6 months remaining
Not another post about a zombie movie - rather the amount of time left before my beautiful and amazing wife will go from being a family unit comprising of two adults and one cat, to a family unit comprising two adults, one cat, and a small human being.

So far, I'm finding the experience of being an expectant father a bit weird really. I'm incredibly excited about the prospect of having a child, even more so after having seen the ultrasound scan we had last week. I certainly hadn't expected the baby to be moving about so much, but there it was on screen doing somersaults and steadfastly refusing to pose for a photograph.

I'm also finding myself immersed in a retail sector I never knew existed, and can't get over how much stuff babies seem to require (well they do according to places like Mothercare, who sell stuff for babies - funnily enough I suspect we can cope with fewer "essentials" than they tell us we need).

The whole process is just such an amazing journey.

But...

...I also find I'm letting a little bit of the anticipation be tarnished by my own doubts and fears.

Will the baby be OK (first scan suggests it will - but you never know)? Will we make decent parents (well, specifically will I be a good Dad - I've got no worries that it'll have a first rate Mum)? Will our respective parents give us any peace again, ever? Do we need to move house? Can we afford all the stuff people (i.e. Mothercare) keep telling us we need?

To be honest, I suppose I shouldn't let the anxieties I'm currently facing take away from the excitement. At the end of the day, I'm not going to love the child any less whatever happens, I'm hopeful that I'll at least be able to muddle through as a parent (although I suspect I'll need to learn to survive on less sleep than at present), I'll probably be grateful of the respite which our respective parents provide, and I'm sure everything else will look after itself.

So why am I so anxious?

Let's not even get started on the whole naming issue - we had enough trouble deciding what to call the cat!
- posted by Paul @ 5:17 pm