One month in to this “parenting thing” and I feel the need to confess that it still doesn’t feel real. This stresses me out. I’m embarrassed to admit it. You would think it would sink in after four weeks.

I suppose it doesn’t help the fact that my son, while surprisingly cute, does not identifiably look like either my wife or I, which depersonalizes things a bit. Had I not seen him as he came out, I’d wonder if he was actually ours. It also doesn’t help that he is only mildly aware of us. Or at least me. Despite his tireless efforts to prove me wrong, I do not supply milk and therefore am relegated to the status of “that thing that holds me whilst The Food Source does something else.” We’re still in the “getting to know you” phase with one other, so I expected things to be a bit rocky, but our jobs really are fairly simple to define. His role is to poop and cry. Mine is to not over-analyze. I’ll let you figure out who’s failing and who’s doing a bang-up job.

I am also pained with guilt over the fact that I cannot do much to help. My wife, God bless her, nurses him, so my nights are not terribly disturbed as most would expect (and certainly ask me about). There are only a handful of duties that I can assume control of in order to pull my weight, and because I’m not up with him every two hours I feel like a schlep. I feel like less of a father. I feel like I’m letting my wife down, despite the fact I can’t do much else.

I suppose it’s expected to feel that my life has been switched with someone else’s life, someone way older turned upside down, that every facet of my former life is scattered about aimlessly. But combined with the odd disconnect that I sometimes feel with Liam, it makes for a much more difficult transition than I expected.

Sure, it will all fade with time as his personality emerges and he recognizes that he’s stuck with his ridiculous father for at least 18 more years. It certainly doesn’t diminish how much love I hold for him in my heart. But no book, no person could have prepared me for the odd emotional limbo that I seem to be drifting in and out of right now. Or how much gas a nine pound being could hold.