Dads-To-Be: Grab a Leg and Make a Playlist
A basic guide to creating a stellar labor playlist
Face it, as a dad-to-be, you are completely helpless. You won’t be able to help push, you won’t be able to administer the epidural (in fact, you’ll be banished to a chair in a distant corner while it is administered), you won’t be able to do much of anything. That’s just in delivery. Wait until you get home where the list of things you can’t help with grows as long as a CVS receipt. You’ll likely grapple with feeling like a spectator while wanting nothing more than to be the starting quarterback. The feeling can be overwhelming and it can be lonely. So, focus on your time and energy now — while you’re preparing to welcome your little miracle into the world — focusing on the things you can do: grab a leg and make a labor playlist.
Your role during the delivery will be mostly relegated to holding back one of your partner’s legs while interjecting words of love and encouragement strategically between contractions (beginners tip: avoid platitudes at the height of pushing… that doesn’t help anybody). Your back is going to hurt.
You may spend hours (my wife pushed for 3 with our first daughter) helping force your partners body together at the middle as if she were an accordion. Trust me, your back is absolutely going to be killing you by the end.
Unless you want your newly-punched face to also be killing you, keep that information to yourself.
Other than accordionist, the other role you can play during delivery is one you can start preparing for right now: DJ. For our first daughter’s birth, we didn’t even realize you could play music in the delivery room. We didn’t know anything. It was all new.
The second time around my wife was phenomenal about communicating all of the things she knew she would like: drive to the hospital earlier than necessary, a cold compress during labor and a labor playlist. Finally, I had a purpose.
Tips For Creating the Perfect Labor Playlist
Tip One: There is no perfect labor playlist
That is to say, there is no universal, evergreen perfect playlist. No google search will yield a result that you can download and call it a day. Don’t take the shortcut; put in the work.
Tip Two: There is your perfect labor playlist
While you won’t be able to copy and paste a playlist that will be perfect for you and your partner, you can google some recommendations or suggestions to get the ball rolling. The most important thing is that the playlist is specific to you as a couple or team. Include songs that are meaningful to you: songs from when you were dating, songs from car trips and favorite movies, songs that make you think of one another and your future.
Tip Three: Balance
Don’t make it all sentimental songs. Those are vitally important but remember that labor can be very, very long and too much acoustic emo rock can make it feel even longer. Vary the genres. All of the songs should be on there for a reason but that reason can be something other than sentiment; like motivation, humor or hype. Don’t be afraid to sprinkle some Beyonce in after the Lumineers.
Tip Four: Start strong and plan for the long haul
The most important songs are the ones at the beginning. To be sure, every song should be important but front load the playlist for a couple of reasons:
1) The first few songs set the tone for the room. Humble-brag alert: our nursing team and doctor were singing along within about 10 minutes.
2) You don’t know how long the delivery will take. If you save your best stuff for hour three and the baby arrives after 20 minutes, you’ll be left with nothing but regret (albeit with less of the aforementioned back pain).
Tip Five: Pay attention
Certainly, pay attention in the months leading up to the due date to any songs your wife mentions. By the end of her pregnancy my wife would outright ask, “Is this song on the playlist? If not, add it.” In addition, pay attention to what song ends up playing when your baby is finally born. That will be something you want to remember forever. Fun story: when our youngest finally came out, the song that was playing was the same song that was playing when I proposed to my wife.
Note: if you partner has mentioned a song in the weeks prior, definitely put it in the front half.
Categories
I ultimately identified four categories for our playlist
Sentimental/Significant
This is the largest category and consists of those songs that mean something to our family. This is everything from songs specific to our relationships to songs that inspired our daughter’s name.
Motivational
This included “hype” songs to get the energy up in the room and, since we knew we were having a girl, empowerment songs.
Time-Capsule
There are a few songs that are on the playlist to capture the moment and/or era in which our daughter was born. For instance, our daughter was just born during the COVID pandemic, at the height of the Delta variant. As such, Mumford and Sons’ “Delta” made the cut.
Situational
This is the “wouldn’t it be cool if…” category. These songs made the playlist because 1) they’re good songs and 2) it’d be cool if the timing worked out and they happened to play at a specific moment or in a specific circumstance. I roll my eyes at people who include “Push It” by Salt-n-Pepa on their playlist. This category gets me pretty close to being a hypocrite.
Many of the songs on our playlist fall into multiple categories.
Our Playlist
Our playlist ended up being about 4.5 hours long. We only needed less than half of that. Here is a tiny snapshot of ours for inspiration:
“Shake It Off” by Taylor Swift (Motivational)
“Wars” by The Stumbrellas (Motivational)
“Dog Days Are Over” by Florence + the Machine (Significant, Motivation, Situational, Time Capsule)
“Rose of Sharon” by Mumford and Sons (Significantly, our daughter is named Rose)
“Delta” by Mumford and Sons (Time Capsule)
“Defying Gravity” from Wicked (Significant, Motivational, Situational)
“Rosie” from Bye Bye Birdie (Significant)
“Today’s the Day” by Pink (Significant, Situational)
“Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac (Significant, cue tears)
“Girls Like You” by Maroon 5 (Significant)
“Edge of Glory” by Lady Gaga (Situational, Motivational)
“Helpless” from Hamilton: An American Musical (Situational, Significant)
“La Vie en Rose” performed by Lady Gaga (Significant)
“The Luckiest” by Ben Folds Five (Significant)
“Africa” by Toto (Significant, Motivational)
“Forever” by Mumford and Sons (Significant)
“Girl on Fire” Alicia Keys (Situational)
“Home” by Phillip Phillips (Significant, the song playing when Rose was born and when I proposed to my wife)
“Dare You to Move” by Switchfoot (Significant, Situational)
“Life is Beautiful” by Vega 4 (Motivational, Significant)
“Run the World (Girls)” by Beyonce (Significant)
Hey, Mister DJ
Each of these songs has a story behind it and a reason for being on our playlist. My wife pushed for three hours with our first daughter and the nurses and doctors kept suggesting that she move between each contraction (hence, “I Dare You to Move”). One of the things they suggested was for her to squat — even though she had an epidural and couldn’t feel her legs — while holding something resembling a gymnastics parallel bar to allow for gravity to do the work (hence “Defying Gravity”).
I took my role as DJ/Playlist curator very seriously because it was something I could actually do for my wife. Two beautiful girls later, I continue to be in awe of her: her strength, her fortitude, her tenacity and her tenderness. She’s the gold standard of what a mother’s love should look like and, through it all, has never sacrificed her love for me. She is my world and she has brought my new world into this world. If I can’t pour my whole self into the creation of a perfect playlist for this remarkable woman then I’m not worth the clear liquid diet forced on her while I ate sandwiches and pasta.
With a newborn and a 2+ year old, I continue to feel helpless at times. My natural response has always been to fix and to problem solve. That’s not always the reality in parenting. Sometimes it’s about waiting; about taking a backseat; about letting others help and lead.
Sometimes, you grab a leg and make a playlist.
