These Advice from My Father Which Helped Us when I became a New Father

"I think I was simply in survival mode for the first year."

One-time reality TV cast member Ryan Libbey expected to manage the demands of fatherhood.

Yet the reality quickly proved to be "utterly different" to what he pictured.

Life-threatening health problems surrounding the birth saw his partner Louise being hospitalised. Suddenly he was pushed into becoming her primary caregiver as well as looking after their baby boy Leo.

"I was doing every night time, each diaper… every walk. The duty of both parents," Ryan shared.

Following 11 months he burnt out. That was when a conversation with his father, on a bench in the park, that made him realise he couldn't do it alone.

The straightforward statement "You aren't in a good spot. You require assistance. What can I do to assist you?" opened the door for Ryan to express himself truthfully, look for assistance and start recovering.

His situation is commonplace, but infrequently talked about. While the public is now better used to addressing the pressure on mums and about PND, far less attention is paid about the challenges fathers face.

'It's not weak to request support'

Ryan believes his struggles are symptomatic of a wider failure to communicate between men, who still hold onto damaging notions of manhood.

Men, he says, often feel they must be "the fortress that just gets smashed and remains standing time and again."

"It isn't a display of being weak to seek help. I failed to do that fast enough," he clarifies.

Therapist Dr Jill Domoney, a specialist specialising in mental health pre and post childbirth, notes men frequently refuse to admit they're having a hard time.

They can feel they are "not a legitimate person to be asking for help" - particularly in preference to a mother and child - but she highlights their mental well-being is vitally important to the unit.

Ryan's heart-to-heart with his dad gave him the opportunity to ask for a pause - spending a short trip overseas, separate from the home environment, to get a fresh outlook.

He understood he needed to make a change to pay attention to his and his partner's emotions as well as the practical tasks of taking care of a newborn.

When he shared with Louise, he saw he'd missed "what she needed" -reassuring touch and paying attention to her words.

Self-parenting

That insight has reshaped how Ryan sees being a dad.

He's now penning Leo regular notes about his journey as a dad, which he hopes his son will look at as he gets older.

Ryan believes these will enable his son to better grasp the vocabulary of feelings and understand his parenting choices.

The idea of "parenting yourself" is something rapper and songwriter Professor Green - whose name is Stephen Manderson - has also experienced deeply since fathering his son Slimane, who is now four years old.

During his childhood Stephen was without stable male parenting. Even with having an "incredible" bond with his dad, profound trauma caused his father found it hard to cope and was "in and out" of his life, complicating their bond.

Stephen says bottling up feelings led him to make "terrible decisions" when he was younger to change how he felt, turning in substance use as escapism from the hurt.

"You find your way to substances that don't help," he notes. "They can briefly alter how you are feeling, but they will in the end make things worse."

Advice for Managing as a New Dad

• Share with someone - when you are overwhelmed, tell a trusted person, your spouse or a professional what you're going through. It can help to ease the pressure and make you feel more supported.
• Keep up your interests - keep doing the activities that allowed you to feel like you before becoming a parent. This might be exercising, meeting up with mates or playing video games.
• Look after the physical health - nutritious food, staying active and when you can, resting, all are important in how your mind is coping.
• Connect with other new dads - hearing about their journeys, the messy ones, as well as the joys, can help to normalise how you're feeling.
• Know that seeking help does not mean you've failed - looking after you is the optimal method you can care for your family.

When his father later died by suicide, Stephen naturally had difficulty processing the loss, having not spoken to him for years.

As a dad now, Stephen's committed not to "perpetuate the cycle" with his own son and instead give the stability and emotional guidance he did not receive.

When his son starts to have a meltdown, for example, they try "releasing the emotion" together - managing the emotions in a healthy way.

Both Ryan and Stephen explain they have become better, healthier men since they acknowledged their issues, transformed how they talk, and learned to regulate themselves for their children.

"I'm better… sitting with things and handling things," says Stephen.

"I put that down in a letter to Leo recently," Ryan shares. "I expressed, at times I believe my job is to teach and advise you what to do, but actually, it's a dialogue. I'm learning as much as you are through this experience."