As of September 2, my son Chance is seven months old, and these are the first words I'm writing about him. I've been afraid to write for some time for reasons I'll address at another time. For today, I just want to talk about being a new father. My biggest fear, before Chance was born, was that upon his arrival, when he was pulled from his mother's belly, I wouldn't feel anything. I was afraid that I wouldn't have that life-changing, immediate love that so many people genericly describe when they first have a baby. Maybe this description has been so practiced for so long that it's shameful not to have it when having a first baby. I don't know, I can't speak to that. I know I cried when I first saw Chance being withdrawn by C-section from Emily. I know I felt immense joy. The doctor had to remind me to grab my camera and take a photo because I was too busy clutching Emily's hand and crying. I don't know if that's immediate love, but it's something. I was in the throws of incredible sciatica pain and could barely stand. This pain has happened a couple times over the past two years, why, I don't know. It just shows up. But what is strange is that leading up to the birth of Chance I started having the pain. But after he came, sleeping on the rock-hard, too-short hospital bed couch, before we left the hospital two days later, it was gone. Chance's arrival changed something in me, physically, psychologically, physiologically. But I still had this fear that the love I was feeling was not enough, or not as full as it should be. I still felt that I would fail him, and Emily.
My mother arrived in a few days when we were already home with Chance. We picked her up from the airport with Chance in the back seat and she was able to sit with him and coo at him the whole ride home. Chance came almost five weeks early. He was tiny. He looked emaciated. His wrists smaller than two of my fingers. His fingers as delicate as straw. He was beautiful. His eyes were large and piercing and his cheeks were round. He had the look of his father, with his mother's nose. I was afraid to hold him for the first few weeks. He was so attached to his mother, her boobs, that no one seemed to notice. But I did. I held him when he slept sometimes, but only briefly. From the beginning I felt like I was failing him. Like I wasn't there enough. But I kept it a secret.
Emily tells me that postpartum depression sometimes happens to father's too. Well if something takes the shape of depression, you can usually bet I've had it or got it. My son didn't want me close. He cried when I held him. He woke from sleeping when he was in my arms. And nothing seemed to soothe him save his mother's arms. I thought this was a direct result of me avoiding holding him when he was a newborn. It's wild the things your mind will conjure when a newborn child is involved. I didn't read any books before he was born. Nothing about baby's first year, or what to expect. In this way I felt like I failed him as well. I should have been more prepared. I should have gone into battle with armor. Rather I stumbled into this life-altering event with the hope that Emily has done this before, so we're alright.
After a time, once Chance started bottle feeding, he became okay with me, warmed to me, smiled at me. I could finally feed him and appear as some kind of provider for him. I changed diapers (I had never changed a poopy diaper before Chance). I washed him with a warm cloth and wiped him down with smooth lotion. I started to take the shape of a father. I was spending every minute of every day with my wife and my newborn son. I was washing bottles while she fed him in the morning. I started cooking all the meals. I cleaned and contributed in ways around the house that I used to previously procrastinate out of doing. This person started to take shape in me. I could feel something growing in me and I wanted more of it. I wanted Chance to grow quicker. I wanted to see him crawl. I was assured by Emily that those days would come and I wouldn't like them as much as I thought, a baby on the move. But I longed for them. I wanted him to walk, to run, to ride a bike. I wanted him to come with me to the trails and find out again what it was like to be newly introduced to the wild. I wanted to feed off of his curiosity and eagerness to be alive. So I've been waiting. Hurry up and wait, I've heard. And that's what I've been doing.
I'm taking more pictures these days. I'm holding on to some kind of slowness. The days go by so slow but the weeks and months burn by. I can count the days by the thickness of flesh on my son's thighs. I can see the weeks go by in the folds of his chin. His hair is like an hourglass, his eyes like the hands of a clock. There is something in this time. It instilled fear in me before, like I'd let something pass when he was born. But I don't see it like that anymore. What happened to me when he was born, that immediate joy, has been stretched like taffy. I wasn't immediately in love with him, and didn't have that sense of overwhelming love. For me it had to come. It had to burn slowly before it raged. I had to know that I could be enough for him before giving over to the love it takes to raise a family. But it happened. And here I am, a flame ablaze for my wife and son. I'll always look back at that fear when Chance arrived. Now I just see it as the glowing embers of a fire I would later become. Chance Idaho Bradbury changed me. He taught me how to love with complete devotion. It just took me a little time.
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