15 Tips For New Fathers on Being the Best Husband While Your Wife is Pregnant

Be the best husband you can be by following these 15 tips.

1. She’s always right. Never, ever contradict her. You are at best naive or ignorant, at worst the biggest jerk in the world. This is not the time for her to wonder if she is having the baby of the biggest jerk in the world.
2. Read all the emails she forwards and books she recommends. Every. Single. Word. Be prepared to be quizzed on it at anytime, anywhere and under any circumstance. You will be forgiven only once for not understanding the new vocabulary, such as when your baby is sunny side up. Surprisingly, despite the overall paranoia and hormonal irrational fears she will exhibit, statistics will comfort her — that said, read the forum groups she will be posting questions. Read the comments, especially all 565 of them, and come back with statistics on the positive side, such as stating the so-and-so nearly impossible thing happened to 3 commentators, which is 0.5% of the posters, which is like 0.000023 percent of all pregnant women. If she says you’re wrong, refer to #1.
3. No one cares about you. Sorry, it’s true, even if someone asks they are only saying it to be nice in front of your pregnant wife.
4. There is never a right answer to any question about her looks. She is glowing to you, but she feels like a cow in the cold rain (and a fat cow at that). Every answer you can think of is wrong. Change the subject quickly, but not obviously.
5. Encourage her to find a “new mom’s” group. Meetup.com is a great place to start. It not only gives her an environment to be with other preggers to diffuse related issues, but you have now deferred a lot of hard questions to a group of women! Hopefully, the husbands of your wife’s new mom friends are cool — you’ll be hanging with them soon.
6. Buy the best stroller you can afford. Learn how to use it before putting your baby in it. Don’t be that new dad that can’t put a car seat in the car. Figure it out! Expect her not to know how to remove the seat, ever.
7. You don’t need to child-proof until at least the baby is 6 months, but do it before then and don’t do it yourself — hire someone. That will not only tell your wife that you are thinking about the baby, but it will be one of a few million checks on her list.
8. Splurge on a house cleaner for one or two times per month. Make sure you have already researched the best natural cleaners, purchased them and told the house cleaner to use those and only those. Throw out all the other chemicals in your house. Let her know you did this — she didn’t even ask you!
9. Bring Cliff bars to the hospital. You will be hungry, but will not have an appetite. Put them in the go-bag. Don’t know what a go-bag is? Find out now and make sure she never finds out you didn’t know what a go-bag is!
10. Sleeping used to be great: expect her not to sleep the last few weeks of pregnancy. That means you are not sleeping either. Get used to this. Be sympathetic to her and do not mention you too are not sleeping. She doesn’t care that you are not sleeping. No one else cares either (refer to #3).
11. Men can’t make jokes about pregnancy. Don’t even attempt it. Women can, especially pregnant women. Only laugh if she laughs. Act offended if she is offended. If she makes a joke, then laugh, but never repeat it.
12. Only invite close family and even closer friends to the hospital. Everyone else can see the baby at home. When they come over, lay down ground rules: time in, time out, no food/hosting, don’t use her bathroom, thanks for the present, and now leave.
13. Eat foods she eats and don’t eat foods she can’t or won’t eat. That’s like running on a treadmill at the hospital in front of a friend that just broke two legs. You jerk.
14. Make a big deal for pregnant milestones. For example, “You did it!” graduation-style balloons for starting her second trimester with a card, flowers and her favorite food. Who is the best DH in the world? You are! Don’t know what DH is, refer to #2
15. Be aware that all parenting books push a parenting philosophy that will not matter until at least 3 months after the baby is born. Babies have personalities, so just focus on keeping them alive and take advice where that is the goal. Ferberizing? That doesn’t apply to how to take a baby’s temperature or how much Advil to give them

Good luck and remember that having a pregnant wife is a lot of work!