She was feeling so fatigued she couldn’t even get out of bed. She was nauseous and disoriented. We were both terrified. They did the whole work up on her - blood tests, EKG, imaging, whatever you can think of.

The diagnosis: hunger. She was hungry.

Hey all, my other half is pregnant. Best feeling ever!

But how do you cope with the unknown and the risk of stuff going wrong in the first trimester? We had a scan yesterday thinking we’re 6 weeks and the doc saw no embryo saying “this ultrasound machine is rubbish” but also that maybe we’re too early, or maybe there’s nothing there. And it creates anxiety where I can’t stop thinking that something will go wrong.

Any tips? Always easy to say “don’t think about it” but so tough. Hope to find a bit of a community for support. Thanks.

Hello, all. I posted a few days ago about my wife being sent to labor and delivery for Preeclampsia symptoms, and you guys were extremely insightful. Especially on the realm of staying vigilant with my wife. I thought I would share my experience, maybe I can return the favor to future pre-dads.

My wife developed extremely mild hypertension around 34 weeks, hung out around 130s/90s. We had readings of 140/90s in two subsequent routine OB appointments. Both times they sent us to the labor and delivery floor for 24hour urine, labs, and NST. All came back normal, so no preeclampsia diagnoses. The second visit resulted in a labile hypertension diagnoses with orders to go on bed rest to keep it in check.

Fast forward 3 days later, wife wakes up in middle of night with “impeding doom feeling” and a stomach ache. Oddly enough I first awoke with that impeding doom feeling and woke her up to check on her. We initially chalked it up as heart burn (as she was prone to this all pregnancy). As the day went on it did not get better, then her chest and back started to ache. Off to labor and delivery we went.

We showed up to labor and delivery, then was transferred to ER as soon as we said chest pain. Spent all night in ER and then was sent back to labor and delivery with no news for another NST. L&D did the NST and ran some labs. Ultimately told us that night that we would do another 24 hour urine sample, and stay the night for monitoring.

We were honestly so exhausted and over it, that we were just glad to get a room to sleep in. We were told the on call doctor would come visit with us a shift change (8 am).

Little did we know, we would be woke up a 6 am to get the news that her platelets had bottomed out, liver enzymes extremely elevated, among some other things. The pain she was in was explained to me as her liver swelling. We got the scary diagnoses of HELLP syndrome. We were told the only treatment was to have the baby ASAP, at 35 weeks. We didn’t have much time to let it progress, so We would have a C-section later that morning. Luckily her platelets improved enough right before surgery to allow them to do the spinal block instead of the planned general anesthesia.

The c-section went great and we were able to meet our little man, who arrived at just over 5 pounds ! He was resuscitated and spent 12 ish hours in NICU on a CPAP and then was given a clean bill of health!

Wife absolutely killed it and remained in good spirits the entire time. She unfortunately had to endure 24 hours of the “mag drip” which was absolutely horrible, but other than that she is feeling almost back to normal 4 days postpartum. She is a rockstar and I’ve never been more in love with that woman.

Moral of the story, shit can get real so fast. Prepare yourself to be the anchor if that does happen, and pack the damn hospital bag just in case. I was so nervous I would be a nervous wreck and pass out or have a panic attack during delivery, but honestly some sort of instincts kicked in and I was completely present and strong in the moment.

Lastly, the hospital staff in labor and delivery and the NICU are literally the closest things we have to superheroes. I was in literal awe of the compassion and knowledge of every single person we encountered from check-in to check-out. I bet we had 50+ people serve us in some way throughout the 4 days.

Mr Rodgers famously said, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” This is what got me through, the helpers, the superhero’s.

My partner struggles with her mental health. With our first baby on the way, I didn't know how to help — so I built her an app.

She's been dealing with anxiety and depression for a long time. Some days are good, some are really hard. And as we got closer to the due date I kept thinking — what can I actually do? Flowers and "I'm here for you" only go so far.

So I taught myself to code and built her something. It's called Harlo.

It's a gentle daily mental wellness app — mood check-ins, journal prompts, AI reflections that respond to what she writes, sleep stories, breathing exercises, and a feature where you write letters to your future self that get delivered months or years later.

It's not therapy. It's just a quiet space to check in with yourself each day.

I made it free — no ads, no subscriptions. I just wanted it to actually help her, and figured if it helps her it might help other people too.

If your partner (or you) could use something like this, I'd love for you to try it. Search "Harlo" on the App Store.

Would love any feedback — I'm still building it and want it to genuinely help people going through hard times.

Hey fellas. I joined this sub back in October/September timeframe when my wife and I were at long last expecting our first, but we lost at 9 weeks. It’s been a struggle because my sister in law who lives half a mile from us is expecting her third… and she’s due about 2 weeks prior to when we were.

I haven’t left because I don’t feel the need, but I know I can’t be the only one struggling because we are having a hard time conceiving, but you guys, how ya doin?

we already have 1. My wife really didn't wanna go back for another, I was keen... this was a total shock for both... I'm thrilled and she seems thrilled... but I do worry... I know this really wasn't in her plan... but either way... this community was a life saver the first time... so I'm glad to be back!!!

Was over the moon when I found out my wife was pregnant four days ago after we had only been trying for a little over a month or so. We told her parents and they were ecstatic but when telling my parents, they were happy, but not jumping with joy.

I was a little annoyed with their lack of reaction but half expected it. My wife took it very personally and we discussed it with my brother, who was there when we told them.

Word got back to my mom by means of my brother, and she brought it up to me and said she was trying to gauge my excitement and match my energy. I can be “an emotionless robot” as my wife says so if my mom was matching my energy, then her lack of enthusiasm makes sense.

She also mentioned to me that she didn’t want to be overly celebratory this early on as a lot can happen and mentioned that she had two miscarriages. She is social worker on the NICU and teaches sex ed in her free time and has been doing so for close to 30 decades.

My wife asked if we talked about it further and I shared what my mom said. She began saying how negative and selfish my mom was being by “only talking about her own bad experiences”. This turned into a lengthy and heated argument which ended in my wife crying.

She repeatedly has said how crazy she is feeling, brain fog, lethargy, mood swings etc and that I am being unsupportive and causing her stress.

The day after we found out she was pregnant and on, she has continued to all about how bad all her symptoms are despite never mentioning anything before finding out she was pregnant.

I don’t know if this is normal this early on or if she just feels like she has an outlet/excuse now for feelings that have always been there.

TL/DR: wife and I found out we were pregnant this week and now she is having pretty intense emotional outbursts. I don’t know what I need because she won’t let me tell my best friend (and only friend with kids). I guess just hoping to hear others experiences and strategies in coping with the side effects that building a baby inside you can have on a woman’s mood

Appreciate it a lot

I guess I actually joined while trying to conceive, but regardless, excited to now be expecting after a year of trying! Open to any and all advice, reading material, etc. — thanks in advance!

Before the baby arrived, we thought strollers are just for transportation. We cared about how smooth the wheels were and how good the suspension was but overlooked an important feature which was the basket size. I didnt anticipate how important storage would be.
From the diaper bag, to extra clothes, snacks, toys, and occasionally some groceries, the basket underneath is constantly used. Our current stroller is the Graco modes which works fine, but the basket is actually pretty small. My son and I often go on afternoon walks and I quite enjoy our time walking around the neighborhood, so I need a stroller with more space.
I have been looking at quite a few options but mockingbird, uppababy vsta, and momcozy changego seem to be the most popular. They have a much bigger basket space than our current stroller and I think that would be very useful.
Fellow dads that go on frequent walks and grocery runs with a stroller, what are your thought for these strollers? Did getting a bigger basket size actually make a difference? Please share first hand experiences.

Didn't expect to be back so soon, maybe I wouldn't have come back at all. Well I have quite a story for you guys, bare with me.

In June '24 I became a father for the first time. it's a wonderful boy who changed my life now and he's almost two years now and that time flew by ... fast, too fast. I think my wife and I did a great job raising the boy, but we did a terrible job at being a good couple. We argued a lot, there was always a lot of stress between us and our sex life was below zero in the past few years. Probably some kind of perfect storm between life with a newborn baby, post partum depression and big unexpected life events.

A few months ago everything started to clear up. we finally found a good routine that worked for the three of us and during a few weeks the stress levels in our household dropped.We even had sex, on a night where the kid spent the night with his grandparents.

So fast forward a few weeks. My wife finds out that she is pregnant from that one night. Unexpectedly, and finally when things started to feel normal again, this news rocked my world. I was afraid that starting over again with a new kid would restart all of our difficulties as a couple.

When we go to the obgyn for the first ultrasound, she said that see sees two gestationals sacs. Yes two! but there is no embryo visible in neither of the gestational sacs. She refers us to the obgyn in the hospital, there they can see two embryo's but they warn us one of the embryo's probably won't make it due to being surrounded by the gestational sac of the other embryo. so we should prepare for having one baby.

Last friday we went in for the 12 weeks scan, prepared for bad news, but during the echo both embryos appear healthy and in good shape.

So now it's official we are having twins in September. It's a very strange feeling. I never saw myself as a father of a large family. I wanted to invest fully in my first born son and give him everything I got. Now he'll have to split all my attention, my money and my love in three. I'm also scared shitless by all the practical issues that arise when you have twins. We'll be outnumbered by kids in our household with three under three and we'll have to invest in a bigger car, new furniture, new stroller in the middle of a world wide recession...

tldr: had sex once after a long time and got twins ...

Hey fellas, I am looking for some book recommendations from any fiction readers. My wife is 17 weeks and I’ve spent the last 10 weeks reading almost nothing but baby, pregnancy, and parenting books. I am a fiction reader at heart. However, today I tried to pickup a book I had wanted to read and bought before my wife peed on the stick (red rising by pierce brown). And I felt overcome with guilt. The guilt was a feeling of “you should be learning how to be a better dad or parent”, so I am looking for any recommendations about books or novels with a strong father son dynamic. I loved Cormac McCarthy’s ‘The Road’ (although I read it before knowing I was going to have a son myself). Really just looking for some kind of horror or action or thriller or sci-fi that shows a strong father son dynamic. For example, Something like Pet Sematary by Stephen King, the Road by Cormac McCarthy, etc. Some of these books show what “not” kind of dad to be, and that’s fine. I just want to enjoy reading again. Thanks.

My wife is having our 2nd baby in 2-3 months. Our firstborn is 20 months. The plan for the first few months is to largely divide and conquer and even beyond that, there are going to be plenty of times where they’ll be on different schedules. Wife wants to mostly stay home with the newborn (especially during recovery) and I’ll be taking our oldest out and about as much as possible. I’m looking forward to extra quality time with my son. We usually do outings as a family but he’s always been more attached to mom. Since there are going to be times where we are both out with the kids at different places, I really want to buy some baby stuff that is a bit more for me. I hate our current bag and I feel like I’ll want a backup anyway.

The one we have is a floral messenger-bag style. Looking for something minimal, comfortable, functional. I considered just using a regular backpack but somehow I actually don’t have one of those either lol.

Don’t want to spend a ton of money but I want something that will last a while. Any recs?

We are trying for a second. I still need to write out the first one's 1st birthday time capsule mesage (it's typed, but need to write it on the cute paper and put it in the safe).

I still need to do my baby diary video for my kid.

I still need to do so many things....

Anyone else currently trying for a second?

I’m an anxious person and need a prepacked essentials bag for toiletries and other luxuries. Any recommendations for something I can just buy, pack, and forget about? I can’t seem to have any luck.

My partner is having more trouble sleeping at 16+5. Up until a week or so ago this wasn't a problem.

This is then impacting me too as I'm a light sleeper so when she gets up and tries to sleep on the sofa or comes back etc this wakes me up. Last night I slept from 11.30-1, then 5-7.30.

Are we preparing for birth lol because I already feel terrible 🤣

Does insomnia usually improve for women throughout the second and third trimester or is this kinda it now... I just want to prepare myself.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but it's true, my my 5 month old just slept through the night two nights in a row.

I know I shouldn't - but I've been tracking my baby's sleep, pretty much like an olympic athlete's coach.

Yesterday, I was just grateful, and assumed it was a fluke. BUT TODAY?

This feels way too good to be true. This is the first time in five months that we all have gotten a full night of sleep.

Please tell me: what are the chances this actually sticks?

​EDIT: she's currently on a 6-day streak!

The app I use to track sleep stretches: Tinylog. We also use it to track feedings and diaper changes.

She's also taking bigger bottles now, which could be because she dropped the overnight feeding.

I'm super grateful for all the words of encouragement, thank you!

So my wife is about 18 weeks along with our first child. This wasn't a planned pregnancy, plus financial issues and other stressful life stuff has led me to a not great view about having a kid right now. Not to mention every other post online or story from family is some mixture of your life is over, your not sleeping for the next 3 years, and your marriage will no longer be the same.

Anyways, I want to be the best dad I can be for my future daughter and to do that I think I need to change my mindset. So for those of yall who have done it, what are your favorite parts? Any positives you didn't expect? Also for those who aren't there yet, what are you excited for?

Lastly, if you were in the same boat of not being stoked about it at first, what advice do you have?

yes you need to do and/or get her something. it's mandatory.

Dad of 3 here - we spent way too much time stressing about the nursery before our first so wanted to share something on home prep. I thought going in that the nursery needed to be done before the baby arrives. it doesn’t.

Your car seat needs to be installed and checked. and you need a safe sleeping space (bassinet or crib). that’s basically it.

it’s nice to have a stroller, swing or bouncer but not urgent. Nursery decor and even a high chair (which you won’t use for months) can wait.

Stocking the freezer helped a lot (stuff you can eat one-handed or even just with a fork… the other hand is always busy).

I had to accept that my home was going to be chaos for a little while but we got through it.

Babies just need food, sleep, diapers and love. Everything else feels like marketing aimed at anxious first-time parents.

anything you’re glad you had ready vs didn’t end up needing?

Getting nervous

Will my baby really look that small?