see.
Carly, however, is super freaking excited about everything associated with being pregnant and thus becoming a mommy. The first time she threw up in the morning after finding out she was pregnant she was bragging quite smugly about her morning sickness. I told her she was being psychosomatic and that her throwing up was just the result of her wanting to throw up. This didn't go over well for me.
Also, Carly keeps rambling about stuff I really don't care about. For instance, just today, she was talking ad nauseam about breast milk bags and nipple butter. She then proceeded to pull these bags out, show them to me, and then explain to me that she could put her milk inside these bags and then freeze the bags with the milk. To this very moment I don't have a clue how this works and why people want to do this. How does the milk get in the bag? Is there a pump? Does she just do it herself? She doesn't expect me to partake in this, does she? Why freeze it? Does it have an expiration date? Does the butter have anything to do with this stuff or was it just random rambling of hers? Regardless, EWWWWWWW!!!
Another example of her excitement is that the very night, the very exact night, we found out we are pregnant Carly felt it necessary to buy two big things of diapers and 2 boxes of baby wipes. I thought this was kind of weird but not weird enough to make any kind of point of to her about (I'm learning to pick my battles).
***side note: am I even supposed to say that-"we are pregnant"? I feel its kind of weird-she's the one going through the physical "stuff" not me but every time I say she is pregnant people correct me and say we are pregnant and that having a baby is a "team effort"-anyways, back to focus...***
Obviously our family and friends are excited too. A great example of this is the night after we got the diapers and wipes we went to visit Carly's grandparents. We both were kind of nervous about going there; we weren't really sure how they would handle the news. Well, it turns out that her grandparents seem almost as excited over the news as Carly herself was (I was and still am in a kind of a "holy hell!" mindset so my excitement level is still a little tempered). The next couple of hours were filled with Carly sitting at the dining room table next to her grandmother and grandfather sharing some really touching moments mainly while they were thumbing through a book of baby names together. About halfway through the night it was pointed out that her grandparents were going to become great-grandparents to our baby and with that realization their eyes just lit up with joy. It really was a neat thing to see. Oh, and by the way, as of right now, we like the names Wyatt for a boy and Brooke for a girl.
There have been a lot of really cool moments that we have shared with our family and friends since the breaking of the big news. In future posts I anticipate sharing more of those stories. However, right now I feel it necessary to share some things that I have found funny to this point in the pregnancy.
One thing that I've been doing to piss her off (playfully, of course) is to, anytime she asks a favor of me, tell her that she's "barely even pregnant" and that she should just do it herself. I don't really know why its funny to me, I suppose its a masochistic tendency of mine because she really doesn't find this response nearly as comical as I do (she's promised to shank me each time I tell her that now).
Another stupid little thing that makes me giggle is the "v-look" Carly gets every time someone sees her for the first time since she announced the pregnancy. People always go from looking at her face, down to her stomach, then back to her face. They always want to check to see if there's a baby bump. There's no baby bump yet people! She's not that far along yet (dare I say, "barely pregnant").
Anyways, I thank you for continuing to take this journey into and through fatherhood with me. Friday we have our first pre-natal appointment and I will be sure to update you all on how that goes and what we find out from it. As we get further along in the pregnancy I anticipate posting pictures (in particular sonograms) and possibly even videos to this blog so be sure to look for that. In addition, I have created a Twitter account devoted completely to this blog and becoming someone's daddy. The Twitter handle is babyBlogED and updates I make from there go directly to this blog in the right-hand margin.
---Ed
First, I'm still kind of in freak out mode. I can't stop worrying about things ranging the whole spectrum from the current health of the tiny legume-sized being inside of my wife to how the hell we are going to afford college for him/her. Inside that spectrum of worries includes things such as: what kind of crib do we get?, will he/she be smart?, I hope he/she isn't an ugly baby/person, will this person become a productive member of society? among countless other worries. Close friends and family have told me that worry kind of goes away when the baby is born and that you kind of begin to live more for the moment at that point. We will see.
Carly, however, is super freaking excited about everything associated with being pregnant and thus becoming a mommy. The first time she threw up in the morning after finding out she was pregnant she was bragging quite smugly about her morning sickness. I told her she was being psychosomatic and that her throwing up was just the result of her wanting to throw up. This didn't go over well for me.
Also, Carly keeps rambling about stuff I really don't care about. For instance, just today, she was talking ad nauseam about breast milk bags and nipple butter. She then proceeded to pull these bags out, show them to me, and then explain to me that she could put her milk inside these bags and then freeze the bags with the milk. To this very moment I don't have a clue how this works and why people want to do this. How does the milk get in the bag? Is there a pump? Does she just do it herself? She doesn't expect me to partake in this, does she? Why freeze it? Does it have an expiration date? Does the butter have anything to do with this stuff or was it just random rambling of hers? Regardless, EWWWWWWW!!!
Another example of her excitement is that the very night, the very exact night, we found out we are pregnant Carly felt it necessary to buy two big things of diapers and 2 boxes of baby wipes. I thought this was kind of weird but not weird enough to make any kind of point of to her about (I'm learning to pick my battles).
***side note: am I even supposed to say that-"we are pregnant"? I feel its kind of weird-she's the one going through the physical "stuff" not me but every time I say she is pregnant people correct me and say we are pregnant and that having a baby is a "team effort"-anyways, back to focus...***
Obviously our family and friends are excited too. A great example of this is the night after we got the diapers and wipes we went to visit Carly's grandparents. We both were kind of nervous about going there; we weren't really sure how they would handle the news. Well, it turns out that her grandparents seem almost as excited over the news as Carly herself was (I was and still am in a kind of a "holy hell!" mindset so my excitement level is still a little tempered). The next couple of hours were filled with Carly sitting at the dining room table next to her grandmother and grandfather sharing some really touching moments mainly while they were thumbing through a book of baby names together. About halfway through the night it was pointed out that her grandparents were going to become great-grandparents to our baby and with that realization their eyes just lit up with joy. It really was a neat thing to see. Oh, and by the way, as of right now, we like the names Wyatt for a boy and Brooke for a girl.
There have been a lot of really cool moments that we have shared with our family and friends since the breaking of the big news. In future posts I anticipate sharing more of those stories. However, right now I feel it necessary to share some things that I have found funny to this point in the pregnancy.
One thing that I've been doing to piss her off (playfully, of course) is to, anytime she asks a favor of me, tell her that she's "barely even pregnant" and that she should just do it herself. I don't really know why its funny to me, I suppose its a masochistic tendency of mine because she really doesn't find this response nearly as comical as I do (she's promised to shank me each time I tell her that now).
Another stupid little thing that makes me giggle is the "v-look" Carly gets every time someone sees her for the first time since she announced the pregnancy. People always go from looking at her face, down to her stomach, then back to her face. They always want to check to see if there's a baby bump. There's no baby bump yet people! She's not that far along yet (dare I say, "barely pregnant").
Anyways, I thank you for continuing to take this journey into and through fatherhood with me. Friday we have our first pre-natal appointment and I will be sure to update you all on how that goes and what we find out from it. As we get further along in the pregnancy I anticipate posting pictures (in particular sonograms) and possibly even videos to this blog so be sure to look for that. In addition, I have created a Twitter account devoted completely to this blog and becoming someone's daddy. The Twitter handle is babyBlogED and updates I make from there go directly to this blog in the right-hand margin.
---Ed
Saturday, August 18, 2012
"Oh, hey babe. I don't really care what's for dinner, you decide-wait, WHAT?, YOU'RE PREGNANT?!!!
The morning of Friday, August 10th began ordinary, just as any other morning had for the past few years: I woke up, showered, brushed my teeth, fed my 2 cats, and went in to work. About mid-morning, however, that fateful day would become anything but ordinary.
It was about 10 o'clock when I was stocking the cooler of the convenience store that I work at when I got a phone call from my wife, Carly. Most of the time, quite honestly, she calls me about really, really stupid stuff; usually its something to the effect of "Hey babe, what do you want for dinner? Do you want me to pull some ground meat out of the freezer or something?." I was pretty hardcore into making sure all of the 2% gallons of milk were filled to their capacity at the time of the call so I was getting ready to retort with one of the usual lines like, "I don't care, whatever you want, babe."
Within only a few short still frames of life I found out that my life would forever be changed. The reason she called me didn't have anything to do with dinner. The reason she called was to inform me that she WAS PREGNANT!!! There are not enough exclamation points in the universe that would properly exhibit the excitement level in her voice as the two simple words, "I'm pregnant," flowed from her mouth and into my ears. After taking a moment or two to realize that she wasn't calling about dinner arrangements I replied very profoundly with two equally simple words: "oh, okay."
The earth was now spinning rapidly, my legs tingling, my breath short. I, for a brief moment, thought I was going to pass out. I told her that we would discuss this "great" news when I got home from work. I, quite honestly, had no idea how to react to this. Her reaction was of pure joy and jubilation and I knew that she was hoping to hear something near that level from me. However, the primary thought that captured my mind was "am I ready for this, are we ready for this?"
After gaining some resemblance of composure, I was able to successfully finish stocking the milk and continue on to finish the work day all the while contemplating the implications of what me becoming a father and my wife becoming a mother would have on our lives and whether or not we are ready for the challenge.
To this very moment I still have no clue what these implications are. This post is the first in what I hope will be a lengthy series attempting to give you, the reader, an inside perspective of where the road to and through fatherhood leads me and what the implications thereof become.
It was about 10 o'clock when I was stocking the cooler of the convenience store that I work at when I got a phone call from my wife, Carly. Most of the time, quite honestly, she calls me about really, really stupid stuff; usually its something to the effect of "Hey babe, what do you want for dinner? Do you want me to pull some ground meat out of the freezer or something?." I was pretty hardcore into making sure all of the 2% gallons of milk were filled to their capacity at the time of the call so I was getting ready to retort with one of the usual lines like, "I don't care, whatever you want, babe."
Within only a few short still frames of life I found out that my life would forever be changed. The reason she called me didn't have anything to do with dinner. The reason she called was to inform me that she WAS PREGNANT!!! There are not enough exclamation points in the universe that would properly exhibit the excitement level in her voice as the two simple words, "I'm pregnant," flowed from her mouth and into my ears. After taking a moment or two to realize that she wasn't calling about dinner arrangements I replied very profoundly with two equally simple words: "oh, okay."
The earth was now spinning rapidly, my legs tingling, my breath short. I, for a brief moment, thought I was going to pass out. I told her that we would discuss this "great" news when I got home from work. I, quite honestly, had no idea how to react to this. Her reaction was of pure joy and jubilation and I knew that she was hoping to hear something near that level from me. However, the primary thought that captured my mind was "am I ready for this, are we ready for this?"
After gaining some resemblance of composure, I was able to successfully finish stocking the milk and continue on to finish the work day all the while contemplating the implications of what me becoming a father and my wife becoming a mother would have on our lives and whether or not we are ready for the challenge.
To this very moment I still have no clue what these implications are. This post is the first in what I hope will be a lengthy series attempting to give you, the reader, an inside perspective of where the road to and through fatherhood leads me and what the implications thereof become.
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