Me & the Kiddo

We have a whole lot of friends that are preparing or have recently had children of their own and I have been asked - "What's fatherhood like?" Well, for those of you that know it's like like nothing else - it's worrisome, it's stressful but by far it's the most amazing, rewarding, awe-inspiring, joyful and love-filled experience I have ever had, and it's something new every day.

So I thought that I would take this opportunity to discuss my approach to fatherhood and why I think it works for us. I think that taking every opportunity to be as involved in my daughter's life is important, and I guess that's sort of my philosophy - be as involved as possible. Do whatever I can to spend as much time as possible with my child: take her along with me for runs in the evening, change dirty diapers, put her to bed at night, watch soccer games on weekend mornings.

So what do you get out of doing all these things some might ask. Well, I think that the advantages/benefits of being involved include a lot of the following: I build trust just by being there - which becomes a foundation for other aspects of the parent/child relationship, i.e. discipline, respect; I create an 'individual' relationship with my child, and it gives us the opportunity to discover one another's personality; we can find shared interests; it gives me an opportunity to provide him/her with an example of how they should act; and lastly (but definitely not least - just ask Brittany) it gIves mom some "me" time.

So what does this involvement include? It, really doesn't have to be anything over the top ... just spend time with your kids. What is it that I do that I find rewarding - we go for a run in the afternoon/evenings, watch soccer on weekend mornings, go play on the golf course, I put her to bed, etc ... just spend time together!

I think it is also very important to talk about your role/expectations with your significant other. When you can clearly define what you expect your role to be and what your significant other expects your role to be it makes it a whole lot easier to meet everybody's expectations. It also opens up the dialogue for later.

Every person has their own style of parenting and I'm not here to tell people that they should do this, or do that when it comes to raising your child. I just wanted to take this opportunity to tell people about how we do it and why I think that some of the things we do works. Take it as you will. Hopefully you read this and find something to think about. I'm no expert. I've only been at this for a year and a half - and in the grand scheme of things that's not real long. I understand that. That being said, I've had friends ask me what it's like being a father so I thought I'd pass along what I've learned from my experience.