I’ve got a 3 week-old newborn. During the day there are plenty of adorable moments and easy times. But it’s the middle of the fucking night, he strategically waited until I was switching diapers to piss on me and all over, then was flailing his arms and pushing the bottle out of his mouth even though he was very hungry, then shit his GODDAMN BRAINS OUT while eating, then after I burped him and cleaned him up and got him in new clothes and swaddled and put him down, he fucking screamed until I picked him up again.
Like, I’ve given him everything his tiny little brain and body could need. That coupled with the strategic shitting and pissing to require the absolute maximum amount of work from me.
The vent here, I guess, is that I fucking hate this. I loved my life with my wife and now we have next to zero intimacy(not sex, obviously, but even our normal physical touch). We have zero time for each other, one is tending the baby, while the other is desperately trying to keep up with cleaning bottles and keeping the house passably clean and there is no time for anything.
I would never let any of what I just said affect how I interact with the baby, but I’m fucking sick of having literally zero independence and I miss my wife (her being in the same bed and next to me most of the day makes it worse somehow).
Fuck.
Thank you for coming to my Ted talk. Check out The Oatmeal, they’ve got a comic about having kids that’s painfully applicable.
It gets better.
I remember things getting noticably easier every doubling starting at three weeks. So it was three weeks, then six, then three months, then six, then one year and two… And that was basically when I stopped needing to count.
At around 6 months, things got easier for us. We got better at everything, he got better at, well, being alive, I guess. And we as a routine that mostly worked. Still had a long journey in raising a baby, but it got easier.
I don’t know when the independence came around, but not before six months. You situation might be different. If you have family, lean on them. Get some sleep. Snuggle your wife.
Seriously, if you can, get someone to tag in once in a while. It’s a grind.
I was going to say it gets harder. When they are a baby you literally take them wherever you want. Needs are simple. They are more like an accessory.
When they get mobile and belligerent they break everything you managed to keep all your life. Rip your favorite books, learn to scream much louder, messes are 10x bigger and they will look you in the eyes with NO remorse as they break the law ;)