re: Youth Baseball Glove for 10yr Old New to Baseball - Advice Request

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Have you considered fishing or hunting instead?

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I haven't fishing could be fun. I've never gone hunting myself, and even if I did I'm not sure his mom would want him killing Bambi.

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Congrats on the kiddo. They're life changing.

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Appreciate it, man. It's funny, I still keep waiting for it to hit me, as in a sudden surge of panic or something, but I've been pretty even keeled with it. It's always hilarious to me, being shot, jumping out of airplanes, etc and my brain's like, "Lock in, focus on what needs to be done." Then when it comes to going to Publix, doctor's appts, even meeting friends I've known since 6th grade for lunch my brain's like, "Sound the alert! Danger, danger!"

Yeah, I'm trying to remain balanced and obviously work with his mom on slowly introducing me into his life more and more without it suddenly feeling strange or out of nowhere for him. So I try to keep my desires to spend time with him in check and not overstress my friend or Atlas. Because I both have a lot to now learn about how to parent, I had a dad who was physically in my life but never engaged with me or my life growing up, and even when I was in 6th or 7th grade I was praying to God asking for a family of my own one day and I always swore to myself if I managed to have kids I'd be there for them in the way my own dad wasn't for me. But I do want to do this gradually and make sure we don't do too much at once or too quickly for Atlas to handle.

But then, just randomly while working at my desk some evenings I'll daydream a bit and imagine when I get to see him this upcoming time, which we're doing something next week, but just getting to pat "my boy" on the head or on his back whereas, before he was just my friends kid, I cared about him & even got him Christmas gifts and stuff, but now it's like, he's my boy...?? haha

So looking forward to truly getting to know the little guy. We've been playing a lot of Roblox this week each evening. Going to do that again in a bit. I just want to make sure I do things right & don't screw this up.

If you truly love your kid, there is only one answer…

Nokona Gloves

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I'm trying to remain balanced and obviously work with his mom on slowly introducing me into his life more and more without it suddenly feeling strange or out of nowhere for him. So I try to keep my desires to spend time with him in check and not overstress my friend or Atlas.

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Do what you think is right, but I must say I brought my first child home from the hospital 2 days after she was born on what seems like last weekend. She leaves for college in a few months. Time flies and they’re gone before you know it.

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So, I actually did wonder from time to time over the years. But she always said that she knew the father was this other guy. So back in October we're just chatting as usual and she finds a way to work in asking for pics of me as a kid. So I sent her some. And later on she tells me, soooo...here's the reason I asked you for pics of you as a kid.

Basically, a few things had started making her wonder. First, her mom's white but her dad is Syrian (Christian, though) but both she and her sister, and I guess most people in their family, have very dark hair. And Atlas, she's a bookworm/your hot librarian girl, haha, but I actually really like his name too, anyway, he started out with very light brown hair. I have very light brown hair now, but I was a complete blonde basically up to 12-13 or so. So that made her wonder. But she also said his looks in general, she's like, "He doesn't look like the guy I thought was his father."

And then she said, he's always coming up to me with these existential or deeply philosophical questions, he makes straight As, he's reading Neil Gaiman novels at 9...and so, as a kid who was in the Gifted program growing up and went to Gifted in elementary & a specialized Gifted program at a Magnet middle school which then led to me doing the IB Program at what was the #1 High School in the country for years and years, including my time there, I'm like...yeaahhh...kinda sounds like me. He also looks very similar to me and has my penchant for sarcasm.

So she told me that she thought I was probably the father. So, I sat with that for a couple of days and then was like, "Okay, I'm figuring this out." So I ordered an at home paternity test off of Amazon where you take cheek swab samples and send them off to a lab. This time it was my turn to surprise her. I asked her if she could meet me on a Monday afternoon as I had something to give her. So we meet up and I'm like, "Surprise! Here's a paternity kit with my samples already included. Get it done!"

And so yeah, we sent that off and I got the results and it's 99.9999% probable that I'm his father.

So, and this could be its own separate thread too, but I've struggled with treatment-resistant depression & Complex PTSD going back to when I was 11. So throughout my 20s I would "date" but never got into a relationship. I was genuinely living a nightmare, one that almost killed me. I ended up putting a 45ACP Hollow-Point through my chest back on July 22, 2017. Luckily I lived like 10mins from Shands here in Jax. It's UF's hospital and also acts as the official trauma center for all of North, Central FL & Southern GA. The bullet blew out my transverse colon, hit my liver, pancreas, spine, and missed my abdominal aorta by 1cm before exiting my lower back. When I looked down after it happened I noticed my intestines spilling out, so I had to push them back in. I experienced 40% Blood Volume loss by the time I got to the hospital. Had 2 15+ hour surgeries that weekend, then spent over a week in the ICU, and another month in the Surgery wing. Somehow, well actually God saved me, I know that, I survived...even the doctors were like, we have no idea how you even made it to the hospital alive.

Sorry, going on tangents I know. But no, my depression basically robbed me of the last 20yrs of my life so I never found someone that I could make things work with romantically. Hell, I was still struggingly with intense despair & suicidal ideation all of this year until Aug 29th, which again, could merit its own thread, but Christ found me & brought me back home & I returned to my faith. Ever since then, for the first time in 20 years, I've been doing legitimately well. Still struggle, but it's manageble, I don't wake up each morning feeling like my chest is drowning and my head is on fire. God has genuinely performed several miracles in my life, from delivering me back in August, to keeping me alive throughout my mid 20s when, if I told you about that time, you'd understand that there is no possible way I should have made it out alive. But I did.

Again, sorry for that long arse tangent, short answer is no I wasn't with anyone officially at the time. lol

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Rawlings

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Second

Go buy him a Bradley baseball glove. Will last him for 3 years

Do not have your kid show up with a sub $100 glove and make sure you break it in for him asap

12 too much glove for novice

Congrats on the kid. God saved your life for this moment. Make the most of every day with him.

Go lower-mid range. Don’t get him junk. But don’t get him an A2000 either, unless it is good condition used.

First season, playing 10U. There is zero benefit in getting a top-tier glove now. Wait until his skill outgrows the mid tier. By then you may also need to resize.

ETA: holyshmoley what a thread.

There’s a lot to unpack here.