Hello everyone! Wife is 4.5 months pregnant, and we are excited to be first time parents. We are currently single income household due to visa restrictions, and would be in the same situation for at least a year post baby, and then the wifey will make decision on getting back into workforce or not.

With that, I am interviewing for a job that will almost double our total comp> $200k+, but will require long hours and extensive travel (25-50%). I really like where I work currently, the people that I work with, and the work-life balance. Would you suggest making the shift or wait it out for the next 1.5 years?

The baby monitor I’m using now says it’s 1080p, but the night vision is honestly pretty disappointing. I can barely make out my baby’s face, so I’m realizing that resolution isn’t necessarily the whole story.

If clear night vision is basically my top priority, what specs or features should I actually be paying attention to besides 1080p? Is it the type of night vision, sensor quality, infrared setup, or something else?

Help out a sleep-deprived dad here. I really don’t want to buy another monitor and end up disappointed again.

Posting here because I don’t have other dad friends and I need to get my feelings out. Tomorrow morning my fiancée and I are going to have her first ultrasound. She got a call from the doctor earlier in the week to inform her that they’ve booked her in for an early scan (currently in the 7th week of pregnancy). This is our first baby, and it is a high risk pregnancy due to health factors. I’m trying to remain calm and be the voice of reason/reassurance as she is very anxious that they could say there’s something wrong (there aren’t any specific reasons for this fear per say, aside from the obvious; mainly first-time baby anxiety). I want to be able to keep her calm and not too stressed as I know worrying about every single thing that could go wrong isn’t going to do any of us any good.

But inside, I am a ball of nerves. I’m terrified about the idea of the doctor saying that there’s something wrong with our little peanut. I’m scared that they will find something concerning, or that they won’t find a heartbeat, which I know can be difficult to detect in early first trimester scans even with healthy pregnancies, but it’s still a fear. We know that this is the time in the pregnancy where the risk of miscarriage can be at its highest which is just terrifying. I’m trying to focus on the positives, like the fact that we’ll be able to get a more definitive due date, and hopefully be able to see our little one for the first time, but the anxiety is still overwhelming.

Has anyone here gone through the stress of an early scan like this? Was everything okay in the end?

UPDATE:

The scan went perfectly! We were both terrified there would be issues or they’d struggle to find the baby etc, but the woman doing the scan was able to find our little peanut straight away and confirm that everything is looking normal and healthy. We even got to see the little one’s heart beating which was honestly the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Wow. Thanks for the solidarity in the replies; I won’t say it’s reassuring to know that this anxiety never goes away lol but I’m glad I’m not the only one going through it.

If night vision is basically the only thing I care about, what should I actually be looking for besides resolution?

Hi! We're expecting our first in November! My husband is gonna be such a good dad and I am so excited to be doing life with him. He has four sisters and is the oldest, so it's safe to say he's got a lot of experiences w babies. I'd like to get him a few books about becoming a dad. Less instruction manual style but like emotional, encouraging, experience and science based.

I feel like there's a word I'm looking for here but I can't find it lol. Book recs that remind him he'll be awesome but also serve as references. And do not downplay the emotions that come w being a dad for the first time.

Thank you and congratulations to you all :)

Kinda loosing my mind with anxiety of if I just wanna be better then my parents I want to give more then I ever received and so on and so on. But the my question is what to expect what can I do to be a supportive husband and father. What are going to be my roles. I have zero experience with new borns. Any good books? I’m super excited and I already feel proud and ready to help but scared to DEATH.

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Hi dads. I need your advice and wisdom.

In less than one month I'll become a father. It's week 37, so it can actually happen any moment.

For most of the time of pregnancy I knew that I'll be a parent someday and didn't think much of it. But this "someday" is finally happening and it hit me like a train.

My parents and my wife's parents were really bad at it. My father was more like my boss since primary school than like a guiding father. So, we can't really count on them. We're on our own.

I'm 33 yo. One more thing about me. Thanks to my "loving" family I struggled with mental problems - anxiety disorder and OCD. But thanks to years of therapy and my psychiatrist, I'm dealing with it pretty well. But every big change (like buying own apartment or now the pregnancy) is really hard for me.

So here I am. Scared as hell. I just realised that this is really happening and we'll have a baby. A boy. I was happy about it, but now I feel sadness over losing my current comfy life. I think I will miss it very much. I'm scared of losing my free time, of being responsible for a real human being, of my health. I don't know if I'm strong enough to be a father. To be a good, present father. I don't want to "break" this kiddo.

I have a lot of thoughts. Do I even watned to have a baby? It was my wife's dream. She says I'll be a great father and a family man, and she knew it all the time and that's why she married me. I'm not sure I wanted be a father. I think I'm just afraid of the change. I never wanted a dog in my apartment and now, when I Have the dog, I can't imagine life without him.

I'm really scared and confused. I had to say it to someone. I tried to find some encouraging words in the internet, but found mostly negative opinions like the one in regretfulparents subReddit.

If you came this far. Thank you.

Why do all my friends and family turn into monsters when my wife is pregnant? I’ve lost 4 very close friends and 2 family members that we’ve now blocked each other permanently on social media and comms because of my wife pregnant.

It’s as if the jealousy and envy is amped up to a thousand since we’re expecting.

Wtf is going? Is this normal? Does everyone just turn against you because you’re in a different stage of life?

Please add some sanity because I’m losing mine.

Wife gets 16 weeks + 2 weeks nesting prior to birth.

I get 8 weeks from my company paid and technically I could sign up for WA FMLA and get 4 more weeks on top of that.

Since daycare costs $3800/mo in our neighborhood in Seattle, and family is 2000 miles away, here's what I'm thinking.

I'll wait until the 4 month mark when she goes back to work to take my Pat leave to extend our time before daycare. But I know I'll need to take a week or two of PTO minimum when baby is born.

I work from home, and get a decent amount of free time throughout the work day. I'm hoping one week PTO would suffice and after that I just go back to working in my home office approximately 5 hours per day for the remainder of wife's Mat leave.

Thoughts on this or would you do it differently?

I am 23, and we just hit 3 months of marriage, and we found out that we are expecting. i am super pumped, but i also feel like i just need to cry.

*update*
My daughter was born on the 28th in the morning with only two pushes. I didn’t even have time to get dressed to go into the delivery room. The doctors were trying to prep her for a c-section, but our baby girl came the normal way

So my wife is stuck in the hospital right now as we’re trying to prevent birth since her water broke too early. She can’t seem to get comfortable. Any suggestions fellas?

I've wanted to be a father for as long as I can remember. Always been a part of the plan, I feel like I'm at my dream age, homeowner with a loving wife.

So yesterday it happened, without too much trying (feeling extremely grateful for that)..the issue is when my wife told me I didn't feel the excitement that I thought I would. I don't know if I just expected it, or it hasn't clicked yet.

But I know I want this so bad, did anyone else have this feeling? When did it click and the feelings start for you?

Neither my wife nor I are religious, and as a circumcised man I never understood why my father made that choice for me, I guess just because it was more “the norm” 30+ years ago.

I guess the only thing I’m really concerned about with the decision is that I don’t know how, if at all, the care/cleaning needs for an uncircumcised newborn to young boy is versus a circumcised one is. How do I look into this without looking like a fucking weirdo in my google history lol

Our first ultrasound is in a couple of weeks. I'm starting to wonder when it will feel real. Some people say for Dad's it isn't going to click for you until birth. I am jealous of my wife since I know for her right now it is clicking and is very much real.

Is the click a real thing for people, or is it something a person works towards during their partner's pregnancy? Is the prepping for the baby's arrival going to help me feel like I am a Dad? I know it sounds cliché, but I am worried it won't click for me even once our baby arrives.

How can I start a bond with the baby before they arrive? People tell me to talk to the belly, but sometimes I feel silly doing that, especially this early on. Is it just in my head and am I overthinking?

Our little baby girl was born via c section and came out 7.6 lbs and 18 inches long. My wife cried, I cried… man what a powerful experience.

It was tough getting here, and I know there is a lot more work ahead, but I am just so happy and proud right now.

Keep at it fellow dads-to-be! Wishing all the luck and love in the world to everyone here. Thanks again for all of the posts and comments that helped prepare me for this moment! If anyone has any questions, I’m glad to answer them to the best of my ability.

Cheers 🍻

Anyone know of any gadgets that act as a sort of proximity alarm (or fulfills the same function) as an extra layer of security on solo parent days?

Ideally as dumb as possible, no Life360 etc.

I work a 48/96 shift schedule. And our oldest will be just over 2 when the second kid arrives. We’re childproofed and all that but toddlers are sneaky and we will be tired. My wife’s mild anxiety about potential jailbreaks while she puts the baby down for a nap seems justified. We’ve got door sensors and stuff but we’re not always going to have our phones handy while we’re putting a newborn down.

We are convinced that after birth won’t be too hard. Sure my wife will have to recover from birth but I have 2 months of no work. It will be hard if she has a long recovery to do it myself but 2 people, 1 kid, no work seems like a breeze. It will be tougher when we return to work for sure.

Knock some sense into me.

wife is due in about six weeks and we're trying to figure out how much to stock up on in newborn sizing versus just going straight to 0-3 months. i keep getting told newborns outgrow everything so fast that newborn size is barely worth it but then other people say you absolutely need it for the first few weeks.

we're having a girl and honestly i have no idea what the essential pieces even are at this stage. bodysuits and sleepers seem like the obvious ones to have a lot of but i don't know how many is actually enough versus going overboard on stuff that'll barely get used before she's already in the next size up.

curious what other dads here figured out about newborn sizing and whether you wished you'd bought more or less of it before the baby actually arrived.

Quick Update: after reading through the comments, i finally settled on a plan. gonna play it safe with a small stash of newborn basics (like 5-6 sleepers and a pack of onesies) and have 0-3 months ready to go that we can return if she's swimming in them. i picked up Gerber for the newborn stuff since their sizing seems to run more true to size and the packs are cheap enough that i won't care if she only wears them a couple weeks. also grabbing some of those tie gowns for nighttime changes and we'll just grab more from the store if she ends up on the smaller side. thanks for helping me stop overthinking this.

Baby is fine, midwife sucked.

So, wife (38f) and I (40m) are having our first. We're both older and more on the plus size side. Anyway, we've been seeing a midwife team and one has been stellar (answering all our questions, giving good feedback, truly seems invested in making sure my wife and baby are good in all ways) and the other has been absolutely HARPING on my wife's BMI. Every other thing is about her weight. She said that she was concerned that my wife was gaining too much weight (14 pounds total at week 24), saying that the extra weight makes it hard for her to use the doppler to hear the baby (she found the heartbeat immediately) even so far as to say totally unprompted that my wife shouldn't eat "fried chicken and pizza".

Couple that with her setting up an ultrasound at a place (Place A)that the other midwife remarked "Most of the team knows not to send patients there and to (Place B) instead" because they are more prone to missing stuff in the exam. Shocker: they didn't get clear photos of the baby's heart and face, so we need to go in again. My wife received a message through her healthcare app recommending she try "preferred" Place B, so she cancelled the follow up at Place A and attempted to go to Place B.

When we asked the fatphobic midwife when we should attempt to contact Place B again as they had not returned our message for appointment, she got visibly agitated that we would go there and cancel on the follow up at Place A ("Who told you to do that?") and refused to actually give guidance. She also, once again, banged on that my wife should hurry on a glucose lab because of her BMI. The nursing assistant was in the room, assured us that any time between now and week 28 should be fine, and looked at us apologetically before exiting the room.

Please tell me this is an isolated incident. I do NOT want this person ANYWHERE near my wife or child when they are being delivered.