Fatherhood

Women aren’t the only ones at risk for depression and in need of screening services when a new baby comes into their lives. Young fathers face significant mental health challenges as well, according to a new study. Published in the May issue of Pediatrics, researchers found that fathers who live in the same households as their children experience a decrease in depressive symptoms in the period immediately before their children are born. However, depressive symptoms among young fathers, who were around 25 years old when they became fathers, increased an average of 68 percent throughout their…

My wife is an accomplished professional. She loves her profession, and she's damned good at it. But she is officially "unemployed", and it kills her every time she has to put that down on a form. So how is it that she came to be unemployed? When we met, MrsPal and I were both working full time---more than full time, actually. I'd have to say she was actually working quite a bit harder than I was. After we were engaged, an opportunity arose for her to cut back on her grueling schedule, but to do it she would have to quit her job entirely. For a variety of reasons, that is what she chose…

Most mornings, I get up with my daughter, or more accurately, I wake her up. We have our little morning rituals---I turn on her lamp (or this time of the year, open her shade), pick her up and take her downstairs (something I might not be able to do for much longer). I turn on the TV and let her wake up slowly---she's not the morning person I am. Usually, there's a good deal of whining and moaning, stalling and kvetching. This morning, though, she was up and ready to go. Today, her family was coming to see her in a school play, and she had memorized her lines and just about everyone else'…

After a week of fine weather, the first weekend of spring was forecast to be cold, rainy, and snowy. I love it when they're wrong. I would love to be able to sleep in, but if I can't sleep in, I don't mind the sound of tiny footsteps. After whipping up a batch of heart-shaped Daddy pancakes, the kiddo and I took off for work. It wasn't looking good out---cloudy, windy, a little bitter. Rounds were brief, and we had time for a stop at the bookstore before lunch. PalKid loves to go to our local sushi joint for rice, edemame, and udon soup, and to watch me eat various raw and wriggly things…

Every morning I get to wake up my daughter and get her ready for school, but often that's the last time I see her until the next day. The other day, my wife took her out of school to go to the dentist (apparently the entire school became aware of this just after my daughter). Despite her initial boisterous objections, she did quite well at the dentist, and thanks to technology, I was able to share in the experience---my wife sent me an MMS of my daughter showing me her three loose teeth. My baby. Losing her baby teeth. This. Isn't. Cool. But she's excited, and she should be. No matter…

I woke up way too early---my damned sinuses. After a good lavage I managed to fall back asleep until a little warm body curled up next to me and used one of its appendages to turn on the TV. That's when I realized how hungry I was. I left the kiddo to her shows and poked around the kitchen. I ran out of waffle mix, so I googled up a recipe and whipped up some batter. Then I put up my coffee. As a bonus, I found a pound of bacon in the fridge, so I put up some of that as well. A short time later, the house smelled like breakfast. While MrsPal slept in, PalKid and I enjoyed a breakfast of…

It's not always easy to figure out that you are not normative. If you grow up in an ethnic enclave, when you're young you probably think everyone is black/Spanish-speaking/Korean. When I was a little kid one of my parents' friends remarried. I remarked on how the new wife was Jewish. My mom corrected me. "But Mom, she talks Jewish." "No, honey, she's just from New Jersey." If you're visibly different from the majority, or you speak a language other than English, you learn pretty quickly what "normal" is supposed to be---and it's not you. My daughter has grown up in an area of mixed…

My kid is growing, and I'm of course ambivalent about it. It's not that she's becoming some sort of giant---she's still a tiny little thing, but now she picks up books and starts reading them. When she does, I usually start shouting excitedly, but she reminds me that I'm not allowed to be excited. She wants to enjoy her new powers in peace. She's outgrowing her car seat, especially when bundled up for winter. And with Midwestern winters being what they are, she's bundled more mornings than not. It's time for me to buy a booster. When I wake up in the morning, I take my shower, shave…

I wanted to sleep in this morning, but somehow it's tough to change gears that quickly. I don't normally get up too early---6:30---but I really felt like sleeping in. I made it to 7:00. That early, I have the house to myself, so I brewed up a pot of some killer new coffee that Dr. Free-Ride sent me (thanks!) and enjoyed the silence. After an all-too-short period of peace and quiet I had to wake up PalKid. I'm a bit blown away by how busy my little family is. MrsPal had to work most of the day so I took PalKid to dance after being "forced" to make "daddy waffles" (from scratch). The dance…

Thank you for polluting my in box with a hateful, lie-filled chain letter. It took me all of ten seconds on the internet to find the truth behind your lie and thereby discover what a tool you are. I'm sure it would have seemed natural to you that because we share an ethnic identity I would give you a pass on this one---I won't. My wife and I are not raising our daughter in a household of hatred, but of love. She will learn to love and respect everyone, and even to reach out to those, who like you, may not at first seem deserving of such a precious gift. My daughter is surrounded by…

My daughter handed my wife a hand-written Channukah wish-list which I will reproduce for you in its entirety: Barbie remote corvette Barbie camper Ken doll For real elephant I'm not sure which one we will get her, but I have my biases.

For some reason, me and the PalKid were watching Apollo 13 this morning. She was fascinated by the story, especially because it's a true story. During the lift off, the camera panned around the control room, and she said, "Daddy, how come there's only mens? Are girls not allowed in space?" Those of us who advocate diversity in science are often asked, "how could it matter what faces are in the crowd?" Here's your answer.

Ahh, Saturday night. Our plans were simple. MrsPal wanted to run some errands at the mall, and PalKid wanted to go out with me for sushi. The plan sounded great, but I thought, "hey, it's Saturday night. We should hang together as a family." So I ran it by everyone and we agreed to have dinner some place everyone likes, and then go run errands with Mom. One of the "rules" for taking multiple choice exams is "never change your answer". I'm really good at multiple choice exams, but apparently I fail at life. Kiddo was a screaming mess most of the evening, tantruming every five minutes…

The kiddo started kindergarten this year. She went from complete freedom to getting up at dawn five mornings a week for a seven hour school day. It is my fortunate task on four of those mornings to help her on her way. Like many of the Pal clan, she is independent of thought, and rather stubborn; once she's out of sorts, well, to paraphrase Colin Powell, you broke it, you buy it. So I've developed a very careful morning routine, designed to ease us into our day as painlessly as possible. I'm a morning person, so I get up and take care of my ablutions before I get her up. Then I walk into…

This morning I woke up early, showered, and dressed. Then my wife and I woke up our daughter, who seeing it was dark did protest loudly. But we got her out of bed, and a few minutes later she was her usual happy loquacious self at the breakfast table. We got her dressed in a navy dress with white polka dots and black patent leather shoes, straightened her hair, took some pictures, and got in the car. We parked about a half a block from the school and put her back pack on her. She wanted me to carry it because it was so heavy (sic). Then she wanted "uppy"---also a non-starter. A…

During our Labor Day fun fest, my kiddo lost her shit, leading my spouse to lose her shit. I was on one side of a crowded village green and got a phone call to come over and "deal with your daughter". She needed to be dealt with. She was not getting her way and letting everyone in town know how pissed off she was. I picked her up and carried her to a patch of grass away from my wife, and held her in my lap to keep her from taking off across the crowded green. She was screaming and wiggling and I found myself saying, "Stop resisting! Stop resisting!"

I didn't get my usual week up north on Lake Michigan this year, but the mild summer took some of the sting out of it. Now that Labor Day is here, we get into a whole other set of rituals. One ritual which is sure to become popular is summer sledding. It turns out there's a park not to far from here with astroturf hills and a sign that basically says, "you are absolutely not allowed to go get a nice piece of cardboard and use it to sled down the turf hills. Really, don't do it no matter how fun it looks." That's my kiddo and her friend on their bajillionth run. The mosquitoes were…

I sometimes feel that if I don't crank out two posts a day, I must have "lost it", whatever "it" is. But I've got the shpilkes and I have to write something. The end of the week is hard. Wednesday and Thursday are long days for me, and after I put my kiddo to bed Tuesday night, I often don't see her again until Friday night. This isn't cool at all. She start kindergarten in a few weeks, and I'm trying to arrange my schedule so that most mornings I can get her up and get her to school before I go to work. That'll mean getting up earlier and fighting with a cranky kid, but it'll…

A hot, sunny Midwestern day. A well-groomed rail trail. Two intrepid riders. That's how it started out. My daughter has been going on longer and longer rides with me on the Trail-a-bike, so today I figured we'd try a great rail trail that goes past a heron rookery. We made it about a mile in before she freaked the fuck out. She was screaming at the top of her lungs behind me, so I stopped. Any time a bug or a fleck of mud landed on her, she couldn't handle it. She felt like she was being attacked by bugs, and nothing was going to get her back on the damned bike. In fact, she was…

Having a daughter in my late 30's, I began my fatherhood journey a bit later than many. I don't have much to compare it with, but I do wonder how I'm going to keep up with the little princess. Mrs. Pal got us a Trail-a-Bike for Father's day---that's one of those "half bikes" you hook up to your own, effectively creating a tandem bike. PalKid can hold on and peddle if she feels like it. That's a serious workout. When we were up north, I dragged her everywhere (and vice versa) and she dropped off too sleep nice and early every evening (which I wish I could have done, but 7:30 is pretty…