The Baby Workout - Now on DVD

Yesterday was the first full day of my 10-week odyssey as a stay-at-home father. By all accounts, it was a good day, as measured by the extent to which my son is still alive. Call it a hunch, but I believe that my son's continued metabolic activity is a positive first step in our evolving relationship.

In addition to the milestone of my progeny's survival, I came away from yesterday with an important realization: babies are heavy. At four months, my son tips the scales at about 17 pounds--big for his age, but not that heavy compared to, say, Wisconsin. But try carrying around a 17-pound bundle of squirming joy all day, and let me know how your body feels the next morning.

I woke up this a.m. wondering if perhaps I had driven to the gym sometime during the night and lifted weights for five hours, returning home and crawling back into bed only after I was certain I had sufficiently broken down enough muscle tissue to ensure that I couldn't move for several weeks. Or something like that. The point is, I woke up this morning and, ridiculous as it might seem, I was sore simply from carrying around my son yesterday. I feel like a total pussy.

Given the aches I'm saddled with today, I'm considering one of two possibilities: 1) my son has a dense lead-iron-chromium alloy endoskeleton that makes him considerably heavier than 17 pounds, but somehow these metals' magnetic properties trick the scale's needle into stopping at 17, or 2) I am a total pussy. Don't tell anyone, but I think it's #2, because our pediatrician has assured me that my son is not the Terminator. (I predict, however, that the first thing my son ever says will be, "Are you Sarah Conner?")

So I'll see you at the gym. But remember not to pick on the scrawny guy, because he may just have a metallic son-from-the-future who'll pay you a visit.

The Next Chapter

A few days from now will mark the beginning of a new, and by far the most important, chapter in my life: I'm going to become a stay-at-home dad, at least for the next 10 weeks. My wife, who has been the primary caregiver of our four-month old son since he was born, is going back to work. She is an amazing wife and an even more amazing mother; it humbles me to watch her interact with our son, to see the love and caring shine from her eyes every time they meet his. But it's time to pass me the torch--and by torch I mean diaper bag, baby bottle, and roughly six metric tons of assorted baby paraphernalia. I'm confident that somewhere in this tonnage is our actual baby, but I'll have to look hard.

In talking with friends and co-workers, seems that not too many other new fathers take an extended time off from work to be a stay-at-home daddy. What I'm doing is something of a rarity, then, in our society. I've never shied away from being an oddball, though, so bring on the dirty diapers! (While you're at it, maybe throw in a hazmat suit or two. Thanks.)

Still, I'm a bit apprehensive about this new adventure. Not scared, just apprehensive. And not so much because I'll be the sole caregiver for our son during the day. After all, by now I'm a veteran diaper changer, I genuinely enjoy intereacting with our boy and the bottle feeding is well-established. More, what I'm apprehensive about is unplugging myself from the working world. I'll most certainly be "working" as I take care of our boy, but what will be missing from the equation is intellectual challenge, problem solving and adult interaction. These things are as vital to my mental health as is water and food to my physical health. I think most people feel the same way, though they perhaps don't realize the extent to which their professional lives factor in to their emotional well-being.

That said, taking care of a four-month old full-time will present its own challenges and problem solving opportunities, and I look forward to these. I'll be unplugging from one outlet and plugging into another; hopefully this new outlet has surge protection. But what I look forward to most is getting to know my son better.

Wish me luck as I turn the page. And to all you new or soon-to-be fathers out there, I hope you have the opportunity to write a similar chapter in your book.