Dad Tips: Week 22

It's fun to read baby books. You get to learn all about placental placement, vaginal discharge, nipple discomfort...and there's stuff for the ladies, too!

KIDDING!

But the best part is the dad tips. Every weekend there's a new lesson on how not to be an asshole. Based on the tips...there's lots of assholes out there. From the week 22 chapter in Your Pregnancy Week by Week:

When you ride together in the car with your partner [ed. note: not business partner. Wife], ask if you can help in any way. You may offer to assist her getting in and out of the car...Ask if she needs help adjusting her seat belt or the car seat.

...because she's going to be HUGE.

Yep, sorry husband. The days of abandoning your wife in the car as you run into the house to catch the last five minutes of the Bears game OH MY GOD THE BEARS ARE 3RD AND 4 WITH 1 MINUTES 50 TO GO IN THE FOURTH are gone. Even if you promise yourself you'll go grab her during the first commercial break, you know you'll forget. And she'll remain there, wasting away in the car, trapped in the leather bucket seats that - let's be honest - haven't gotten a guy laid since 1986. Her desperate honking will slow as the night goes on, but you can't hear it. You've lost yourself in a Jon and Kat Plus Eight marathon. Yeah, you tell you're wife you only watch the show for her, but we all know that's a lie. Hell, if it wasn't for Jon and Kate and Property Virgins, you and your wife wouldn't have spoken since the day you left the city and bought you McMansion in Bolingbrook. One episode turns to two which turns to 4 and, just like every tuesday, you're asleep in the chair.

And tomorrow, when you patiently wait at the breakfast table for your eggs, it'll start to dawn on you that you haven't seen your wife in a while. Your eyes go round with panic.

You couldn't have.

You did.

So yeah. Open the door for your wife. You'll thank yourself later.

Dad Tip #1

I've been so inspired by all the helpful fathering books out there, I thought I'd pass along the knowledge I've gleaned from them - free of charge.

Be sure to tell your wife if you're worried that she'll love the baby more than you. She'll understand your concern and appreciate your honesty. And if she doesn't, she's probably just hormonal.

Fear the Cheese Baby

Everything was going pretty well with the whole pregnancy thing. We ("we") had emerged from the nausea-full first trimester, skipping merrily into the glory that is the second trimester, looking forward to three months free of sick and full of energy.

It was all going to be great.

Or so we thought. You see, around week 19, our baby has apparently started to coat (him)(her)self in a greasy white substance that, apparently, is not unlike goat cheese. I love goat cheese.

I used to love goat cheese.

And so that's almost fine. I mean, I can just pretend that the cheese isn't happening and focus on things like the development of toes and fingers. But then I discovered that sometimes the cheese, it doesn't go away. Sometimes the doctor can pull a baby from it's uterine home and pass it to the parents, cheese and all. Just a little wet burrito covered in a cocktail of amniotic fluid, baby pee, and goat cheese. I don't think I can handle that.

Actually, it kind of makes me think that a water birth might be the way to go. Think about it:

• Self cleaning: straight from the womb to a tub. Niiiiice.
• Only the strong survive: if the baby can swim, cool. If not...well, nobody ever said Darwinism was easy.
• No better way to make friends than to be the kid with a pool.
  

Whether it's a water birth or just a towel birth, something needs to be done. Nobody wants a cheese baby.