Doris and I are the proud parents of a daughter and son, 14 and 11. Although many years have passed since our children were born, I'll never forget when I became a father for the first time.

As an expectant father, I found that the classes we went to were very helpful, at least for the first child. I learned how to help my wife breathe and to be more relaxed during labour, plus other important aspects of looking after a child during the first few months. All this preparation helped me play a greater role as a father not only during the delivery but after the baby was born.

Doris had a natural delivery and I was very excited to see the baby come out. My heart was beating so hard that even afterwards, when I was alone outside the ward, I continued to be very excited. When our second child was born, I was happy to have a son but the level of excitement wasn’t as high as being a father for the first time.

After the birth of our first child, Doris was in confinement for one month and stayed with her mother. Again, because of the classes, I knew what to expect when she faced a slight case of the baby blues.

Of course, both pregnancies affected our sex life. When a child comes, the wife becomes more involved with the child and the opportunities for sex become less. But you can’t measure intimacy by the frequency of the sex act. In terms of actual closeness and our affinity for each other, there is no lack.

Written by Fook Kong, taken from ‘Men’’s magazine