Predicting baby size
 

It is the most beautiful moment in the world.

I barely even noticed when a tube got pulled off the needle in my wife's arm and she bled all over me.

And I am usually sensitive to such things.

But it is a moment not to be missed. Tell these Dads that you know men are wimps, but try to cowboy up for a couple hours.

Predicting baby size
 

His teammates are full of shit. This is a magical confluence of real fear and pain, squeamishness about female genitalia, and a love of top-this gross-out stories in the male subculture (see, for example, my prior post).

Anyone who claims to have permanently lost desire for their spouse b/c of witnessing childbirth either had yoni or spouse issues going into the childbirth enterprise.*

*I would love to see some kind of scientific comparison of lost libido resulting from childbirth versus witnessing some other kind of non-genital spousal physical trauma, like a compound fracture in an accident. It's not a fun thing to be reminded that the object of your sexual desire is basically a very vulnerable leather bag filled with meat and bone, and that's got nothing to do with the yoni.

Predicting baby size
 

The outcome of dad's gross-out (impaired relationships with mom, guilt, etc) seems to me more about how the couple deals with it than about how gross it is. I think its terrifying on a different level for dads. Mom doesn't see herself bleeding, and has her own body to tell her whether to be alarmed or not. Dad's just looking at what seems to be a life-threatening situation for the woman he loves (even if he knows that's not true, sometimes there's a lot of blood), and freaks out a little. If you're able to talk about that afterward, and understand that its not about how much he loves the baby, I don't think you'd face those same issues.

Plus, Trepidation Dad is listening to men talking to men. Mr. Turtle's stories to other men were awful, but there was no mistaking his expression when he held the bloody mess for the first time. And he came back for more.

In preparation for our first, I've been watching "Maternity Ward" on TLC, usually with the encouragement of Mrs. Panda. I have the feeling that a lot of what goes on is left on the cutting room floor. Anyone seen this show? How close is it, and what don't they tell you about?

Honey, is that you?

MW shows a lot of high risk births and births with lots of unkown factors (they seem to have a lot of mothers with no prenatal care or with various addictions, etc.), so in that respect, I think it is more dramatic than your run-o-the mill baby hatching. The part that they obviously can't show - that mom has been in labor for 20+hrs - is a whole other level of unpleaseantness that they don't convey. They do not typically show delivery of the placenta, which is pretty gross, but not traumatic to mom. Other than that, they seem to show pretty much everything - blood and goo and all - except the actual baby emerging, which may be the problem for a lot of dads. Mr. Lex has watched the show - he is really freaked by the c-sections and how they always pull baby out by the head and then wave her around like a rag doll.

-TL

hmm.
 

You all make it sound so wonderful. It was much better than Cats, I'm going to see it again and again.

hmm.
 

You know you want to see it. Monday nights - 8 or 9:00 (I forget which) on TLC. If it's too much (wuss), you can tape "A Baby Story" on TLC at 8 and 8:30 a.m. - much tamer visually. -TL

I recently got to watch Soupette#2 emerge from my wife's abdomen. As I was standing near my wife's head, seeing the baby emerge just a bit north of where it's supposed to come out didn't seem visually odd.

But the really wild part is when they took my wife's uterus out (I suppose, since they got her all opended up anyway, the docs take the opportunity to check her uterus and ovaries for any malignancies), flipped it around a few times, pointed her ovaries out to me, dried it off, and then stuffed it back in. Good times.

Look for some Australian to bring "Puppetry of the Uterus" to some off-off-Broadway venue near you.

Holy shit. Now I don't even want to be in the room.

That'll be one spinal block and a side of morphine drip, please. Wake me when the hairdresser comes.

Maybe. What did we have for dinner last night??

Thanks. I think I'll be able to handle the majority of it, but I want to know going in what's the worst thing I could see (excluding stuff that I don't want to think about, like any danger to Mrs. Panda or to the little Panda.)

I hope you kept the camcorder running through the whole thing.

Predicting baby size
 

Amen.

(I'll forego the graphic details. They come with the territory, and I didn't find them disconcerting. So what if real life is a little bit messy? :))

Bad Dad
 

OK, my 10 year old daughter was offered a modeling contract (unsolicited, out of the blue, nothing she'd ever even thought about doing before). Daddy said no. She expressed mild disappointment and moved on, no big deal. But I keep worrying about whether I did the right thing. Any thoughts?

Bad Dad
 

Yes, you did. She can start with the restricted eating, bulimia, chain-smoking, unrealistically negative body image, and sexual exploitation by older men when she hits 18.