A week ago, Brea and I found out that our baby is going to be a girl.

It’s an amazing thing seeing our unborn child on the ultrasound. The sonographer, or whatever she’s called, was looking at all the blobs of light on the screen and calling out what she was seeing. “There’s one of the kidneys…here’s the brain…there’s the lungs.” There was no way that I was going to be able to pick out any of those things on that screen. Part of that is due to my total lack of knowledge about human anatomy, but that’s another story. It was so cool sering our baby girl moving around months ahead of her birth.
I’m glad I have a few months to prepare for being a dad for a girl. I don’t really worry that much about taking care of her the first few years of her life. Taking care of girls is not that much different from boys in the early years, at least that’s my theory. What I’m glad I have time to prepare for is the fact that I am going to shape the spiritual and emotional well-being of someone who will one day base most of her understanding of God, life, and men in general on her relationship with me. That’s scary!

As a man, I feel much more prepared to raise a boy. After all, I am one. I know that one day a boy will basically need tough love. He will throw a fit, be mad for a little while, but eventually get over it, just like most boys do. A girl, however, is another story. I’m worried that when I raise my voice she will start crying. Tears from a girl are good tools of daddy-manipulation. Thankfully, I’ll have a few years to figure that one out.

Overall, I’m really excited. It’s going to a challenge, but it’s going to be incredible becoming a dad.