To Become a Father, I Learned to Let Go and Trust
A New Life
About two weeks ago, my son Ivan was born.
That moment marked a new chapter of my life. When I heard his first cry after coming out of his mother's womb, I felt joy, gratitude, excitement, and fear—all in the same instant.
Those of you who know me probably know that my wife and I have been trying to have a child for about two years. The first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage in October of 2021. We were both devastated by the loss. After finding the courage to try again, we struggled with infertility. For about a year, we saw doctors and went through fertility treatments. None of it worked. This is when guilt started to grip me by the throat.
Overcoming My Own Fears
Perhaps due to my own father issues, for the longest time, I had a strong fear of becoming a father. I kept finding reasons or excuses to delay having a child in the early years of my marriage. It wasn't until about three years ago, when I started taking men's work seriously, that those fears started to dissipate. Instead of seeing children as headaches and chores to be dealt with, somehow I started to recognize that they are reflections of the most tender, innocent, creative, and nurturing parts of myself.
I now wanted to become a father, but thought it was probably too late.
I was forced to confront my own powerlessness like never before. Faith was what I had to rely on, and it was being crushed month by month and replaced by excruciating anxiety.
All my life, I learned to apply discipline, hard work, and focus to get what I want, and it usually worked out, slowly but surely. Not this time.
Nature has its timing, and there are things beyond my control, things that cannot be forced or coaxed. I know these facts in my head, but this time it was served to me viscerally, like a gut punch. I hated it.
Learning to Trust and Let Go
Last March, I had a long and difficult conversation with my wife. She asked me to just stop with all my obsessive planning and controlling. Of course, the word I would have used was "leadership." She asked me to just "let go" and trust her intuition on these matters. I did, reluctantly.
The very next month, she became pregnant with our son Ivan, and he is exactly two weeks old this Christmas Day.
Key Take-aways:
Creating a child has many potential obstacles: infertility, miscarriage, anxiety about parenthood
Despite wanting to, we are not always in control
Sometimes we just have to trust