Hi Dads,

I made a post over in !fedigrow@lemm.ee about possibly consolidating the many dad groups down to just one (at least for now) to encourage activity.

The general consensus was that we focus discussion over at !fatherverse@midwest.social because, among some other reasons, it’s the only community that seems to have an active mod.

I hope you’ll join me in posting over there!

Hello dads,

I'll be a dad myself shortly, and it's entirely planned, we discussed the idea and then worked towards making it happen. My wife is over the moon and loving the whole process and I'm struggling to see it as a positive change. All I'm seeing is more bills and tasks.

I want to be excited and enthusiastic during the pregnancy (and of course afterwards) but I'm struggling to see this as a positive change for our next - at least - 5 years.

It's causing some stress between my wife and I, when really I'd much prefer we were bonding now in preparation for the stress our relationship is going to need to endure after the baby arrives.

I guess this is partly just venting, I feel like anyone I know that I might say this to, would think I'm a bad person considering it was entirely planned and now I'm not feeling it after its too late to undo, but if anyone has some ideas on how I can focus more on the positives (I do see them... watching their personality growing, seeing the world from their fresh perspective, a sense of investment in the future, etc. I just struggle to focus on them) of this and less on the incoming bills and sleepless night and relationship stress, so my wife and I can bond, it'd mean a lot to me.

I'm also concerned that I'm seeing the baby as a problem instead of a... Source of joy? and that this might mean I don't really have a natural parental instinct, so I won't love it like I should, but instead see it as a series of chores and costs and problems.

I just became dad last month. So from more experienced fathers: What are best ways to express love to your family?

I was laid off earlier this month from my job as an HVAC service tech due to lack of work, a first in the 8 years I've been in the industry. I'm looking for work but the mild winter in California has made my job obsolete until it gets hot and I'm feeling ROUGH.

My wife became pregnant with our second child last month, and my hours have been slashed since last October, so money is tight, and our relationship is strained.

I'm considering a career change but I have a couple thousand dollars worth of specialized tools and experience that I'm loathe to put aside. I'm feeling hopeless and I just wanted to reach out to other dads to vent and see if there's other ideas out there.

Can I just say, I’m really happy how successfully my kids appreciate a huge variety of foods, and I’ll pat myself on the back for part of it.

We had a bit of a rough start with one kid allergic to everything and the other just not eating. Now they’re teenagers and not only know how to eat healthily, but enjoy a huge variety from many cuisines (and are almost at my level for hot sauce)

Today one kid was home and he thoroughly enjoyed:

• breakfast: cilbir
• lunch: pupusas with avocado mash (and when I offered my hot sauce selection, he picked ghost pepper sauce!!!!)
• dinner: tuna steak and halloumi over salad in a sesame dressing with nori

At my house: dinner around the world!

Edit: or maybe I need to rephrase …. As Americans with no other cultural heritage and whose families eat “American” food, my kid in one day had food inspired by Mediterranean cuisine, Central American, and Asian. Polished his plate and asked for more!

Feels like yesterday I had a two year old and a newborn. And yet, here I am planning their third and first birthdays. Where does the time go?

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/11775142

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.owenfromcanada.bedtime

For your toddler, or for you! Customize your routine from a list of options, and enjoy the cute icons, fun sounds, and general dopamine of accomplishment.

I created this app for my daughter, who thrives on routine but was having a rough time getting to bed at night. It's not the most polished, but she loves it and maybe someone else will too!

Later this month we’ll be taking our 2.5 year old daughter to Disney World.

Any dad tips? Or any fun Disney stories?

If so we should revive it

I wanted to be one of the first to wish all of you dads a Happy 2024. May you do great dad things this year, and every year!

Over Christmas my oldest who is six months pregnant brought with her a home heart monitor device that lets you hear the baby's heart. I heard my granddaughters heart for the first time the other day and yeah, happy tears!

Mind sharing any piece of advice that you felt particularly useful? Thank you in advance. I’m so excited!

Let’s get some conversation going, and share the laughs.

It's surreal. I am sitting here with her sleeping on my lap as mom gets some much needed rest.

It’s bittersweet

We're trapped indoors for the weekend due to a hurricane, so we've put an intermittent screen time limit on the kids (two under tens). They can stare at screens for an hour, then they need to spend a couple of hours doing something else.

My wife and I are both adhering to the same rules and it's good. There's a natural time to spend time together, and some time on our own.

Over the weekend my wife snapped a few pictures of our 22mo running around splashing in a lake wearing nothing except a shirt and a swim diaper. My wife was quite taken aback when she uploaded the photo to Facebook, and had the picture removed for nudity / inappropriate content. We all rolled our eyes and figured this was just an overtrained AI being an overtrained AI, but it's got me wondering - is this attire getting to the point at this age where it really is inappropriate, and I'm just too fuzzed out from taking care of babies to notice? Curious to hear ya'lls thoughts.

Our daughter started potty training right before she was 2, and took to it pretty easily. I know boys tend to be more of a challenge, but we're just not sure what to do at this point.

Our son started potty training around 2 y 2 months, and it started off going well. He was bottomless at home and mostly doing well. Unfortunately because he's also in preschool/daycare, he was coming home with 1-3 soiled sets of clothes a day. As 2 months wore on, he kept having more and more accidents. If he's wearing anything down there, he would just say "it's a diaper enough" and wasn't even telling us.

So, we're in a reset. He's back in diapers, and for the first few days he would still tell us when he needs to go, but now he's stopped doing that. At this point I'm worried that this reset has caused him to care even less when we start back up (in about 2 weeks).

Any similar experiences? Ideas?

I just found out that my wife got some Narcan for my kid’s first aid kit and I was all like WTF? Turns out Naloxone is being recommended to everyone in the US as a just-in-case life saving med and is now available over the counter. It can even be gotten for free in many states (USA), which is apparently how she got it.

Where you aware of this or already have some in your first aid kit?

You find community based distribution info for your state (USA) with this website: https://nextdistro.org/naloxone

Hey all,

We are expecting our first at the end of September, and we are tired and scared and stressed. I have been looking for dad groups locally but haven't found any. Just reading through a few posts here and I feel less alone. Thank you.

Ever since we've had kids, my usual laid back attitude has been replaced with increasing stress and anxiety. I feel like I manage it well enough, but at the same time I find myself becoming more and more of a hermit.

I need to get out more (run club once a week right now), and I always feel better when I do, but I also feel guilty for leaving the wife with the kids, or not spending time with them, by doing things for myself.

What do you to balance yourself and your family?

My son is 4 and is now randomly saying I love you to me and my wife, and at other times giving us proper tight hugs. We are so buzzing about it. Ever since he was born we have been doing that to him as neither of us got it growing up so wanted to show him all the time that he is loved, and it really feels like all that effort and work is really paying off as he is such an emotional and lovely boy.

Just wanted to share as a super proud dad...