For those who haven’t heard. My daughter, Dinah Aeryn Garner, was born on May 7th, 2004 at 11:10pm. She was 19.5 in. long and weighed 6 lb. 5 oz. As of her doctor appointment this morning, she’s 21 in. long and 8 lb 4.5 oz.

I’ve put off posting about it until now for a number of reasons.

1. I was kinda busy with Sarah helping Dinah get here
2. I was adjusting to life with baby.
3. I was waiting to have more organized thoughts to reflect on.

Now, just after the first month has passed, I think I finally have some thoughts…

All the stereotypes about your child’s birth being the happiest day of your life are pretty accurate, at least for me. It was a long day, but Sarah made it through great, and our beautiful healthy daughter came just at the end of it.

Its really been wonderful to watch Dinah grow this first month. Just to see each day what new thing she can do, or how much more she’s eating, or just any noises she makes. The highlight of everyday is when I see her smile. She probably has no idea she’s smiling, and its probably just gas (she is my daughter after all) but that smile is there just the same. Its just the greatest feeling ever when I hold her. (Man, I’m sappy.)

I find I’m still mentally adjusting to the fact I’m a father. It just hasn’t become part one of the first things I think about when I think of myself, those tend to be: geek, husband, and nice/fun guy.) When I got married I remember feeling similarly about being “married” and being a “husband”, so I’m not too worried about it. Any big change in life probably takes awhile to sink in to one’s self image. In that way, its just a weird, but good, feeling to say things like “my daughter” still. But I’m sure that will pass.

On the other hand, the activities of parenting have come suprisingly natural to Sarah and myself. Sarah never changed a diaper until Dinah came along, never held a baby much, nor fed one. Its just come to her and she’s been awesome. It must be part of being a mother. I’ve been luckily enough to be the oldest of 23 grandchildren on my mother’s side. Through the years I’ve done most of the activities listed above at least once, but not extensively. I think I’ve taken to it pretty well.

Sarah and I have also been really good about sharing responsibility for parenting tasks. Thanks to Dinah being on forumla (for a number of reasons,) we take turns getting up with her a night. Although, I probably owe Sarah a few more turns since she’s gotten up a few times when I should have. Sarah’s generosity in that regard will wear out at the exact same moment she returns to work. We’ve also been making sure its not just one of us changing her diapers and feeding her.

We’ve also been relaxed and calm around her in general. This is probably because we’re both well-read intelligent people. We read enough and talked to people enough before hand that we’re pretty confident that we’re doing “the right thing” most of the time. We’ve already gotten a number of comments about “how calm” we are around her. Appearently, we’re not the stereotypical first time parents that some people expect to see. Also, some people have compared us to others they know with kids, but some of those others were pretty nutty before they had children, so I think it follows. The added bonus to us not being freaks is that the calmness is great for Dinah, so she’s not stressed out.

People always say that as a new parent, you won’t get any sleep and you’ll be tired all the time. This is one of those cases where what everyone says is true. Well, true up to a point. We do get some sleep, but we are tired quite often. Sarah’s never been one who’s been good on less sleep then she would desire, but I’ve been amazed by how its catching up to me. Every third or fourth day, I’m just exhausted and either need to crash early or guzzle coffee. I didn’t used to be this way, but I think I slept more on the weekends back then.

That’s all I got today, but as this fatherhood thing is an ongoing adventure, I’m sure I’ll have more to spew in the future.