Tick...tick...tick....tick....

Just under two weeks and counting now. 2.0 in there routinely gives a good and vigorous outward boot on many an occasion. Baby's completely healthy and in position for launch, or so the docs say. Room's ready. Emergency plans for work are prepared. Pretty much everything is set, in fact.

....except that 2.0 isn't coming out yet. I'm actually discovering that THIS - the waiting - is by far the most difficult part of the whole experience since the first trimester. At work, phone rings, heart races. Anywhere, cell rings, pulse pounds. Is this it? Is it time? Are we going?

No. Someone needs to go to the office. Amy's just calling to tell me about her day. Which is all well and good, don't get me wrong, but geez. Imagine someone telling you that sometime very soon, you're going to win a whole LOT of money. Not a wee bit, mind you. A life-changing, jaw-dropping, you-thought-Susan-Boyle-was-a-shock-then-check-this-sized amount. You just don't know quite when. Soon. Very soon. In a week or two. Now.... continue your normal life please. Pretend all is well. Do not think unduly on it.

Yeah. RIGHT.

Because that's realistic. Honest. Fellas, gotta tell ya - when you're waiting to be a dad, WAITING can be the most unpleasant part. So I'm reading a lot, playing games a lot, trying to keep my mind occupied as much as possible, all while keeping one ear out for the blood-curdling shriek (those please dear lord maybe not QUITE that) that will signal the process has begun. The immediate effect of this is that I get bored and irritated with most of my hobbies really quickly, and I'm ping-ponging around like mad. Don't want to get any involved projects going, 'cause, y'know... could happen. Don't want to go anywhere particularly far away cause, y'know...could happen.

Eh. Can't make this post too long...

Cause..y'know.

(Could happen.)

-MT out.

The Red Zone

So here we are. Just under four weeks left until May 1. The probability of 2.0's arrival now becomes statistically more significant with each passing day.  I'm starting to look forward to it, though I still dread the actual frantic drive and hollering wife part. I think Amy's pretty much in the same place. She's getting somewhat uncomfortable, but still taking it like an amazing friggin champ. Her complaints are rare and when they come, singular - no whining at all. How did I get this lucky?

So I find myself doing some - but not all - of the things I used to roll my eyes at other guys doing. Making goofy faces at kids, grinning and winking at them, and so on. I refuse to use baby talk now or ever, though - I'm of the opinion that baby talk is simply most people's way of getting around the fact that they don't have enough voice inflection to get a kid's interest. I'd rather the kid get used to the way people really talk, thanks.

I think the nine months of various stresses really does give one time to prepare for the notion of fatherhood, provided you actually DO spend some time thinking on it.  Some guys probably just block it all out until the last minute, I figure. Or maybe not - I don't know how many dads drop the ball bigtime in the fatherhood, but I've heard a lot of dads move on or generally don't step up for the role model bit. That kinda confuses me, because it seems like you miss out on the good stuff that way. Sure, creating the baby is plenty fun (heh, heh) but then the next nine months, not so much. I guess maybe the fellas who duck out don't see what comes after that as fun either, but I dunno - the teacher in me sees it as a chance to really make what you figure is the best possible person. Sure, it's not that easy, and yes, other inputs apply... but still. We all have a good idea of what we figure someone ought to be, right? And isn't raising a kid about aiming for that mark?

Meh. I dunno. I told myself when things reached "4 weeks to go" I'd write this Red Zone thing and talk about how I felt knowing that literally anytime from here out - including while I write this sentence - Amy could walk in and throw car keys at me with a wild look in her eye. Not so much drama anymore, though. More a calm, waiting acceptance. It's coming. Soon. There'll be stress and much flailing of limbs, and then 2.0 will be here. I'm kinda eager to get on with it. People always say "You always think you're ready but you never are"... but then again, I've spent my whole life violating those axioms of mediocrity, depression, and downtrodenness. 

I'm ready. Let's get this show on the road.

-MT out

Reality Check

So Amy and I went to a baby education class today. Big ol' 8-hour whoppin' one. Covered everything from "bring a picture of your pet to look at" through "look, here's some really gross birth movies to watch" and wrapped up with a dash of "Don't forget to bring all these things with you while you're stuck in a closet for two days."

I fully understand why all this stuff is important - don't get me wrong. And I'm glad to have more information, and generally I feel as though I've moved from "Useless Cavedude" to "Mostly Useless Cheering Cavedude." That's a step up, I guess. After eight hours of that stuff, though, yeesh. Has anyone ever seriously sat down and considered the staggering volume of conflicting messages on this subject?

"Oh, just use the epidural. Everyone does it, it's perfectly safe." vs. "Use only what is medically justified."

"Natural home births with water are the way to go!" vs. "We'll keep you two days in a nice, well-monitored room."

"Use a ball" and "Use a bar" and "Don't lie flat" and "Don't lie on a side that hurts" and "Don't Touch Her Face" and "stroke her hair" and "short quick blowing breaths" and "deep long cleansing breaths" and "massage this" and "don't rub that"  and WHO THE #!$%! SERIOUSLY EXPECTS YOU TO REMEMBER ALL THIS !#$$!? Dear god, people. I still flex in the mirror and make rawr faces when no one's around like every other dude under the age of fifty! (If you claim otherwise, you lie. I will tell you to your face that you lie, too. Once in the past six months, you HAVE flexed with mean-face on. You know it. Move on.) I'm not a friggin doctor! That's the damn doctor's job to know all this crap! I'm still not entirely convinced me, my wife, the baby, or all of the above will not suddenly spontaneously combust or explode in a gory pile that will somehow result in my being at fault and being left to take care of an infant on my own!

Look, amigo. When the day comes, if you're anything like me, you're not a damned cheerleader with a science degree and a pack of fifty friggin plans, subplans, and "focus items." I'm going to be focusing on three tasks:

1) Keep the lunch in the gut while remaining conscious.

2) Don't say or do anything TRULY memorably idiotic.

3) Attempt NOT to beat the hell out of anyone who seems okay with my wife's great and radiating discomfort.

Given how hyper-protective of her I am already (seriously, my driving habits have changed to the degree that it annoys her - there's even an intersection I've started avoiding, I'm coming to realize) I can only imagine that task 3 may require a great deal of personal restraint. If I can actually be supportive or pull off any of the crap they dumped at me in rapid-fire today, I'll consider it absolute proof of the divine. If anyone calls me a "coach" again, though, I may very well punch them. I'm not a friggin fat dude with a whistle and a newspaper, k? I'm dad. Padre. Father. I'm the strength of the pair, the grumpy reliable, the dumb-but-instructable. I'm the hairy half of the team, and I'm going by that title - I'm not going to scream "Drop and give me twenty" at my wife while she's in labor, so don't call me a friggin "coach."

Honestly, I don't think I was the only guy at the end of that 8 hours with a case of "Oh, damn" going on. When you're a dude, you totally recognize there's a pregnancy in progress. Aside from living with a psychopath who suddenly develops a wild, aggressive fetish for cleanliness, she has this fishbowl mounted in the front and occasional serious jonesing for ice cream. It's not hard to notice changes in the air, even for we cave-and-club types. We get it. Really. On one level, though, the entire thing is still a semi-romantic, like-you-see-in-the-movies kind of deal. Twenty minutes of heave-ho counting the commercial break and she's gorgeous again and life goes on.

Fellas, I'm not giving you the rundown, but let's just say it ain't so. I encourage you, for your own sanity and calm, though, to maintain that illusion for the first eight months. The amount of dread of "the day" in the back of my head has skyrocketed. The short version is the moaning/screaming/wailing/beat-hell-out-of-husband part usually runs, if yer lucky, for closer to the full-length-of-Titanic-without-commercials timeframe, not twenty minutes counting an advert for Burger King. If I can manage to not put my wasted college days of silly sports to use on a doctor's head by hour two, I'll be very pleased. I'm of the opinion that if your wife in genuine dire distress for an extended timeframe doesn't give you nightmares, you've got some serious internal conversations to be had about that ring you're wearing.

Amy, thankfully, is rock solid in any situation where I start coming apart, and vice versa. S'good thing, because while she was freaking out yesterday and I calmed her down, today I started to come unglued a bit. (Fellas, your emotions are going to do weird things in the last few months. Just accept it. We have some pretty primal instincts going on too.)  When we were touring the delivery area and the post-partum recovery area (big fancy word that means "after giving birth") I started having a very serious dose of reality check. Pardon my french, but this is pretty much, word for word, what went through my head, along with a wailing klaxon and red flashing lights:

"Uh. A month from now you're back here, and uh, yeah. This shit ain't no game anymore, jack. This is getting seriously real.  A month from now you've got a little ****** (gender deleted) to look after. Here. This hallway. This room. HERE. RIGHT. HERE. YOU. AMY. BABY. Damn."

And it didn't help any that as the tour was going around, there was a seriously stressed-out looking dad-to-be hanging out in the waiting room, scratching his arm nervously for so long I actually noticed the skin raw under his hand. Found myself wondering if I'd see a tour go by a month from now, and if some dude would stare at me, and wonder what was going through MY head. (Probably not. I'll be in a room, beating the screaming jesus out of a doctor, remember?)

Did I mention there were about 30 of us packed into this little room getting information on this tour? Nothing like finding out whether you have claustrophobic or crowd-press issues during all that, right? Meh.

On one hand, I get that this is all normal. I get that I will probably be just fine, that I will keep Amy sane, and will probably not go predator-hostile on a doctor for not instantly making Amy happy, if only because doing so would make Amy UNhappy. I get that, on some level, this "realization of reality" thing I'm doing is also very normal and expectable for dads-to-be, especially at this point in the process.

On the other hand, fellas, knowing any of that stuff won't do you a damn bit of good when your guts start wrenching as you contemplate the staggering reality that soon something will be produced that really will look on you as the shining example of how to be a man. Could be your son who sees you as EXACTLY how to be when he grows up. Could be your daughter who sees you as EXACTLY the kind of man she wants to spend her entire life with. (Yeah, that thought makes my blood run cold, too. I don't know why Amy's insane enough to deal with me - god forbid my child want to deal with someone like me.) Yeah, that phase doesn't last forever. I'm well aware that eventually kids acknowledge their parents as a reality. I'm also aware that despite my deep and abiding dislike of my mother, there ARE traits of hers that I DO evidence on a daily basis, and you DO pass on more of your teachings through role modeling than anything else. (Makes you think twice about scratching yourself in public, don't it?)

I'll probably keep this blog going well beyond the birth of 2.0, even though at this point we're basically down to "1 month to live" as it were. I'd like to think that there may be a few dudes out there who, like me, are going to have some serious headchecks going on, and that this rambly thing may be useful. I'm pretty certain there's a subsection of women -possibly that I know, possibly not- who find this entertaining and possibly interesting as an insight into me.  Hopefully there's a practical tip or two in here, too, for the guys who aren't like me, either because they're made of steel or stone, and aren't affected because they're either too tough or too stupid to be.

(But if you claim to be either, I will call you a liar to your face. Or I'll wait until you take the 8 hour class and show up RIGHT after the birth video. Then we'll see.)

Friggin "deep cleansing breaths" my ass.

-MT out.

Life After Baby?

This is a quickie blog entry, but I suspect this will be one that a lot of guys who read this down the line will empathize with and wonder about. It'll probably be something I blog about after 2.0 joins us in the outside world, too.

I've picked up a new hobby in the last 2-3 months. Very cheesy geek hobby called Battletech. You basically drive this 100-ton walking robot-o'-doom. Jump into an 8-foot tall, 5-foot wife lil' egg with a bajillion screens, buttons, joystick and a throttle, with seven screens of video-game-goodness around you. Guy who introduced me to it is actually mildly famous - in Battletech circles - as quite the pilot. Getting pretty good at it, I am. Every Wednesday night I plunk down m'20 dollars, go romp around for 3-4 hours doing the shooty thing. A tad expensive 

Only problem is that I suspect my hobby will be in both temporal and financial jepoardy once 2.0 comes along. I'd like to think that I'll still have the time and the cash, but can't really know about these things, I suppose. Obviously, when wife enters The Red Zone where birth is imminent, I'm going to skip my Wednesday night to be near Amy. ('cause nothing says "QUALITY DAD" like running an Atlas battlemech around when your wife's in labor, right?)

I imagine a week or two afterwards, I'll have to give it up as well to make sure the wife is okay, and I'm totally fine with that. What I worry about is the longer term. A lot of people say "Once your kid is born your life is over," and indeed that grim prediction is what led to my blog's name. I dunno. The closer I get to "THE BIG DAY" the more I wonder if it's right, though. I absolutely want to be a huge part of my kid's life. Killed me that my back was out and I couldn't help paint 2.0's room or lay in 2.0's new floor.

At the same time, though, I still want to be more than just "2.o's dad." I'm a guy with a lot of talents, and a lot of passions - and I don't think it's wrong that I want to hang on to those. It's funny, but even after 8 months of observations here, I'm still back to the original question: when 2.0 was conceived, did I have 9 months left to live?

Dunno. I'm not morbid or in the least bit unhappy this morning - hell, wife made me cookies, I'm in a great mood! - but I find myself wondering about my future. I'm really happy, for the most part, with how life is going right now, and even an idiot can tell you big change is on the horizon. I know I'll be happy with what I'll gain. I just wonder if I'll be happy with what - if anything - I lose.

...including, potentially, a 100-ton walking robot.

-MT out

The Yellow Zone

So at this point, we're pretty much in the yellow zone as I call it in terms of baby arrival. It's unlikely still at this point, but no longer out of the realm of reasonable possibility. (32 weeks.) I myself was a moderate bit early - 6 weeks - so every time Amy winces and grabs her belly, I cringe. Fellas, in case no one ever told you, seems chicks have this "Braxton-Hicks" thing going on. They're basically fake, warm-up contractions that don't actually hurt, but cause women's eyes to widen and hands to go to their bellies. Great way to freak a fella out, lemme tell ya. I'm not sure if I'm going to be James Bond when the moment for that drive comes, or more "Father of the Bride 2" when the time comes. Feel free to place your bets.

Speaking of freakouts, I've got a mild grouch going with our doc at this point.  I don't think I ever posted on it, but awhile back the doctor saw some strange shadows in the brain of 2.0 (Baby Fletcher's Codename) and sent us to the specialist. Fair call, apparently it can be a flag for UBER BAD STUFF, and so the next day we went. In the 24 hours prior to trip number two, Amy and I were an absolute and total wreck, major basketcase, and anyone at work telling me "scary signs show up during pregnancy and babies are fine all the time" got a polite nod, an ear, and absolutely no mind whatsoever. Turns out nothing was wrong, and that's one thing I'll happily never go through again.

Well, baby doc sent us back to the specialist this week for a heart echo. My freakout level was a lot lower this time, because of the past, and because of the phrase, "Won't affect delivery either way." Went back to the same specialist again, and I swear the guy almost looked annoyed this time. He basically said, in politer terms, that there was almost nothing here to worry about at all. Now I get that the first doctor is just playing it safe, but geez. Shouldn't he be able to, I dunno, make a decision on his own? Do an analysis and figure something out without costing us money to go to someone else? Bah. I'm not advocating reckless behavior with 2.0's life or anything, but c'mon, if the specialist practically gives off "time waste" signals, you'd think the first doctor could make a friggin judgment call once in awhile, eh?

Anyhow, it's cool that 2.0 is healthy and definitely wigglin' around. Amy's belly is a show all its own nowadays.  Amy's had a friend coming over to help with the construction of the baby room the past three weeks. This is cool and all. It's a little frustrating from my point of view, though. I was kinda looking forward to doing dad-type stuff with 2.0's room, and since I blew out my back moving heavy things - something that's still annoying the hell out of me to this day - even standing on a solid surface too long starts to hurt. Yeah, the chiro-dude says I'm healing very quickly, fine, been that way all my life. Still doesn't mean I'm able to help with the fixing-up of my own kid's room. And given what you, oh tolerant reader, know about my feelings towards contribution and being a decent parent, yes, this vexes the hell out of me. Meh. At least Amy doesn't appear to be flagging much. She still looks amazingly well, healthy, and not-fat for a woman 31 weeks along. She's wielding power saws and drill bits with a gleam in her eye, and it at least makes me feel better that she doesn't need me for this kind of thing, despite her pregnant state. Sorta makes me feel better, I guess. Really.

In other news, students have a big friggin test this week. Be nice when that's water under the bridge. Not really too worried; they're well-prepared, but still - something about being held to a vastly higher bar than the rest of the school when it comes to their results is a tad ulcer-inducing at times. ;)

Life goes on. Yellow zone will progress to red zone, and we'll finally find out if 2.0 looks more like mom or dad. Mental note - at some point soon, discuss strange rumors and suggestions I've heard about the goings-on of a baby shower.

Thirty-Two?

So, okay, I suck at life. One blog post in all of January is pretty lame, but I'm writing this one on the second of Feb and I'll try to get two more in despite the short month, figure that makes up for it.

I turned thirty-two a few days ago. I note this not to garner presents or attention (because I really crave neither, although I wouldn't refuse them, mind you) but to note the fact. Thirty two, statistically speaking, means I am now exactly halfway through my expected lifespan. One foot is now in the cradle, and the other in the grave.... or for the less dramatic, neither foot in either one. Eh.

I have a habit of looking back at the previous year around every birthday, and since one of my presents was a nifty electronic picture frame, neatly fixing the problem I've always had with frames (only one picture in the frame sucks) I've been doing more looking back than usual lately. Combined with the sudden re-emergence (if only electronically) of my high school friends, it's been a real trip of self-examination lately. Yeah, I know, I probably do that too much anyhow, but this is as much reflection as examination. I've come to the following conclusions, based on pictures, conversations with high school friends, and general rumination:

1) I've become a lot better person than I used to be, but improving does not mean I grew up. I consider this a good thing.

2) I've been overweight for a lot longer than I care to reflect upon, and done little to change it. I consider this a bad thing.

3) Despite the intensely abnormal nature of my childhood, I have established myself in a surprisingly normal life. I was mildly uneasy about this, but I console myself with the fact that my normal life is about as skewed as a normal life can be before marching off into the realms of, as Dan puts it, "drug fiends, polyamorists, transexuals, and guys who dress like Dr.Who all the time." That's a pretty cool place to be, I suppose.... even if I wonder about the field I'm competing in, there.

So the kid is now 13 weeks away. Two school terms. Less than one full season. Three months to live? I'm not sure I see it that way anymore. I've discovered that every major goalpost in my life so far has been as dramatic as I've caused it to be.  High school graduation, college arrival, college graduation, my first teaching position (the first kid I ever had in my classroom, a moment I expected to be a lifechanging experience, turned out to be in the wrong room, turned around and left - a lesson I've heeded well), my engagement, and my marriage. Now don't get me wrong - I'm not saying they weren't fulfilling, that I wasn't deeply moved, and so on. My life was only so changed as I desired it to be, though, and my existence wasn't completely rewritten. Jesse before engagement was the same guy as afterwards - I had always been genuine to Amy, and I had nothing new to show. Jesse before marriage was the same guy as afterwards - I had no reason to treat Amy differently, and again, my existence, thinking, and living was unchanged. I still get her flowers for no reason, I still fart under the covers, and I still thank her for every meal. A metal band and a rock changes nothing you don't wish it to.

Despite the drama-filled predictions of others, I'm not convinced this next phase will change the person. Jesse the father, if he's been living right, will already BE the role model his child deserves. He won't have to change his behavior, won't have to mind his actions, won't have to come up with explanations for "do as I say, not as I do." Unless I've lived a hypocritical life, I am already the father I should be. (Whether that's a good thing is another entirely different issue. HEH!) Maybe that's the difference - I don't see my life changing because I am that which I wish to be; the role model to my students I would be to my own child. That probably sounds arrogant, but I think the people who know me best will understand. I got hooked on the idea of the knight in shining armor when I was a kid, and - when it really matters - I've always stuck to that ideal.

So yeah. Maybe not three months to live...but three months to life. Not a new life for me, not a new way of living (life is adjusting to change, people, if you're doing it right) but three months until a new life, a third life, a Fletcher 2.0 life. 

That's still a scary thought, but for a whole different set of reasons.

Heh.

Normally I'd sign out here, but I have a small confession to make - I fibbed a little at the start. I've been meaning to write another blog, but I've been avoiding it like mad because the subject makes me a bit leery. I'm a very, very big follower of the ideology of "Keep your religion and your politics private" - but I suspect I won't be the only dad-to-be who lives in Texas and knows that his religious views differ from the vast majority of the native population. So right now I'm torn on the subject, and it's been keeping me off the blogger. I'm fully aware of the fact that I have coworkers who read this thing, and I'd rather avoid the risk of being treated differently for my politics or my religious beliefs. Don't know that it would happen - betting not - but I've heard of careers being shot down for dumber reasons, and well, the ambition bone is starting to twinge again, and I think the classroom and I may part ways within the next three years or so, if I have my way.

So I'm still weighing that subject, just as I'm turning over my thoughts on teaching religion to my kid, and wondering if I should really air them or not. I'd like to believe this country is one where all views can be respected, but while we all talk the talk, I'm not sure we all walk the walk.

And the wife's home, and I've got nothing else to say, so....

-MT out. 

Tough.

Some of my blog posts are more rant and less new-father related, but this one, I suspect, will be a bit more handy for dads-to-be.

The end of the term is coming in scholastic-land, and as I always do, I run kind of a mental self-check of what I've accomplished in a particular term, from a variety of perspective: quality of teaching, value of assignments, number of exams, yada yada. Also do a general survey of life as I know it, kind of a way of keeping one's self in touch with reality, if you will. This time, though, I came across some uncomfortable truths: I have been WAY below my game lately. Embarassingly such.

Now I'm well aware that I'm a perfectionist, and I've been told more than once in my life that I push myself way, way too hard when it's something I care about. I don't deny that - but I also can't deny my nature, either, so I just kind of shrug and move on. My lessons haven't sucked, but the assignments have been well below par and not enough of 'em. I've got an eighth grade research project that is scaling way out of my intended plan.  I've got a seventh grade project I had to abandon as a result of upcoming TAKS, and I had the naive idea about helping out my department that I've not been able to get running at all, that I'm sure makes me look quite the jackass after asking about it.

Don't get me wrong - this isn't an "oh, poor me" post. I'm not happy about it, but I'm more interested in why. It's not like I picked up an addiction to Austrian hashish or discovered my great and undying love of the bottle. Since I have no new concrete changes in my life, I have to assume it's something intangible. 

And yeah, THAT one is fairly obvious. I didn't really consider the whole "baby on the horizon" thing as a major change in my life pre-birth. Maybe that was naive of me, or maybe all guys do it, I dunno. Realistically, very little has changed for me - I have to watch out for Amy a bit more, but the "knight in shining armor" motif tattooed inside my head has been making me do that since I met her.  I moved some furniture out of one room so we could start prepping it. (Yeah, "nesting" is definitely underway around here.)

Otherwise, life physically hasn't changed much - but I'm coming to realize that all those times I spend boggling over WHAT-IS-TO-COME may be

A) unhealthy mentally

and

B) time wasting.

And sure, okay, it's probably entirely normal on both parts - but that doesn't mean you can't strive to fix it. What I'm coming to realize is that I have entirely and completely crap means of stress relief. I'm well aware that I barely had enough for being a healthy teacher to begin with - this added stress is absolutely nuking me. So fellows, here's a big starting tip of advice:

Make sure you've got some major, significant form of stress relief already going on in your life before she gets pregnant. More than you think you actually need. And uh, don't rely on what couples do naturally as your first and only form, because that whole system gets a little erratic as well.  Plan your stress relief in a non-caloric, non-chemical for, or you'll do some pretty major damage to yourself at a time you need to be tip-top.

Also - don't neglect your sleep. Too little sleep means more stress. Even if the reason you're neglecting sleep is because the wife is going to bed earlier and it's your chance for peace and quiet and contemplation (in whatever form you prize and treasure that in, heh.) You'll pay for it more in fatigue the next day.

Stress, by the way, makes you tolerate the wife less - and even though they're massively internally focused right now (as well they should be) they're also hypersensitive to their environment. Probably some ancient defense mechanism, but it means they'll notice you are more irritable, and that doesn't help you, them, or the bun.

If it sounds like I'm speaking from experience, well...heh.

Anyone got any relatively short-duration, cheap stress-relief methods?

MT out.