Guest Blog

It was 2:30am, and the living room, with the exception of a smartphone clicking and a page of a book turning, was silent. Occasionally, you could hear the sound of a four-week old baby, sucking to get a bit of nutrition from her mother, who was checking Facebook to stay awake and talking with me as I flipped through a book for my research.

Because I am working on researching the folklore of first-time fathers, I sleepily crack jokes that I should be taking field notes with each feeding. Eventually, the beeping sound of the bottle warmer lures me into the kitchen, where my daughter’s tube-fed supplement awaits.

The tube was a huge relief to us when introduced by the nurses; finding out that our daughter had to be given supplemental formula during nursing periods was an issue that deeply affected us as new parents. Self-identifying as big proponents of breastfeeding, we had hoped to never have to utilize any form of formula; we feared, like many a parent, that it would lead to the obesity and allergy struggles that affected both of us into adulthood. Furthermore, as graduate students on a small income, having to purchase more each week put a fear of financial struggle into our minds.

As our daughter’s weight shifted up and down over time, we found ourselves asking a lot of questions: Why does the lady over there have a problem with too much milk, yet my wife has to take several fenugreek pills a day? Why is there no consistent set of advice about what to do?

Most of all, we asked ourselves: what did we do wrong?

I struggled to keep my feet on the ground for my wife and daughter; there were many days where I couldn’t, in fact, stay up any longer with them during feedings, and many a night where my daughter simply wouldn’t fall asleep in my care. It wasn’t that my daughter didn’t like her papa so much as that the relationship between her and her mama was something unique that, in spite of trying to replicate it, could never be replaced.

As time went by, I realized that I had a unique role in her life. She knows that I can’t provide her with the same food and contact as her mama, but she is starting to realize that her papa has the ability to nurture her with just as much care. The learning process is gradual, and part of being her father is to trust said process.

Some fathers I know joke about the notion of a “papa bear instinct,” in which our actions are very protective; as time goes by, I’ve discovered that such actions can be very involuntary. For example, my wife was trying to feed our daughter in public, and our daughter, due to the weird positioning of the seat, wasn’t having the easiest time finding a good latch and ended up crying quite loudly in a coffee shop. A man in line for his drink began to look at us with a fixated look of disgust, and my first instinct was to look back at him to imply “Please give us space; my wife has every right to nurse in public.” He quickly turned around, and privacy was ours again. Thankfully, it hasn’t happened since, but my wife and I have talked in great detail about it; she asks me to help her feel comfortable with nursing in times and places where it is feeling compromised.

I don’t have many opportunities to talk with other fathers, but the dialogue that does take place often reveals a similar message: we did not physically give birth to our children but that does not mean that we can be physically absent from our kids’ lives. The same applies to the support we give to our partners and spouses; sometimes we all need to stay up together to get the baby fed. Sometimes that phrase is metaphorical, and other times it is quite literal. But, all of the time, it has to be on our mind in order to show others how such a partnership can work.

Our author, Nic, baby Mari, and wife Jen