Baby Basics For Men

My fraternity bro Rob is having a baby girl soon and I'm not confident he is prepared for the journey that lies ahead. To be fair, no one is ever ready to become a parent for the first time because you do not have a way to measure the oncoming experience against what your life has already presented you. Sure you may have friends or family members similar in age to yourself with children and maybe you watched really close when your parents took care of younger siblings, ass wiping and all, but the fact of the matter is you're jumping into a gang fight where your arch rival is the size and weight of a small bowling ball with biological weapons that out perform any shank or AK47.

To help the average dude prepare for parental combat I've compiled a few tips that will help familiarize him with this dangerous enemy. Consider this a survival guide of sorts. Honestly parenthood is the best experience in life, but like anything worthwhile, the joy you will receive from nurturing a perfect baby boy or girl comes only through great sacrifice. No pain no gain as the say in weight lifting and it's even more true in fatherhood.

Daddy's rules to live by:

1. Forget About Sleeping: Remember when you first moved out of the house after high school. The first opportunity you had to sleep all day was as rewarding as the new taste of independence. No parent telling you to get up and be productive. No class to attend. No job to go to. Just unlimited sleeeeeeeeep. With child, a 15 minute power nap feels the same way. Having a baby means you never feel rested, you never sleep more than 6 hours consecutively, and you learn to sleep with one eye open just in case a disaster breaks out. The situation gets worse if the baby ends up sleeping with you at night because not only does the nook you took years creating in the bed get stolen by the little thief you also don't have anywhere near the level of intimacy you enjoyed prior to baby. Like Heavy says, "instant cock blocking."

2. Save Your Money: Unlike the $10 bottle of wine that ignited your night of baby making 9 months ago, newborns can be expensive. Cans of powdered formula cost around $20 lasting only about a week if breast feeding is not an option. Diapers also cost about $20 (per 60-80) but last a little longer. Then you have the big ticket items like car seats, strollers, swings, cribs, etc. And clothes, you never stop buying clothes. Best advice for a new dad is to reinvest the beer money into the baby fund and find a new hobby to pass your alone time. Like internet porn.

3. Develop Tough Skin: Let's face it, parenthood is embarrassing. How do you think your mom and dad felt when you got in trouble at school for some stupid wise crack directed at a teacher or an a suspension at the hands of an ill advised prank? Embarrassed! With a newborn the complexity of the awkward moments is lessened as the kid isn't smart enough to really screw up though there are plenty of situations like being pee'd on during public diaper changes that still sting the ego. And let's not forget the arguments about whose turn it is to change the diaper while in the middle of a shopping experience.

4. Beware of Toxic Substances: Your child will produce things that will appear to have come out of a "Superman" comic book like a radioactive substance from the planet Krypton or something. Think neon green poop and that's before the introduction of real food. Enough said.

5. Ignore "Leave It To Beaver" and "The Brady Bunch" Stereotypes: Okay so our elders grew up in an era where men came first and women came second. I desire to be selfish sometimes and travel through the ages to such a time like the 1950's -1960's where the traditional nuclear family thrived. My routine would consist of going to work, coming home to hot meals, and relaxing to cocktails while the wife did all the household chores and the kids did their homework. Of course American society is not like that anymore. Women are now treated as equals and good for them. Translated to men it means we must virtually train ourselves to be single parents so as not to be surprised when the spouse refuses to perform some old school chore that once belonged to women like cooking, cleaning, washing clothes, blah, blah, blah. Basically, the better prepared you are the more likely you will succeed even if it means doing everything yourself because as all married men will tell you, there is no such thing as 50-50.