As it happens, I’ve done a pretty fair job of adjusting to parenthood…but then again, I was 9 1/2 when my youngest brother was born. I’d been around babies a little bit. My wife, on the other hand, was an only child. The adjustment was harder for her. Even now, she’s more prone to panic or worry than I am when it comes to our little Bear.

Experience matters, and I think classes like this may become more important as more and more parents come from only-child households or have siblings so close to them in age that they were never around babies.

My wife and I had our first child almost a year ago. I took a class through the local hospital here and it was called, “Boot Camp for new Dads.” I laughed at first, but took the class because I wanted to show the wife that I would be there for her and our new baby. And we took a prepared child birth class and it was so good, I figured this one would be the same. It was.

The most important thing I received from taking the class was there were new Dad’s there that had 6 month olds. They told us everything they went through – from many late nighters, diaper changing and helping the new Mom. It was kind of reassuring to the new Dad to say the least.

Honestly, a lot of what they did and taught I could have learned on my own. But I know there were guys in there that were a little shell-shocked about becoming new dads and the class did a world of good for them and for me.

Plus, it seems like everywhere you turn these days you see men portrayed as lazy, sports-crazed couch potatos. You see it in movies, in television shows and in commercials. Perhaps the above mentioned program isn’t exemplary of this stereotype, but it does exist.