I get by with a little help from….the dad’s!

We often hear stories about how we, as mums, feel during pregnancy, labour and general parenting. Of course we do the physical carrying and protecting of our unborn babies alongside the mental hormone spikes and crazy cravings, but I wanted to hear from the dad’s about how they felt at each of these stages.
Perhaps they felt helpless in the delivery suite, perhaps they fell in love with you all over again seeing you bloom and grow a piece of them, perhaps there’s no way on earth that they could cope with your mood swings for another nine months. I think LagerDad’s feelings certainly fall into the latter category.
I have two children. Personally through pregnancy one I felt really ‘in it’ with my husband. It was the first time we had been through anything like this, so everything was exciting/worrying – but we got excited, and worried, together.
The second time it was different. I felt like he took it for granted that I’d done this all before so presumed I knew what I was doing. And I felt this at every stage.
I was more hormonal the second time round and I had lots of irrational thoughts from the crazy to the borderline psychotic; I had numerous dreams about LagerDad having affairs and I definitely threatened divorce at least ten times. Looking back this is hilarious, but Stuart was often walking on eggshells or just being flippant in his reassurances. Neither were winners in my eyes.
But I didn’t even stop to think how he may be feeling; was he apprehensive about our family expanding? Was he worrying whether he could love a second child the way we love the first?  Was he wondering how on earth to look after two when some days it was a damn right struggle just with one? He seemed to just cruise along like nothing was happening, like the next raft of sleepless nights were not edging closer as each day turned into night and a day closer to d-day.
The only time I saw some concern or worry was when I went into labour at home. This I’m sure was because a) He was worried my waters would break in his car and b) Because he isn’t keen on hospitals. In fact, upon arriving at the hospital, I clearly recall me doing that contraction pacing thing and he just sat watching The Andrew Marr show, like it was a bloody Hollywood blockbuster.
Then in the very early days of Arlo, I really felt like I was alone – there was not really  ‘togetherness’ like with the first. Having another, easier distraction, in the form of Sofia meant he would often choose to entertain her – the easy one who he knew and had been best buddies with for 3 years and I was left to my own devices with this newborn. Even though I’d done it before, every labour and every child are different.
This post was meant to be all about giving ‘daddy bloggers’ the chance to put their thoughts and feelings across on first, and subsequent, pregnancies, labours and beyond – but my pool of daddy bloggers really surpassed themselves and rather than little excerpts…they wrote loads!
So, rather than hiding them within this post, I’m giving them a voice with their very own Q&A series which I’m  calling…Let’s hear it for the dads.
Enjoy the read!