On Fatherhood - Year II

With Father's Day now behind us, I wanted to reflect on what these past two years have meant to me and what they've brought into my life.

Becoming a father has taught me patience. As my daughter grows and I watch her learn about the world, I've noticed that she fights for knowledge. She wants to know how things work. I know that what we do matters because she wants to eat like us, drink from glasses and cups like us (she won't accept a lid if we don't have one), and even drive like us.

She often wants to climb into the driver's seat of our truck and get it moving—fiddling with the buttons, turning the steering wheel, trying to figure out what each thing does. There's an awareness that the truck gets us from point A to point B, and she wants to understand how.

Watching that has taught me to slow down. It has taught me to give her the extra few seconds she needs to buckle herself into her car seat because those moments are building her confidence, her independence, and her belief that she can do hard things herself.

Fatherhood has also redefined my role as a protector.

As a child, you're willing to ride for just about every friend and family member you love. As you get older and move through your twenties, maturity narrows that scope to your closest friends and immediate family. Once a man is married, that circle narrows even further until it wraps itself almost entirely around his wife and child.

The idea of protecting my daughter exists in so many facets while simultaneously wanting her to embrace a healthy kind of adventurous, explorer-like danger. I don't want to protect her to a fault. I want her to scrape her knee because she ran too fast. I want her to fall while learning to ride a bike so she discovers that getting back up is part of living.

A few weeks ago, I went into the basement to grab a few things. Normally she'd wait at the top of the stairs and call down to me, but on this particular day she followed me downstairs without hesitation. I loved it.

Of course, knowing I was there made it easier for her, but it also reminded me that, in her mind, if Dad is there, then it's safe to be there. Protecting that trust—that quiet confidence she has in me—is the responsibility I think about most.

My daughter has already begun her childhood without many of the hardships I knew. She has grandparents who spend time with her, gymnastics classes, swimming lessons, international flights, tropical vacations, and countless experiences that simply weren't part of my early life. While she will undoubtedly have her own trials and tragedies, she will not know drug abuse, absence, exclusion, and many of the things that shaped my childhood.

Being a father would not be possible without my wife, who supports me in the role every day. I can see how her relationship with her father laid the foundation for her relationship with me and her willingness to give space to the relationship I have with our daughter.

Jas values my relationship with Jenevieve and trusts my role in her upbringing. When I tell Jenevieve "no" and let her cry through the disappointment, Jas doesn't rush in to undermine my decision or tell me I'm being insensitive. Instead, because of the conversations we've had and the respect we've built, she understands that our different life experiences may lead us to different approaches, while ultimately pursuing the very same goal.

People tell you a lot of things when you're becoming a parent, just as they do when you're getting married.

Here's the list I've collected—or now find myself sharing with others who are beginning the journey:

You'll never have more pictures on your phone than you will during your child's early years.

Read to your children—early and often.

You'll never love the same again.

You can't protect your children from everything, and you shouldn't. When they're young, your job is to thoughtfully manage their introduction to the world.

And once your child is born, you'll find yourself bargaining with a higher power for just a little more time.

If these first two years have taught me anything, it’s that while I’m shaping her childhood, she’s quietly reshaping the man I become.