Dear Dad...

For me, Father’s Day has a slightly different meaning this year.

At 8:45am on the 6th of January, 2026, I became a dad. A Father.

It still feels very strange writing that.

For most of my life, “Dad” has meant someone else. Someone older. Someone wiser. Someone who knew what to do. Someone you called when something went wrong, when you needed advice, when something needed fixing, or when you simply needed help. (And occasionally when you needed some money).

Then, at 8:45 that morning, that became me.

And in that moment, I started to understand dads in a way I never had before.

I watched my amazing wife get through a (relatively quick and seamless) labour with both pain and determination, followed by sheer exhilaration and that sense of relief that everything is ok. After 9 months of caring for a human inside her, it all came down to about 4 hours. She gets the first hold of course, and then you get handed this tiny person. You’re holding them in your arms and suddenly everything feels different.

There’s this overwhelming love. But there’s so much more. The nerves of the unknown. The lack of knowing what you’ve just got yourself into. And the biggest of them all, responsibility.

The quick and quiet realisation that, from this moment on, there is someone in the world that you not only need to keep alive, but would do absolutely anything for. Someone you want to give every opportunity to. Someone you hope, one day, will look back and know that you were always there.

I’m only new to this. I’m still learning what being a dad means. But already, I find myself thinking differently about all the dads who came before me. In fact, my daughter is still so young, she can’t even say ‘Dad’. But I know it’s not far away. Maybe by September 6… but that might be a little hopeful.

Time is no longer a linear event. In-fact, it feels somewhat non-existent, simply because it is going so fast. The days, weeks and months are disappearing faster than I could have imagined. I sit here at 10pm, writing this piece while the little one sleeps. Thinking that I should head to bed soon, but knowing she’ll probably wake for her first feed in an hour, so I’ll keep going.

The days have a new meaning, as do the nights. Work is important, but getting home to her and spending the precious few hours we have together before bed time. The nights are short, but also long. Short in the sense that you don’t get enough sleep. But long when you’re standing in the cold rocking her to sleep at 3am, wishing you were back in bed.

So, as I look back at the last 40 years, while looking at the next 40, I think about the things that magically got fixed when I was a kid, and when I get to fix them. When I get to teach her how to change a tire, hit a golf ball, snow ski, mow the lawn, drive a car and so much more. All the fun stuff.

Then there is the advice. That stuff we sometimes listen to. The dad jokes and the repeated stories you’ve heard 5 times before. The worry and the hurry. The sacrifices we probably never even know we make.

As a kid, I just thought that was what dads did. Now I'm living it.

Becoming a dad has made me want to hold onto the ordinary moments a little tighter. The evening cuddles. The extra time in bed. The contact naps. Even the moments that feel exhausting now, because I already know they won’t last forever.

For now, I’m at the very beginning. I don’t have all the answers and I’m sure I never will.

But I understand something now that I didn’t before. This is the ride of my life.

And I hope I can do for my child what so many dads have done quietly before.

So, to all the Dad’s reading this, new and old, and especially mine. Thank you. This one is for you.

And to those who are no longer with us, the ones we would give anything to sit beside again. To have a beer with. To ask one more question. To hear one more story, or share one more laugh with. Cheers to you too.

Happy Father’s Day