Becoming a father.
Back in 2020 if you were to ask me, “Hey Jack, are you going to be dad anytime soon,” I would have unequivocally said no. If you were to ask me if I ever wanted to be a dad, the answer would simply have been “YES YES YES!” I have always wanted to be a dad, but on reflection, never had an idea of when are where it would happen. Enter June 2022 when Courtney Stubbs came into my life. It was love, that I naturally confessed after our ‘second date….’ which was a two week staycation at my house in Sydney for her. 8 months later, and after a little adult time, we are now welcoming our first little bub, a little girl, OUR little princess into this world.
Becoming a father in this day and age is easier than it has ever been. The amount of information we have at our fingertips is wild. We can quite simply click a button, and we are transported to a webpage that has an abundance of information ready to be processed by our brains, and bend and shape the way we plan to parent our children. I personally, am amazed at the community of new wave fatherhood that is taking storm across the globe, specifically Australia. Take for example one of my favourite podcasts built soley by one dad wanting to talk about dadding. Hamish Blakes, How Other Dads Dad. (Find Here). Hamish has taken an approach to learning about how to be a dad to a new profound level that I canonly aspire too with my little one. As you have probably guessed by this point, I am a little Hamish Blake fan boy, but it goes without saying that he is merely a figure point in some amazing cultural shift in how males are starting to view their role in parenthood.
Speaking of a dads role in parenthood, and speaking from someone that is still an expecting father, I am well aware of how easy we have it compared to our partners who go through everything from growing the bub, nursing the bub, and being quite literally the baby’s lifeline for food and sustenance for its first 6-12 months of life. Going to any class, the first thing you get told as an expecting father is, “Jack, you can’t fix anything here, your job is to support in any way shape or form she (Courtney) needs you too. Your role through pregnancy, through labour and even through breast feeding (if you are planning to do so), is to sit back and do exactly what she says she needs as soon as you can!.” I think its naturally a male trait to just immediately go into ‘fix it mode’ and try and make everything better. As a male writting this blog, it has been an interesting learning curve for me in this pregnancy to just sit back and understand that the struggles of pregnancy and birth aren’t yours to take away, but rather to guide her through. And isn’t that just a perfect way to segway through to how I want to be a dad to my future daughter.
So how do I see my role as a father to my unborn daughter. If she were here now, I would want her to know that I am always here for her. Whatever the cause, whatever the need, I am here. I don’t want to control her life, but rather help her through it. We all know that life from around 13 years old (highschool) gets more complicated. We build our social skills in that time, and then have to utilise these through life. We are taught, but are also shaped by our friends and family. So, for me as a dad, I want to be that parent that is there when my daughter goes through a tough time. I don’t want to have to fix the situation, whatever it may be, but I want to and will be the parent that can empathise, and understand the struggles that she will no-doubtedly go through. From birth and till I am gone I want to be apart of my daughters life, and be apart of everything she does. Whether her hobbies are dancing or football, painting or gaming, I want to connect with her at every chance I get, because I know that being a father now mroe than ever is about connection with your children, and I want to connect with my daughter.
So it’s 2023, and I am ready to be a dad. More than that I NEED to be a father for my daughter. Cause i want nothing but the best for her life, and I just know she is going to bring me joy in ways I had no idea could have existed prior.
Honestly, I am not sure how I ended up talking about hwo I want to be as a dad, as I write this it just felt natural for me to jot it down. I wanted this to be a jovial blog on dadding, but have inadvertedly opened my heart up to how I want to be as a father to my future daughter. If you’ve gotten this far, I hope you enjoyed. I am going to be writing every now and then about whats going on in my life. Could be about Finn, could be about Nonna. Who knows, but I hope you enjoy the journey.
xoxo
Jack
