Mathew Miller

Becoming a dad is both an exhilarating and a terrifying experience. Planning ahead and being prepared are the best ways to handle what’s coming up in the next nine months and beyond. Doing what you can ahead of time, such baby-proofing your house and packing your hospital bag, will save precious time later on and help you feel like you’re in control (at least a little bit).

When you and your partner are trying to get pregnant there are some do's and don'ts for scheduling sex. Just because you've written sex down on your calendar doesn't mean it's just another obligation that eats up your time and lacks excitement. After all, this appointment has a far bigger upside than the average visit to the dentist.

Let's just get the myths out of the way for you new dads right now: Your penis isn't long enough to hit or poke the baby during sex. The baby can't see your penis when you're having sex, and she isn't afraid of your penis during sex. Your semen won't get all over the baby upon completion of sex. Sex is perfectly healthy during pregnancy.

In recent years, movies, TV shows, and even commercials have begun to transition from the bumbling, know-nothing father of yore to the modern dad who's just as comfortable changing a diaper as he is fixing a car. Fathers today range from traditional to single parents to equal partners in every aspect of parenting.

The neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is like nothing you've ever seen before and it can be scary for new dads. Although hospitals put more emphasis than they used to on keeping NICUs quiet, they are, by necessity, fairly noisy and busy, with alarms going off, lights on day and night so hospital personnel can see what they're doing, and at the center of it all, your little baby.

Fun should rule the day when it comes to setting up the nursery, but overanxious parents-to-be, including new dads, often try to tackle too much at once. Begin your nursery designing with a planning session. Draw a bird's-eye floor plan of the room. Then start filling in the space with all the things you need and decide on the placement of all the furniture.

Although you and your partner discussed pain medication options during the pregnancy, nothing is written in stone on the day you become a dad, when labor starts. A staunch au naturel supporter may find herself asking for an epidural the minute she hits the labor floor, and a woman who was sure she's epidural material may find herself breathing through labor and deciding she'd rather do without one.

Blood tests during a pregnancy have two purposes that will be covered here for all you new dads-to-be. Some prenatal screening tests are for your partner's overall well-being and check for potentially harmful medical conditions. Second-trimester quadruple-screen blood tests are aimed at determining the risk of genetic anomalies in the fetus.

By the end of the first trimester of pregnancy, a new dad's baby's vital parts are all in place and beginning to perform the functions they'll carry out for the next 80 or so years. By the end of the second trimester, the baby's lungs, one of the slowest organs to mature, are almost capable of supporting life with assistance if he's born very prematurely (23 to 24 weeks is considered the earliest that a fetus can survive if born early).