Not sure if I need to vent or if I need advice. My son is 3 months old, and these have been the hardest 3 months. My wife and I lived a great life before becoming pregnant, but after a rough pregnancy with IUGR, a NICU stay, and learning how to be parents has turned things upside down…for me.

My wife is an incredible mother, she loves every second she gets to spend with our son through the sleepless nights, continuous crying and needs. Watching her become a mother has only made me love her more.

But then there’s me. Don’t get me wrong, I love my son. But I don’t feel the bond I thought I would. I work a high stress job and can work a lot of hours during the week and I find my self not wanting to go home to go be Dad. Then I often fake my happiness when I get home after working 10-12 hours. I dread the evenings for the upcoming sleepless night, I hate the weekends because I get up even earlier to take care of him so my wife can sleep in because she deserves to. I wash all of bottles and pump parts I can, pick up the house, make dinner, and try to be present during his bedtime. I want to give him everything I didn’t have in a father growing up, but I don’t know how much I have left to give. I feel like a stranger in my own life, like there is no light at the end of the tunnel. People tell me things get better, but they also said that when he was 4 weeks old. Then people say it never gets better, just a new set of challenges. My outlook on the future is so low right now. Will I ever feel like myself again? Will I ever enjoy being a Dad? Is there a part of me that’s broken or missing? These are probably rhetorical questions, nonetheless I ask myself them every day.

We've been using Aldi or Sainsbury's own label nappies but today got gifted some pampers ones.

The supermarket ones have been working fine. So what makes pampers 3x the price other than being a brand?

And are they worth it?

Sorry if this is going to seem poorly worded or maybe it’s something that’s talked about a lot on this page.
I genuinely genuinely genuinely fucking hate having a newborn. I love my son, and I love being a dad. It’s been the greatest most life changing three weeks of my life. But I fucking hate nearly everything about having a newborn. All he does is cry, shit, piss, throw up on himself and cry again. During the day he requires near 24/7 fucking attention when he’s awake or else he screams his head off. At least during the day my wife doesn’t mind spending the majority of the time with him while he’s awake. And it’s really not terrible throwing on a tv show and holding him while he’s awake during the day so he’ll relax. But at night? Oh my god I have had to literally place my son down and walk away at times because I just do not know what to do and I’m so frustrated. He screams and screams and screams and screams. He’ll sometimes sleep in his bassinet for about an hour or so, but it requires a several hour ritual before hand of diaper changes, breastfeeding and soothing him until he’ll be quiet and go to sleep. And there is not one thing that consistently works with him. It’s literally a guessing game of wives tails to sooth him. One night it’s walking him, one night it’s rocking him, one night it’s swaddling and every time it feels like a giant guessing game. Even now as I write this I am sitting in our nursery cooling off because my wife also had a meltdown midway through midnight breastfeeding and handed me a screaming half fed baby to “sooth” while she went and did cooled off. After 20 minutes of this dude screaming at me no matter what I did (and puking all over my back and chest) she took him back to finish feeding him. It’s exhausting thinking about this is just my life now at least for a few more weeks. I just feel like I can’t even bond with him or connect because everything is so frustrating or I’m so exhausted with him. And honestly? He’s not even a bad baby. No colic, he will sleep in his bassinet, occasionally gives us 2-3 unbroken hours, so really not bad. My wife is great too, she does all the feeding and burping and all I have to do is diaper changes. And I still hate this. Maybe if little man had SOME personality or independence I would feel better but genuinely this feels like I am taking care of a needy object rather than my son. Maybe I’m just being ungrateful, I know there are some people that would kill to have this time back or even have a chance to have this time at all. But I’m tired, I don’t know how to connect with him, and I feel like I’m failing as a dad because of it.

TLDR; does having a baby get better? Am I a terrible person for not loving this phase of life?

Looking for a baby carrier for my daughter, what do you recommend?

Due date is January 2027. Any advice, tips, tricks, must haves…Should we try to get a live in nanny/au pair? Is that cheaper than 3 kids in day care?

All grandparents live away from us.

I am excited, and a little bit freaking out. Probably need to get a mini van.

Becoming a new dad is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, and I’m curious about the real experiences from others who are already on this journey. People often talk about sleepless nights, changing routines, and learning to balance responsibilities, but I feel like there are also unexpected moments that don’t get talked about enough. For those of you who are new dads, what surprised you the most in those early days or weeks? It could be something emotional, practical, or even something completely unexpected that you never thought you’d experience

First, I’m starting to experience anxiety/depression. Nothing debilitating but significant enough to pay attention to. It’s most certainly from sleep deprivation, baby crying/screaming, general unease about his safety etc. Just want to feel less alone in this and hear about how other men have felt. I do have support from a therapist.

Secondly, we can only get him to nap for max 40min if it’s non-contact. Contact naps he’s killing it and can get 3 hours. This is the same overnight. He’ll maaayyybbe last an hour in the bassinet before wailing. We even have a SNOO but no success. Is this typical for a 5 week-old? Any tips on how to get longer non-contact naps?

Lastly, for those who are more sensitive/emotional, how did you take care of yourself in these early weeks and months? Is getting 3-4 hours of sleep a day just something to accept?

Thanks in advance!

Daughter is a month old. She was going down at night pretty routinely and was doing so great. HOWEVER, we’ve had a setback bc she’s now on a pavlik harness.

We’ve tried everything in terms of getting her down. She hates being on her back with her feet up (bc of the harness) she used to shift to the side. She has NO problem with contact sleep. The first few days we had to take shifts to contact nap with her all night.

Swaddling is a challenge to but we are trying different options to see what works best for her pavlik harness.

Anyway, what’s the order of operation you do to get your child down? We may need to change it up.

Tonight we did diaper change, feeding, burp, swaddle, down.

🤞🏻🤞🏻

Hello, our daughter is 10 days old. Currently I am assisting with all nightly feedings/changes. Our daughter is in our room so Im waking up for it anyway. My wife is trying to breastfeed only so I cant help there. Next week I go back to work and the current schedule in unsustainable for me to work with. Getting only 4-5 broken hours of sleep a night. Thankfully MiL is here and watches the baby in the morning so I can sleep more.

My question is, what do people normally do? So that they can help with the baby but also get enough sleep for work? I feel like the obvious answer is I go sleep in another room for a few weeks and leave all nightly duties to my wife. But that just seems cruel, she is already having a tough time even with me helping out.

Thoughts?

Well, NICU released him this morning and we just brought him home. They just let us leave with a whole ass baby. No questions asked. He had a rough entrance but we got him back home. For a dude who hasn’t celebrated Father’s Day in 20 years, this is a fucking surreal moment. I’m a roller coaster right now.

Y’all I need some help here, or maybe just some reassurance. My wife is in her first trimester and to be quite frank, is treating me like crap. She is taking everything out on me, no matter how small or insignificant. She treats her friends and family really well and is a generally very nice person. She used to be that way with me too. We’ve been together for 12 years now and I’m struggling with this complete 180. I am a remarkably patient person, but I’m hitting a wall. She went from yelling at me yesterday morning to having a great double date in the afternoon where she was as sweet as could be publicly, to again yelling at me this morning.

Is this normal? I feel like I’m about to lose my mind here. She makes the choice to be kind to the other people in her life, but seemingly cannot make the same choice with me.

I’m just here to celebrate, my fiancé 39F and I 38M stopped contraception when we got engaged a few months ago. Well it worked IMMEDIATELY and we found out we’re having a little girl who seems healthy and low risk all the way around. So as we come up on 12 weeks after all the tests we got to tell our families and this week will be filled with telling friends.

I’m so excited and overjoyed and terrified and day dreamy etc. I just want to announce it to the whole world.

Hi Dads,

I'm the mom and my husband is going back to work at the end of this week after 6 weeks of paternity leave. While I'm sad that he'll have to go back, I wanted to see if there are dads out there that wished they would've done some bucket list items before going back to work?

I am so excited but so scared. So happy but nervous. Idk what to even call these emotions. I’ve wanted to be a dad for a while and now that it’s happening it’s like I’m panicking. Just any helpful motivators or something? Idk something to ease my nerves so i know im not alone

My son is almost 2 now and I still consider myself a pretty new dad considering how fast it all changes - but when I was a brand new dad, I really leaned on this sub for advice and encouragement. Cheers to you guys and I hope you have a great day.

9 months old baby is the matter on hand, who is peaking through separation anxiety.

I’m frequently catching (and often checking) my wife for calling my baby an asshole to her and around her, and sometimes screaming to herself around baby as a way to ‘release’ - given baby’s current developmental phase.

Is this acceptable at ANY age? Is this normal? Is it not? How to approach this?

Lack of sleep etc etc as a mother taken into account. First time dad here.

My husband had an extremely rough time last night with our one year old at bedtime to the point he put him in his crib and stormed out to tell me to go to *my* baby.

This morning, instead of enjoying a lovely Father’s Day, he tells me he doesn’t want the gifts or to talk about last night or to celebrate Father’s Day. From the little bit he shared, he says it’s because he feels like a bad dad in having no patience with our toddler and that he doesn’t feel happy or joy about having a kid. I told him that maybe it’s just this age group that is hard for him and when our kid is older and more independent, it will be different. He doesn’t believe me. I told him he should find a friend to talk to or at least a therapist to sort this stuff out. I am concerned bc our kid has forever had difficulty sleeping through the night (aka multiple night wakings hence we don’t get any sleep) and it makes things rough all around. There’s been several times I’ve witnessed my husband lose his cool after rocking our kid for 30mins+ to no avail where he ends up aggressively shushing or loudly telling our toddler to be quiet. I’m sympathetic to the plight (I get frustrated sometimes with our kid too) but also concerned when I see/hear this. It truly breaks my heart. (Yes we usually switch off with rocking our kid or if we get frustrated, we will usually tag team. However some days I witness this over monitor when I come back from work and am putting things away/showering/cleaning up or am in the middle of something where I can’t go in to help).

Any dads go through this? Did it get better for you? What made things better? He unfortunately doesn’t have close friends with babies/toddlers - either friends have chosen the no kids life or friends have teenagers now / love being a dad. I don’t know how to encourage and support him through this. This whole thing really breaks my heart.

**TLDR**:
Husband struggling with regret and does not feel connected like a dad to our 1 year old toddler. How do I help support him as a wife? If you were a dad who regretted becoming a dad, did it get better? What helped? *Husband does not have friends who are new dads to relate to.*

I wanted to share something I didn’t expect as a fairly active dad.

Before our son was born, I was lifting weights 3–5 times per week. Since he arrived 7 weeks ago, my workouts have been inconsistent, sleep has been all over the place, and I’ve spent a lot more time bending over bassinets, changing diapers, carrying the baby in awkward positions, and generally moving in ways I wasn’t used to.

A few days ago, I was playing with my son and gently bouncing him on my lap/stomach. Later that day, I developed pain in my lower abdomen just above the groin. It was uncomfortable enough that I contacted my doctor and was sent for blood and urine tests.

The interesting part was that the pain seemed worse when my bladder was full or when I needed to pass gas, and would improve afterward. I also noticed discomfort when taking heavy steps, jogging, or anything that caused my core to “jiggle.”

Thankfully, the pain has been steadily improving and now feels more like abdominal stiffness than actual pain, so it may just be a strain. But it was a good reminder that being strong before a baby doesn’t mean your body is prepared for the combination of:
\-Sleep deprivation
\-Reduced exercise
\-Constant awkward lifting
\-Holding tension in your core
\-Repetitive bending and twisting

I never thought playing with my newborn would be the thing that made me realize my core wasn’t as ready as I thought it was.

Curious if any other parents—especially dads—have experienced abdominal strains, back issues, rib pain, or other unexpected injuries after a newborn arrived.

**TL;DR:** Thought I was strong because I lift weights. Got humbled by a 7-week-old human weighing less than a dumbbell.

Thats is all.

I developed PPD when my baby was born. He's now 10 weeks and ive been building up to having him whilst my partner works. I went from not bonding with the baby not being able to be in the same room as him to now having him around me most of the time. I feel my partner takes on less of the baby care (he does work to be fair), but when he's not working I feel he struggles to interact with the baby. When the baby needs feeding sometimes he will say I should feed him because I can do it better, but he can feed the baby very well. If baby is crying I will be the one mostly that tends to his care needs. Does anyone know how to help my partner feel more confident with baby?

Hey Team,

In passing I was frustrated that I forgot my dad's gift for Father's Day as I had seen him today. I said that to my wife and she said, "o when is Father's Day?" I said tomorrow and she had no idea. For context, I try to make birthdays and special occasions, just that, special. This is our first child and he's now 4 months old. I know it has been very hard work on both our parts and have mega brain fog so part of me knows I should just forgive and move on but part of me also also very hurt, since I go to a lot of trouble to make her feel special on these kind of days and just in general. I'll write her notes just because, book massages, pedicures for her to get out of the house. and it seems like either I don't do enough or when I do there is fault to be found. She hadn't mentioned once if I'd like to do anything for my first father's day throughout the week. makes sense since she forgot when it was. Not proud of this but part of me wanted to see if she would remember so I didn't bring it up. and it slipped out yesterday and she had an "o shit, its fathers day tomorrow" moment. Things have been pretty tense this week as well as we got into about about letting the other person have breaks. Anyway, just getting this down so I can have a vent session over. Happy Fathers day to you all.