New Dad - coping with the pressure of expectations

increasingly precious time.

Friends and social
Most couples' social lives take a hit after the arrival of a new baby. You're usually both so busy and

physically exhausted that going out simply doesn't appeal. After a while things will probably settle

down a bit, and you may be able to get into a good routine with your partner that allows you both to

have regular time with friends each week, but you're unlikely to ever go back to the heady days of

pre-baby socialising - unless you're an insensitive twit who never carries that baton at home, that

is. Some friends will accept this more readily than others, often depending on what their own family

situation and experiences are. If you're one of the first among your social group to start a family

then you might find it takes some explaining before they even begin to understand why you're not out

on the tiles so much anymore.

Career vs family
While the ongoing dominance of traditional gender roles still exerts a strong pressure on men to

provide well financially for their families and derive their self-worth almost entirely through their

career progress, many women - themselves juggling family and career - expect their partners to be more

hands-on in the home and with child-care than a generation ago.

Your exhausted new-mum partner probably hopes for some relief from nappy-changing, night-time waking,

vomit cleaning, settling a cranky baby and drowning in laundry. But, after the initial congratulations

have died down, your boss and work colleagues may expect you to carry on almost as though nothing has

happened. As a result, although two week's paternity leave is standard in the UK, many men still feel

uncomfortable taking even that much time off. And even your own parents may raise an eyebrow if you

decide to take more time off to get to know your child, or decide to take on the main responsibilty

for childcare yourself.

If you're one of the lucky few whose employer has a positive approach to fatherhood which gives you

greater flexibility to accommodate your new family, then you may have things a little easier, but

you'll still probably feel pulled between the need to provide for your family financially and

providing for them by being present and involved.

Focus on what you want
Try to block out the 'noise' all around you of other people's expectations and take some time to focus

on what you want, and to set your own expectations for yourself. Of course, trying to separate

what other people expect of you, and your reaction to those expectations, from what you actually want

for yourself isn't necessarily easy. Maybe try to imagine that you've reached your old age and are

looking back on these years with a young family. What do you hope you will have achieved with and for

your family? What kind of relationships will you want to have forged with your children? What will you

want your relationship with your partner to be like? What do you think your regrets or missed

opportunities may be? Will you look back and wish you had spent extra hours at the office working

towards promotion and a bigger pay packet, taking more 'me' kick-back time to reduce stress and/or

more time getting to know and care for your children and building great relationships with them? Think

about the relationship that you had/have with your own father and how it has affected your outlook on,

life, what would you want to recreate from that with your own children? and what would you want to do

differently?

If you have an idea of where you want to get to, or where you want to avoid ending up, it can help you

sort out your priorities in the here and now.

Once you've worked out what you want for yourself it's time to start communicating / negotiating with your partner, the other key person to consider in all this. One key to a successful partnership is

making sure that you're both working towards the same overall goals as a family and that you balance

each other's personal needs well.

Once you and your partner have a clear idea of how you're going to approach parenthood together you'll be in a much stronger position to buffer the ongoing storm of expectations, which probably won't completely die down for many years to come!