One of the best advice for new dads is this: get your inner mental game in shape.
Creating and maintaining a positive mental attitude towards fatherhood makes the work of taking care of a baby feel a lot lighter. If you are having fun taking care of your kid, then work becomes play.
A good start is to eject from your mind all the negativity surrounding the care and feeding of newborn babies. If you have told everyone that you know that you are having a baby, you probably know what I mean. It is doubtless that many guys will tell you of all the doom and gloom that awaits (this really doesn’t help if you ask me!) Some of the stuff that I heard when I was about to have my baby Victoria were along these lines:
- “After the baby is born, sleep will be a far distant memory.”
- “Having a baby is the hardest thing you will ever do!”
- “Oh, the diapers, so many diapers…” (devolving to unmanly sobbing into hands).
After my baby Victoria arrived, man was I glad that I decided to avoid all that negativity! I decided that I would look forward to having an awesome experience as a new dad no matter what anyone else told me.
Fortunately there were some guys who said some really encouraging things to me, so there are clearly still a lot of guys who really had a great time becoming a father.
I figured that having a kid can either be an amazing experience or a miserable slog, depending on my attitude. I figured what the hell, I’ll have an amazing experience.
I did 5 things to prepare for Victoria’s birth to make sure my mental game was in order. I think it is important to have these tips for new dads in mind during the transition to fatherhood.
1. Make a choice to make it awesome.
Lots of guys make a choice to make it awesome. The baby’s coming anyways, might as well choose to frame this event as a great experience.
There are two other alternatives: choose to be miserable about having a baby, or make no choice at all (which is risky, and usually ends up careening towards misery). Those options suck!
As mentioned before, it is best to eject from your mind all of the negative things that people say about having a baby.
If someone warns you about sleep deprivation, vaccine shots, diapers, etc., just tell them you have a system to deal with all of these and you are sure that you can handle it. Combat negativity with enthusiasm and confidence.
I really believe that happy parents make for a happy baby. A happy baby makes for less crying and more sleep. My Victoria is being raised by two happy, well-rested, and calm parents, so she is also happy, well-rested, and calm (most of the time, anyways).
2. Realize what you are gaining.
The rewards of having your own child are immeasurable.
As long as you do a reasonably decent job as a parent, you have someone to carry on your legacy, you have someone who will love you no matter what, you get to have the unmatched experience of being a parent, and you will have someone to hold your hand as they push you through the doors to surgery.
The return on investment is “infinity” divided by “a lot of work”, so the ROI is basically infinity.
Reproduction is one of our driving human urges. By having a baby you are obeying your nature as a human being, just like eating food or owning territory.
Instead of focusing on what time and freedom you might be losing (doing 10 hour Netflix binging marathons or whatever) think about how that time can be more positively used to build a healthy and happy family.
Having a baby was important in my growth as a man and allowed me to level up my life. Having a family turned out to be a huge advancement in my life.
Paradoxically, after having a kid I actually gained a lot of free time because I was forced to brutally optimize my schedule. I overshot, and ended up getting enough spare time to do crazy projects like build a baby how-to blog for men.
3. Education.
Targeted education cures a whole whack of problems: fear, ignorance, poor outcomes.
Getting educated about having a kid makes things a million times easier. It is a very good idea to consistently learn more about the care and feeding of babies before and after the birth.
There are tons of advice for new dads out there to learn what you need to know:
- The Internet: The internet is awesome. The best sites that I found to learn about baby care are webmd.com and whattoexpect.com.
- Pre-natal and post-natal classes: Many hospitals have these, but several private businesses also offer these classes. Sign up and practice how to hold baby dolls, do a choking rescue, and learn how a baby looks when coming out of the mother so that you don’t freak out too much (lots of hair, wrinkles, vampire claws… it really is kind of crazy).
- Books: There are excellent books out there, the two I found most useful are “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” and “Happiest Baby on the Block”.
- A soon-to-be-released project I am working on.
4. Have some faith.
If you can believe that you can do a thing, then you can probably do that thing. If you can believe that you can raise a helpless newborn baby up to a slightly less helpless toddler and then to an angst-filled, gangly teenager, then you can do it.
It is incredibly possible to raise a child. At this point in history, 108 billion human babies have been born on this planet. Since our species continues to propagate, many of these babies must have made it to become functionally reproductive adults.
Many of these 108 billion babies were born into crazy environments where parents were fending off sabre-toothed tigers, bubonic plague, or raids on their village, and still our species has propagated. Raising a kid in the modern day should be eminently doable.
Another thing that might give perspective is that all of the things that you were warned about—sleep deprivation, endless crying, and diaper changing—is probably not as difficult as many other challenges that you have had in your life.
By now, you have become a man of worth. Think of the difficulties you went through in building your career, finding a home, and courting your wife. Having a baby is just another challenge that you need to figure out.
About sleep deprivation: I was far, far, more sleep deprived during my university days studying mechanical engineering than I currently am raising a baby girl.
Having a baby is not that freaking hard. Having a little faith that you can do it goes a long way.
5. Gratitude.
It is an incredible coincidence that your baby even exists. Think of all the things that led to this pivotal moment: you and your wife had to meet, your parents had to meet, all your ancestors had to do their thing, humans had to evolve, primitive forms of life had to develop, the earth had to create the correct conditions for life, the earth had to form from the remains of a supernova, and the Big Bang had to occur to allow the formation of the universe. Mind blown, right?
At a less cosmic scale, consider that lots of people have difficulty trying to conceive due to a variety of unfortunate medical reasons. It is actually very lucky that you are able to have a child.
From these perspectives, it is a very easy to be grateful to be having your own kid.
Gratitude does something else: it inoculates you from all the shit that life throws at you. I physically write down three things that I am grateful for every morning, and having a family always makes the cut. I think that being grateful makes for a happier man. It is certainly a great tool in your new dad survival kit.
I think all of this pre-game mental work really helped me. In the weeks after Victoria was born, everyone commented on how happy and well-rested I was. Some people were annoyed that I made it seem easy.
It was kind of easy doing the whole baby care thing once it came time to it; however, I did a lot of work upfront to smooth the transition to fatherhood.
Having a positive mental attitude helps enormously when you have a new baby introduced into your life–it’s great advice for new parents. Hope this post helps!
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If you enjoyed this post (or looking for expectant father gifts), check out my latest book, A Man’s Guide to Newborn Babies. In this book is all the advice for new dads you need to become an ace new father. Go beyond merely surviving the newborn baby stage—aim for a thriving new life when baby arrives!
