Fatherhood - Part I

Overwhelmed.

Exhausted. Frustrated. Awestruck. Relieved. Proud. Scared. Humbled.  These words describe what I've felt these first two months of fatherhood. It was a difficult journey for him to get here, and now that he's here, Enzo has changed everything. Forever.

No return, no refund. The fact that my wife and I are responsible for the care, feeding, and upbringing of our son so that he may be an educated, well-rounded, responsible, participating member of society is, well, overwhelming.  There was no test, no certification, no licensure.  Pretty much the one thing we were required to do [in order to bring him home from the hospital] was have an infant car seat[1].

A friend said "welcome to the new normal" - we're still trying to figure out exactly what that is.

The biggest challenge for me right now is trying to regain balance.  How do I now re-allocate my time to my marriage, my family, my friends, my employer, my customer, the community, and last, but not least, myself ? 

I don't know. I'm still sorting that; hopefully I'll have a good answer to that question such that my at least my family comes out on top.  (They haven't been, or, more accurately, my wife hasn't been, and she has been beyond patient with the high amount of overtime and travel I've put in throughout all of the death march projects I've been on over the last N years. Through that time, I've pretty much put work first (Delivery, Delivery, Delivery!). 

Perhaps I've already started to realign things.  I've been working locally since early spring (and needed to as my wife was having some significant issues with the pregnancy).  Of course, the question now is what to do when I roll off of this one (slated for January).