How does it feel…

Many people have asked me in the last few weeks how it feels to be a papa. I generally hedge, I deflect the question saying it’s too soon to tell or that it’s not really sunk in. That’s not true at all.

It feels… amazing. It feels like I finally get the punchline to the greatest story ever told. It feels like things make sense again. It feels like I have a future again.

One of the symptoms of PTSD is that people who suffer from it tend to be so focused on getting through the present they tend to stop imagining the future. While I don’t mean to put myself in the same category, it’s a good metaphor to look at where Shannon and I have been for much of the last decade. So many of our decisions and resources were focused on becoming parents. I stopped dreaming about our future. I stopped so entirely that I had not even realized what I was no longer doing.

Now, I’m in a beautiful world of paradox. I have no free time, yet I am getting more accomplished. I have a greater obligation then I have ever held in my life, yet I have the freedom to dream again. I have more restrictions on what I can do at any given moment, yet I feel less emotionally constrained. I’ve not slept a full night in the past month, yet I am emotionally refreshed in a way I cannot remember feeling.