Books on Parenting for New Dad

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Hi all,
My wife and I are expecting our first child, a boy, in August! Can anyone recommend any parenting books, especially Catholic parenting books, that were influential to them? Looking for something to read until then!

JMR
 
I can’t speak to the early years directly but I do recommend the following:

amazon.com/Be-Man-Becoming-God-Created/dp/1586174037

Children watch what you do first. As they age, they begin to understand the world and you must help guide them to do good and avoid evil. Parents are a child’s first role models. They will imitate you and even though their mental capacity is limited, will need you to follow Catholic teaching at home, at play and in taking them to Church. As they ask questions, be ready. Loving God and teaching them to pray are so important. I remember my mother teaching me to pray, with patience.

Best,
Ed
 
We never bothered with books , new borns are hands on,
Helps if there is an experienced mother available for advice,.
But you learn as you go along, plan your sleep times if at all possible
 
I haven’t read any Catholic parenting books yet, but if you are looking for practical advice, I’ve liked Heading Home With Your Newborn, What to Expect the First Year, and The Happiest Baby on the Block. All three have been good resources for us.

For your wife, I’d also recommend The Girlfriends’ Guide to Surviving the First Year of Motherhood. This book made me laugh and made me feel better about a lot of things.
 
I don’t know any titles, but there are probably a lot of them. Just remember that you can’t really learn it from a book, and you have to trust your gut more than the book.
 
No book can help you. BUT learn ahead of time how to hold a newborn, change diaper, feed and a bunch of that basic stuff somehow because after you have the kid, you and your wife will be relaxing in her hospital room and the nurse will come in, hand you the baby and leave. You and your wife wil ook at each other and be like “uh…so what do we do now?” and it will be the most stressfull night of your life because you have no idea what to do.

If your Mother in law in inclined to help out, be open to it… welcome it…ask for it because for the first couple weeks you will have little idea what to do.

Other than that, it is just flying by the seat of your pants and doing the best you can. A book might give you a game plan on a real macro level but won’t help you in the trenches. Like you can take all the karate lessons you like but when you get in a real fight it will be all out the window. Good luck!👍
 
Books are fine but you really aren’t going to learn until you’re in the trenches and figuring it all out.
I’ve flipped through “what to expect the first year” and another book we were given by my MIL that is directed toward dads (the name escapes me right now) and thought the advice was quaint and overly general.

Patience, common sense and a good pediatrician you trust…on speed dial…is all you really need to parent. Especially when it comes to surviving the first year with your first child.

My husband and I didn’t read any books, go to any parenting or birthing classes. We just figured it all out as we went.

My husband did call his mom when I had a nervous breakdown the first few hours we were home with our first baby…but everything smoothed over after that.

The best advice you could get is to just enjoy each other and love each other and do lots of fun things together…go to dinner and go on dates and have fun before the baby gets here.
 
Sorry, can’t recommend any books, but a couple of thoughts-
  • As my mother (6 kids) told me as I pontificated one day on how I was going to raise my kids (no physical discipline, getting them involved in lots of sports/outdoor activities, etc. etc.) She just laughed and said, “They’re all different.”
Read all the different theories and approaches you care to, but realize you’re not dealing with a machine coming off an assembly line. You’re dealing with an individual who will have some inherent traits, abilities and a disposition. You’ll need to do what works for that individual. I didn’t discipline my 3 children the same because they all responded differently, what worked for one didn’t work for another.
  • Best discussion of parenting I ever read was in Robert Asprin’s “Little Myth Marker” and it went something like-
Parenting is to a large extent taking the credit or blame for things that you may have had no control over. You will never know if your kids’ success or failure is because of you or despite of you. Whether other influences were responsible for the negatives or positives. If you were a contribution to their success, or an obstacle they overcame. Ultimately, they are human beings who can, and will, make decisions and choices in their lives different then you would have desired or guided them to make. (Kind of like our relationship with God). You can do everything ‘right’, and kids can make bad choices. All you can do is the best you can, loving them and doing what you think is right.
 
I don’t like parenting books. I think you will find that most things come naturally and you should trust your instincts. All too often the experts get it wrong because usually they have very little hands on experience of really raising kids or they focus on the dynamics in only child or two child families that have one or two textbook perfect kids. Most of us don’t live in that world. The other style of parenting books seem to be that they dismiss all types of misbehavior as normal instead of wrong. They say kids can’t grasp concepts that as a mom I can assure you kids do understand.
 
jmr_1985 said:
Hi all,
My wife and I are expecting our first child, a boy, in August! Can anyone recommend any parenting books, especially Catholic parenting books, that were influential to them? Looking for something to read until then!

JMR
Click to expand...
I wrote a book about parenting and I am going to post it in it’s entirety right here.
Do not put too much stock in parenting books.
Click to expand...
It took me a while to write…
 
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