Parenthood.. life with a baby boy

The time before dragon got pregnant was great, I thought she was so fine. Our daughter is already 6 years old and now I spent more time with dragon together. Then the news of the baby came. Considering how much fun we were having, i think that was God's way of saying, "Enough already!"

Many people were right about one thing, baby does distrupt your schedules. Dragon and I had perfected our routine: work, movies, travel, computer games, reading, gifts to each other. It wasn't a bad way to live, except when she expected me to wear the chaps to bed.

Baby's birth broadened our lives by making us focus on another human being. In other words, the baby demanded lots of time and energy. What I really mean to say is that we signed a lifelong contract with no escape clause. At the time I believed that forsaking my own needs in the service of another was transforming. Now I think I was so sleep-deprived that I couldn't have been thinking clearly and signed the lifelong contract under extreme duress.

The whole fatherhood experience has turned me into a different guy. Once, when an inconsolable infant cried nonstop in a plane, I would say to the stewardess "Look, haven't you people heard of cloroform?"

But being a father has brought me smack into the family of man. I am far more less judgemental. Now, if my son cried on the plane and if I get annoying looks from the passengers; my first thoughts are, "Maybe some chewing gum will help your ears.. maybe if I held you people up for a couple of minutes would fix your hearing problem.. maybe you should try to hear from your backside.."

Having a baby made me both fiercely protective and softened me to life. The kid opened me up to hope. Kids are about hope. Kids are about the future. They're about our future. They are about having someone around we can guilt into taking care of us when our minds make appointments our bodies can't keep.

I like the guy I am now better than the guy I used to be.

Parenthood.. raising a boy..

Having a kid has made me do things I never imagined I would. I nurture other people's kids. I can be talking to an adult and wiping snot off his kid's mouth. I'm grabbing boogers out of some kid's nose and wiping them underneath the table or on the couch. Hey - either I do it, or he will. Dragon and I are now pondering, whether raising a boy would be any different from raising a girl. Do girls get into trouble? Generally, they don't.

Girls are more likely to be doing useless things like studying or going to after college function to develop their social skills! Skills that don't prepare them for important things, like toilet-papering houses. Now, where's that going to get them?

They like reading romance novels under bedcovers at night.
Reading?
But reading what? Nancy Drew meets J.K Rowling?

Boys, well.. they always get into trouble. To be forewarned is to be forearmed. I have been a kid before so I knew. Boys learn early that we can't get a girl without a car and/or prison record. A good grade point average in your class or memorised parts in Shakespear can't compete with riding a motorcycle. When the girl's parents said, "I don't like that Alaz, he drives that bike." you knew you were in.

And I am not talking about serious heisting here. Just kid stuff, like as boys sometimes we borrowed our parent's car without asking. Now, I didn't do this, of course, to the best of their knowledge. But between you and me, I did take their car around the Subang Jaya neighbourhood once and my heart beat so fast and so hard that I thought it would burst out of my chest. Suddenly that's all I could think about. I started freaking out. If it came through my chest, I 'd probably look down and try to stuff it back in or something. And while I was looking down, some neighbour lady walking her doggy poodle would, at that very moment decide to cross the street, and when I'd look up - "Oh, my God" - with the manuevering skill of Michael Schumacher the junior, I'd swerve out of her way just in time and plow right into lawns, front gates and small gardens before I hit 2 rubbish bins and back on the road. I sped home and spent the rest of the day recovering.

What goes around comes around. I have 2 kids growing up now.

Here's the big difference between boys and girls at the age when everyone is looking for action - from my point of view. Take 2 cars, put 4 girls in one car and 4 guys in the other and you send them both out to get a six pack of beer and tell them to be back at midnight.

The girls will probably back by eleven o'clock. One beer is half empty and warm, with lipstick on the rim. The car is cleaner that when you left it, it smells like a mix of Chanel and gossip. Everyone's chatting happily and planning how to get together soon for dinner.

The guys - if they ever come back - one is missing, there's a little blood and no one's talking. The beer's gone, a second six pack is also empty, some liquor bottles are hidden in the backseat. There are butt prints all over the windows, a tire is flat. One fender's all dented and a big piece of animal parts is strapped on the hood, probably belongs to a cat or a cow that they hit on the way back..

Two different worlds.

Parenthood.. 1+1 = more than I can handle

It was a natural birth. Dragon didn't want her drugs until after our baby was born. I told her, "This is not the gladiator movie. If it starts to hurt, take the epidural!" Dragon was breathing very heavily, she could have cussed out the nurses when the pain got intense, but it wouldn't have meant as much to her as cursing someone who would take it personally.

It was a good thing I was around. Dragon was breathing all the wrong and the baby started coming out before anything was ready. I had to remind her to hold on. Before my kid was born, I used to think very differently about being in the delivery room. Like there is absolutely no reason to be around. You're there for support, but you're really just a pain in the ass. You coo and whisper supportively, trying to help your wife concentrate on her breathing. It never works. If it was me delivering the kid, I'd want to hear a manly song.. like the one I could sing along with Michael Jackson.. "Beat it... beat it.. just beat it..." I could breath to the drum cadence and move my butt profusely on the bed - and say 'hello' to my newborn in no time. Men also say stupid things in the delivery room. Men are such lamebrains. She's lying there and we're going "God, honey, that's gotta hurt," or "Will I be able to use that area again?"

But the attitude changed the minute I saw the baby coming out into our world. Seeing the process first hand just reinforced my belief that men are far more jealous about women's ability to bear a child that we'll admit. We can't do what women can, so they have the ultimate power. We act like they don't. We did not treat them well because we can't have kids. We demean them - not because they'll accept it, but just to keep them in their place. If women understood the power they have, I don't know what we'd do. Maybe they do know. Nah, I can't even consider that. Too scary.

I can't even fathom having to really deliver a child. I watched that child come out. The pride swelled up in me. Also the anger, and the competition. What I witnessed was something that hurt my woman and I couldn't stop it. And something that made her happy in a way that I've never been able to make her happy. This doesn't mean her screams didn't make me think, "Boy.. I'm glad I'm a guy!" Our baby boy finally arrived yesterday. Yes, a baby boy. I discovered later that dragon and the gynae were in on this and just trying to get back at me for the crack about the baby girl. I had to kill them both.

My next blog will be about single parenting.

Parenthood.. oops, another baby is on the way

It's 8:00 a.m, The daylight filters through the blinds into my bedroom, throwing lines of sun and shadow on my face. They remind me of the shock years ago, when dragon told me she was pregnant. Life is so unfair... before I could barely enjoyed the very little freedom I have left, she gave me another shock - that a new baby is on the way.

An odd thing about fatherhood is the change in camaraderie with other male parents, especially when your new baby is going to come to this world. You bond.. and the bond is rife with genuine tenderness, vulnerability and a little sadness. I don't know why. It just is - maybe because a kid finally connects a man to something he loves unconditionally that, unlike his car, which can actually love him in return.

Dragon has a hard time carrying her big belly around the house, puffing up smokes everywhere. The woman is angry, tired, tied down and hell, she can't do anything about it. I can't even fathom having to carry something that size in my belly. Finally to shut her up when her ankles swell to the size of holiday cheese logs, I had to strap one of those pillows in my belly and walk around for a while to entertain her.

Dragon tries to make me understand the pain and the stress women had to go through during pregnancy. She needed practices to make sure the breathing exercise are correct and nothing should go wrong. She wanted to play the gynae doctor and I have to be her - the pregnant wife on the hospital bed. She'll asked me to spread my legs wide open, to feel the contraction and labour pain.. and I have to scream like how she screamed in the delivery room..

"C'mon doggyboy... push!" she'll quipped

"Ahhh...Uhh...ehhh.....mmm....."
"Push... ok... " "Push!"
"Ahhhhh......(like this?)
"I... I.. can see the baby's head.. quick.. push.."
"Ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!..."(ha..ha..like really..)
"PUSH!!!!"
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" (whyd' she have to pinch my butt?)

She'll only allow me to stop screaming after I passed out..

The last time we played this game - she was carrying our first child. She laughed so hard until her waterbag burst and ended up in the emergency ward.

The whole episode made me realised that as men, we are like bees; we are created to hover around the uterus and trying to reproduce ourselves. We can't get pregnant. Women does. But when men come out of women, they spend the rest of their lives trying to get back in.

We went back to the same bald headed chipmunk face - gynae whom we consulted years ago. He gave the usual greetings...

"Hello.. what gives me the pleasure? 'accident' again?"

"Hey doc, you know - that's not funny......"

Of course, dragon is thrilled with every visit that we made to the gynae. Dragon loves to see the baby on the ultrasound, especially when he scanned and showed her the tiny heartbeart... but I am interested only in one thing..

"So doc, umm.. is this going to be a boy?"

"Looks like a girl..."

"............................"

"................................"

"Are you absolutely sure? are you 100% sure?"

"If you want 100% sure, I can take the baby out to show you first and then put the baby back inside.."

... Can they do that?

Parenthood.. what an expensive job

Before somebody calls me "daddy", I didn't think having a kid would be such a big deal. I always thought that babies are nice, play with them and put them in the closet until the next time we want to play. Then my daughter arrived in all pink and smiles at you with her cute face, and everything changes..

When I sit back on a warm night, caressed by the soft breeze, sipping a glass of wine and I see her playing in the front yard, I stop for a moment and think, "There's a lot of pain coming."

As she grows up she's going to hurt me, without even wanting to. She already hurts me and doesn't know how much.

Love hurts.

However, without her our lives would be incomplete. The minute I carried her over the threshold 6 years ago, our house finally became a home. Actually, I carried my dragon, who carried my daughter, who looked so beautiful and innocent that I almost dropped them both, as well as dragon's luggage from the hospital which, having no free hands, I had to hold in my teeth.

Now my little girl has her own room, full of her own stuff. Dragon and I have separate closets but I swear I never actually gone inside. i might not make it out. Once, when she asked me to find a particular purse, I had to call my mum in law to come over and help me.

When I opened my daughter's closet, I got a shock, her closet looks just like...my dragon's closet, only the clothes are smaller and neatly arranged in smaller cloth hangers. There's no mistaken whose daughter she is. Like her mother, she also has lots of shoes. Some have never been worn. Suddenly, I feel like someone's staring at me. Her room has dolls all over and there are so many - you hardly notice them. Most of the dolls are pretty cool but there is one collection she calls 'fragile dolls'. Their little, all-too human eyes looks at me as though I am an intruder. They've hemmed me in. I feel a bit faint and wait... I could've swear to God one doll in the middle was not there before. From the corner of my eye, I saw them looking at me. They'd better not be moving and switching places when I'm not looking, or else I'm going to have to check into a hotel room for the weekend. What's that sound.. now there's something scratching at the door. It better not be any of her doll's friends.

Parenthood.. watching a girl grow up

I'll admit it. When we did the ultrasound before my daughter was born and the doctor said, "it's a little girl," I went "Ohhhh..." I actually made that sound. Like I'd opened the wrong gift. There was a moment of calmness and everybody looked at me before the doctor said,

"What was that all about?" and Dragon said, "What's Ohhh ' for?"

"Oh...ahemm...I was clearing my throat.."

I quickly turned to Dragon and said "Oh, look! a girl! a friend for you! Look at that!"

I was dissappointed then. Now, of course, I feel guilty in front of God. This girl is so much pleasure to me and she's so incredible. When my daughter and I are alone, she'll hug my leg and say, "I just love you so much, Daddy!" There's nothing like this in the world. When I told her it's weekend, and she gets this great look on her face and she goes "We have so much to do, Dad!"

There are some rules, however.

Swearing too much around the house is not permitted when there's a young child about. I've said stuff and then realised my daughter was listening. Even in general conversation, you got to be careful. You make a decision about and for the child and you forget they can hear you. They're not stupid. And then when you least expected it, they then become little myna birds and repeat what you said.

Recently, she went to the toilet and I overheard her scream..

"Oh shit. why this shit has to be so hard... shit shit oww..."

Holy shit!. that's exactly what I said yesterday when I did my business downstairs...

My daughter likes me to chase her - definitely a girl thing that stays with them until the day they finally allow some lucky guy to catch them. I'm teaching her early, though, to run real fast.

I drag her into my world whenever I can. She likes to go for rides with me. She loves going fast. She thinks my Gen2 is a Ferrari. That's probably not a bad thing. If I'm real lucky, it will probably save me some money when she wants a Ferrari for her sixteenth birthday.

Parenthood.. what an experience

Have a kid and everything changes. I used to to hear those words over and over again but still I couldn't anticipated the consequences.

I would like to share them. And since this is my blog and not yours, you'll just have to put up with my going on about this for a while. Or else, I'm taking my bottles and diapers and going home, to put myself down for a nap. See...have kid and right away you start acting like one.

Dragon and I never tried to get pregnant. It just kind of happened. We were in fact, already booked a trip with my old mates to Pangkor and hoo boy, doesn't everybody had a cold sweat back then.. this was because we were anticipating some of my old mates to get married first and enjoy our freedom for at least a few more years.

Not only we were not married, but I haven't even met with dragon's family... the 'ancient' dragons... ones that breath fire first before it speaks.. and her mom was an expert at spitting fireballs...

We both knew we wanted kids, as a concept but both dragon and myself were still scared and maybe a bit selfish. I thought "What would I do with a kid? What would a kid do with me?" And then, one night, within a moment, my whole perspective changed. I visited my colleague and her dad was in town. We were sitting in her sofa, laughing about something and suddenly I noticed her dad looking at her with what can only be described as a sparkling gaze of pride, love and eternal friendship. (words cannot describe this really.) And all at once he asked for a kiss and a hug. I said, "I'll hug you but a kiss is out of the question." I learned later that he was speaking to her.

This ineffable moment between them made me rethink about parenthood. Dragon and I knew - that having a child would change our lives, change sex, change everything. But after all these years and looking back at the time, I think it's the best thing that ever happenned to us. We wouldn't want to change anything even if we are able to go back in time. Dragon kind of suspected that she was pregnant. My reaction to the news that dragon was pregnant was screaming. Loud sustained screaming...probably because my mind was so blank at the time..

Dragon said "Aren't you supposed to call for help? Screaming won't help much"

"No no, that's an excited scream."

Actually, the whole process was kind of fun. I've never had such a MANLY feelings, both for her as well as about myself. Dragon has never looked more radiant. There's something about how lovely pregnant woman are that makes you fall in love even with pregnant strangers.

Of course, we were scared to death. Dragon said "Now, what do we do?" We were worried. I called my buddy to cancel the trip beforehand and to think about what to do... next...

"Err.. sorry, I can't come with you guys to Pangkor today"

"Why, is everything alright?"

"No, she is expecting a baby and I am going to be a dad.."

"What? Does her parents know?"

"Actually I haven't even meet her parents"

"What?"

"Well, I am going to meet her parents and I will say Hi..."

"Shit, does your in laws have to come to your full moon first?"

Her parents gave their blessings of course. I met them two months later on the 1st day of Chinese new year. I met them again for second time on Chap Goh Mei and proposed the marriage. They almost fainted.

How much being a parent would change my life didn't occur to me until I was heaving up my dinner the day my daughter was born. I ate my dinner at the hospital, then had to stop in the parking lot and throw up: once because of the baby, twice because of the food.