I’m reading Home Game by Michael Lewis. It’s a collection of his journal entries during his three children’s first year of life. It’s more for fathers than mothers but I recommend it to anyone that has or is having children. Here is an excerpt discussing how a father’s love changes for his children from "could care less" to "totally in love":

"But there’s something else, too, which I hesitate to mention for fear it will be used against me the next time we divvy up the unpleasant chores around here. The simple act of taking care of a living creature, even when you don’t want to, maybe especially when you don’t want to, is transformative. A friend of mine who adopted his two children was asked by a friend of his how he could ever hope to love them as much as if they were his own. "Have you ever owned a dog?" he said. And that’s the nub of the matter: All the little things that you must do for a helpless creature to keep it alive cause you to love it. Most people know this instinctively. For someone like me, who has heretofore displayed a nearly superhuman gift for avoiding unpleasant tasks, it comes as a revelation. It’s because you want to hurl it off the balcony and don’t that you come to love it."

I can totally relate to this. As a first time father, I was unsure how I was going to handle a child. Someone that was going to need my undivided attention. At first, I was prone to pawn her off on mom. She was a nuisance. How dare you wake me from my slumber every hour? But that passed with time. Now I can’t wait to get home from work just to see her sleeping in her crib. At one or two in the morning, I hope she wakes up just so I can hold her and play with her for a little bit while she drinks her bottle. I may seem grumpy when she decides its seven in the morning and it means everyone better wake up and you’re not going back to sleep because I’m going to play with my toys and don’t you dare walk away out of my sight for I will scream and cry. I could complain and bitch and moan about those mornings, but I really love them.