The baby was born. Our baby. It was a boy. We named him Lionel.
Lionel was delivered at a hospital. I don’t know why we say babies are ‘delivered’. I can’t think of a more misleading way to describe the process.
Everyone at the hospital did their job. For all their shortcomings, hospitals at least seem to be full of people who can more or less do the job they’ve been trained to do.
I was expecting bad things from midwives. They practice midwifery, which sounds cruel and pre-modern. They were just fine.
The local government nurses have also been good. They visit you when you have a baby, weigh him and leave literature about breastfeeding and SIDS.
Like most people working with babies now, our nurse was highly enthusiastic about breastfeeding, even to the point of suggesting we not keep formula as a back-up. “It’s like having chocolate in the fridge: too tempting”, she said.
This didn’t sit well with me, but I think I’ll write about it at a later time, after some more reflection. Challenging the value of breastfeeding seems to invite hostility which I’m not in the mood for.
Anyway, we seem to be doing everything correctly, mostly. His sleeping and eating patterns appear consistent with everything I’ve heard and read.
There is exhaustion but also joy, which I hadn’t factored in. (That is all I will write about joy on this blog, which will have a narrow, technical focus).
I have delayed the full implementation of my parenting philosophy.
Actually, I don’t really have a parenting philosophy. I read two books, Baby Love and Things they never tell you. They were both helpful and useless in their own way. Lots of tips, but nothing doctrinaire.
Three minutes out
I like some bits of all of them, but there’s usually one thing for each that rules it out. This attachment parenting looks interesting, say, but we are not co-sleeping. I fall asleep next to him sometimes but this is not the same.
I will keep searching.
papabendi 
As an unlikely father of seven children under the age of 12 (you would think an honors degree from UNSW would have curbed my reproductive desire) I have had a go at many of these parenting doctrines.
My favorite is the ‘take-it-easy-the-kid-will-tell-you-what-he/she-needs’ approach. “Needs” being the operative word.
I have had all my kids breastfed up to the age of 1-2 and they all grew just fine. It seems to satisfy the needs of my wives and children and whilst it’s invonvenient for me I decided not to get in between the mothers milk and babies. It’s much much safer to fathers.
I have endured countless hours of dribble from parents who have control issues dressed up in parenting theorem and I prefer my own childrens dribble.
I react to “authorities” who have only bred with one with one partner in one country in one community in one socio-(non) religious – economic – cultural setting but I save myself and my children from reacting to my own children.
Children are thank God children and the projection of adult-thromorphic (term still in therapy) behaviors is confusing to everybody when more often than not a smile, a giggle, or a grin will most definitely do.
Finally when the panic sets in count to ten, breathe deeply and recall the scent of jasmine on a warm spring evening (I visualize walking around the Kaaba (black box) in Mecca – but whatever works for you definitely will work for Lionel).
I know you didn’t ask for this but
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Thanks, man. I got to ‘approve’ this comment as the ‘moderator’. It made me feel powerful. I could have put you in Spam. Luckily, I have a child to satisfy my need to dominate others, so I let your comments stand 😉 The truth is – and no doubt it’s the truth for everyone – I won’t be able to follow through with everything I think is the best. So much will be out of my hands. Obviously, my reflections on philosophy will be a little tongue-in-cheek. I think I’m more or less in the ‘take-it-easy-the-kid-will-tell-you-what-he/she-needs’. But I won’t think about walking around the Kaaba until the Saudis learn something about events management!
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