My First Mother’s Day as a Father

When speaking with my wife recently about booking a Mother’s Day brunch for our moms for this year, it suddenly hit me, she’s a mom now too! My next thought was, and I’m a dad! I know it sounds beyond obvious, but it was a weird realization that in my sleep-deprived state of having a seven-week-old newborn in the house, I somehow managed to miss.

Now I have to plan two Mother’s Day celebrations each year, as if one wasn’t hard enough! Good thing there is more than one meal to be eaten in a given day, or someone’s feelings would be hurt.

So I’m now planning my first ever Mother’s Day dinner with my wife, and already I’ve made my first mistake, right off the bat. As we’ve had scarce time alone since the little man’s arrival, I said to her, “You know what could be cute? Having one of our sisters come over to babysit and going out somewhere nice for Mother’s Day dinner.” I was quickly reminded that that would ‘defeat the point’ of a Mother’s Day dinner.

Such are the growing pains of being a new dad, I suppose.

If anyone has any stories or advice along the lines of the above, I’d love to hear it.

Being a new dad has been such an amazing experience. I’ve never had a two-month stretch close to anything like these have been. It’s been, fun, exhausting, frustrating and educational all at once. We’ve received contradicting stories and advice from essentially everyone we know. I have finally concluded that there is no ‘normal’ time for him to start sleeping more than a few hours at once. No ‘normal’ amount of crying, no ‘normal’ amount to eat. With me being an ‘A’ type personality, this drives me nuts, but at least I have finally come to the realization that the only thing ‘normal’ is whatever he’s doing at the moment. Life suddenly became simpler.

So, Happy Mother’s Day to all the new moms, not-so-new moms, grandmas, great-grandmas and moms-to-be. I’m looking forward to whatever parenthood brings, and if the past seven weeks are any indicator of what’s to come, it should be an amazing ride ahead!