Life changes constantly. True. But sometimes it changes more noticeably, or more dramatically than usual. Mine took that more dramatic kind of turn a little over three weeks ago, when my son was born. And of course, a couple of common phrases popped into my head and onto some conversations, and I thought of leaving a register of my early reactions.

“Your priorities change”

Not my case. Maybe because my wife and I discussed this for a long, long time after we were dead set on not having children; maybe because a lot of what I’ve been doing for a while now relates to this decision… who knows. But the truth of the matter is that I don’t think my priorities have changed at all. Time will tell whether they are in the right order (whatever right ends up meaning), but I feel fine with where they are.

“It feels unreal”

Quite the opposite. It feels hyper-real. Now that things have settled a bit, I’ve grown more accustomed to that sense of hyper-reality, but I can still tap on its novelty and compare with how I felt before. It’s as if I can and not merely must take care of “grown up” stuff. Not that I didn’t take care of that stuff before, but it’s the disposition, the “can” part that’s sort of new. I used to second guess myself a bit more. Now (or so far) it feels like I can make decisions on the spot way more quickly and just roll with it.

“Time works differently now”

Absolutely true. I think we didn’t get a super difficult baby, just a regular dificult one. He sleeps for stretches of three hours and then wakes up for about an hour. We can sleep at night when we take turns and we do feel more or less rested. Before we did that, it felt like one really long, extenuating day since his birth day. It’s weird.

“It’s a kind of love you can’t explain”

Not really. I was lucky enough to feel the bond from the moment he was born. I know it’s normal for that bond to take a while to form, especially for fathers, and that “delay”1 can lead to feelings of inadequacy and guilt, and I’m thankful I did not have to deal with that. But what I feel for him, even if it’s a “new” kind of love, it does borrow a lot from the love I’ve felt for other people and pets (yes, pets, especially my cat) throughout my life. In fact, maybe a hot take, I honestly believe that loving my cat has prepared me to love my son.

This might not be the last time a write about this topic. But that’s all I have to say at the moment.

  1. I don’t think there’s a right schedule. It’s just a way of putting it. ↩︎