Tampa Bay Devil Ray third baseman Aki Iwamura welcomes a son

In what could be considered perfect timing, Akinori Iwamura and his wife Misaki welcomed their first child — a boy — over the All-Star break on July 10.  Taiki Iwamura was one week overdue, weighed in at 7 lbs 3 oz and is the picture of good health, according to his proud father.  Aki blogged about the experience and emotions surrounding Taiki’s birth on the MLB website for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, for whom Aki plays third base.

Just having my own baby makes me feel like I have more responsibility than at any time in my life. So my life has changed a great deal. Now the baby comes first. Anything I do, I think about the baby first. It’s only a few days after he’s born, and as long as he’s healthy, I’m happy. Once he starts crawling or walking or picking up baseballs, I’m going to be even happier; that’s when I will have even more joy spending time with my son.

I am fortunate in many ways, like having a wife who understands I need to sleep for my job, so she has done the majority of the work when it comes to taking care of our new addition. If Taiki wakes up in the middle of the night, Misaki takes care of him. Right now, it looks like my wife is OK to take care of the baby on her own. She has the energy to do that. But once she becomes tired, I’ll help out more. Everybody asks me, so I’ll confess: I have not changed a diaper yet. But I have fed him.

While I’ve felt a great deal of change in my life — good changes — with the addition of Taiki, our dog, Nutts, hasn’t handled the change so well. I suddenly feel the jealousy from Nutts because of the baby. So my wife is taking care of the baby, and I’m taking care of Nutts.

Source:  MLB.com