A Dad-To-Be's Stress or "A New Appreciation for Mothers"

Other the past few months I have received a fair amount of sage-like advice from many of my co-workers. I have also been ribbed about "I can't wait to see you change as baby gets closer"! When I heard my friends talk about the changes us guys go through as baby gets closer I knew that I would see some changes but man-oh-man did I underestimate how big the changes would be. With as close of a relationship as Bari and I have I knew that I would probably experience some sympathy pains. I never realized how in sync the two of us were until I could say to her "hey are you feeling sore here "point at random body part" and to hear Bari say oh my gosh all day i've been having pains there. It was really cool in a freaky sort of way.

Many of my guy friends would say wait until you start feeling "insert random emotion" and I chuckled until it started happening to me. The road to fatherhood has been a real experience and one I don't think I will ever forget. 

Another thing that many of my friends warned me about was the intensity and levels of stress that we guys experience and to find a healthy outlet to deal with it. I had a good chuckle when I heard the stress comment simply because I am a master of dealing with stress or so I thought. Pretty much everyone knows that my occupation is IT or more specifically I am an IT Director for a fairly large direct response company. My job is 99.8% stress and .2% kick-ass (you know the feeling). Anyone that has walked a mile in my shoes knows that our primary job function is fire fighting since most end-users are accidents waiting to happen. Throw in the fact that our business is pretty much 24 hours / 7 days a week / 365 days a year and we have offices overseas, call centers in remote countries, users on the road etc. and you realize that stress is a driving factor for my position. There is no such thing as a day off and the phone rings way too often at god-awful:30 in the morning. You know it is part of the job and you deal with it. This is why I think so many of us geeks are big kids you know what I mean the comments like your 30+ years old and you still play online games or own a playstation/xbox/wii... yes, it is our escape from reality and my therapy.

Being the self-proclaimed champion of stress I was pretty sure I could deal with whatever came my way and boy was I disillusioned. Let's start with the anxiety. In 32 years of my life I have never had an anxiety/panic attack... until recently. Wow do those suck! Thankfully being the logical individual that I am I was able to realize that it was an anxiety attack and I have learned to recognize when I start to feel one coming on and how to deal with it. Being the firefighting geek most it is not uncommon for me to wake up from a dead sleep with the solution to a problem that I have been dealing with. But it seems like now my mind is always racing with the what ifs or similar issues I still sleep but it is not the wake up in the morning feeling well rested kind of sleep. Moving right along lets talk about lack of appetite. I have been making a real effort at improving my diet and eating better but wow has my appetite sucked. I know this ties back into the whole sympathy pains type thing since Bari has been pregnant meat has not tasted right to her well me too! I share her pain because I am a meat and potato fan or should I say I used to be.

The mind truly is a powerful thing. I have been lucky in having to deal with the psychological symptoms and some of the physiological manifestations of stress.

Ladies, I have an even greater respect and admiration for all you have to go through on the path to motherhood. I know how much of an impact the experience has had on me and I don't have to deal with the physical and hormone changes that you all experience. I really don't know how you do it but I am truly amazed.

The path to fatherhood has been absolutely amazing and I know that when little Alex finally arrives the journey is not not over but rather just beginning. I can't wait until I can hold my son close and my beautiful wife even closer.

Until that day finally comes I will deal with everything life throws at me with my own forms of therapy. I'll continue to play my video games, take my walks around the block, study for my tests, and of course my favorite form of therapy... cuddling on the bed with my beautiful wife stroking her hair with one hand and resting my other hand on the baby bump (feeling little Alex bounce around) while kitty curls up on our feet.

~E