December 16th 2015 my wife Alexis gave birth to our first child. A boy. We named him Owen. He was born naturally at home. The pregnancy was not an easy one. My wife was sick all 40 weeks. Her sacrifice and suffering for his benefit began day one and was immense.

I am hooked! I am attached to my son like I never thought I would be. I hug him and kiss him all the time. I have so much fun talking to him, reading to him, tickling him, feeding him, singing to him, changing his diapers, changing his clothes and playing with him. I think about him, I miss him, I root for him, I show people pictures of him, I talk about him often. I did not think I would be someone who is showing pictures of their kid to people. I didn’t think I was going to be married, let alone have any kids and then be “one of those people” showing off pictures and talking about their kid. So far he is developing just great! He is a sweet, mellow little guy. I just love him so much!

I want him to continue to be a happy, healthy, intelligent, successful person. So I make life decisions for him. Isn’t that funny that so many decisions are made for someone else. I really have begun to feel all the karma associated with having a child. There are so many opportunities (many unavoidable) to create karma, good and bad. So I put him in certain situations that I think will be to his benefit and I avoid others that I think will be to his detriment. I purchase certain toys and not others. I have plans for his first school, an idea of where I would like him to attend the school after that and the school after that and the school after that. I have plans on how I will approach lessons to teach him, what I will say to him when the kids are mean to him at school or someone is mean to him. I have ideas of different ways to teach him to make friends at school, how to solve problems, how to brush his teeth properly etc etc I have some plans on how to ensure we are maintaining relationships with other parents of children he may like and want to be friends with. I think about how to deal with him hanging out with people I don’t want him to hang out with. I think about how much I need to learn so I can teach him more- I have a lot to learn!

Now whats the truth of the matter? There is so much to think about and do but the truth of the matter is I have very little, to no control over the outcome of his life and the above mentioned situations. I can all that I can do and he can become the opposite of what I was thinking. He can also become all those things I think are good and he still not be happy. He is going to be his own person. We can make all the sacrifices we can and still end up unhappy or hurt him. A small but recent example of doing what we thought best for him actually hurting him. As of today we are practicing the sleep wave method to help him learn to sleep on his own. The sleep wave method requires that you use a script to verbally reassure him every 5 minutes (if he’s crying) when he’s going to sleep and if he wakes up to help him to use his own body and development to soothe himself to sleep. No cuddling, rocking him in the chair anymore to put him back to sleep or get him sleepy. That can of course be done anytime during the day but not for napping or bedtime. Up until today we rocked him and soothed each night and each nap to put him to sleep. The love and attention we were paying him actually was a harm to him. It delays his ability to learn to soothe and sleep on his own and actually makes his nights harder for him.

Now what is really the truth of the matter? The truth of the matter is despite what I may have thought I wanted or said I wanted, at the end of the day this is what I wanted! I wanted to be loved, to be in a committed relationship, to be married and have a family. I wanted my little Owen. If I really didn’t I wouldn’t have made the decisions I did, nor taken the actions I did. Now that I got what I wanted is it what I thought it would be? It is not. Both good and bad. But I own the suffering and not that comes with this attachment and will continue my practice. Having my Owen is teaching me again actions speak louder than words, my serenity/contentment lies within me not outside of me and its my attachment to him that causes me joy and suffering.

So what is really, really the truth of the matter? The truth is I am the cause of my suffering and I am selfish. Even when I want something for him so he is happy and healthy really its for me too. Because I selfishly associate myself with him and his well being. He is my Owen (even though he doesn’t belong to me). When he is happy and healthy I feel accomplished. I feel like I’m doing a good job. So the truth is I am a very loving, generous person, a loving, attentive father but like others- also selfish. In finding and accepting that aspect of me like all other aspects of myself, I am able to grow and identify with other people. In identifying with other people and seeing how I am the same as them I am able to remove judgement. My perceptions change, I suffer less.

So tell me what is your real, real truth of the matter that you’re involved in right now? Leave a comment and let me know. I’d love to hear it!

P.S. I would leave a picture of Owen but that’s another decision we made for him. We’re not publicly posting any media of him online.