One of NDA’s teachers became a father over the summer. Mr. Adam Rudar and his wife, Mrs. Tanya Rudar, welcomed their son into the world on June 1. They named him Roman Henry Rudar.

Picking a name for a baby can be very hard, requiring a lot of thought. With Mr. Rudar being a teacher, picking a name became even more difficult. He gets to meet so many students with all different names that it becomes hard not to think of a specific person when you hear that name. Therefore, he wanted a name that was more unusual and not as common.

Mrs. Rudar wanted to dream about names throughout her pregnancy, but Mr. Rudar picked the name early on and continually used it.

He would put his hands on her belly and say, “Hi, Roman.” Needless to say, she got mad. Mr. Rudar said, “When I would wake up, rub her belly and not say anything, she would give me a look. She would say, ‘You are saying Roman in your head, aren’t you?’  Finally she said, ‘I am not going to win, am I?’”

She obviously did not win.

Mr. Rudar came across the name “Roman” after many hours of looking at names. “It is a cool name,” he said. “I have never met a person with the name Roman in real life.”

In addition, Henry is a family name. It is Mrs. Rudar’s grandfather’s name, but it sounds nice when it follows the name Roman.

Mrs. Rudar said she didn’t realize that she could function on so very little sleep. She jokes about trying to find the remote in the fridge and having to double check she is wearing shoes–the SAME pair that matches–as she heads out the door.  Nevertheless, being a mom is one of her lifelong heart’s desires.

As a nanny, she had the opportunity to “borrow” other people’s kids until she had her own. Consequently, she has many “nieces and nephews” at NDA that she still considers “family,” but she had no clue how much you could love another human until she had her own offspring.

Mr. Rudar was not sure what he expected Roman to be like. “He is such a surprise… from the way he looks, the way he moves or sounds. Everything is new. Every day I get to learn more about who he is.”

In the first month, Mr. Rudar got in trouble with his wife for waking Roman up because he could not wait for him to get up so that he could spend time with him.

“Having a baby is kind of like having Christmas morning every day. Both Tanya and I talk about how we did not know we could love someone so much,” he said.

Now Mr. Rudar and his wife talk about how they do know it is possible to love someone so much.

“The best feeling ever is when he looks at me, recognizes I am ‘dad’ and smiles,” said the teacher.

Having said all of this, it is a lot of work taking care of a baby as Mr. Rudar and his wife are finding out. “It has been a really good lesson about being a good partner and sacrifice,” he said.  “It becomes a question everyday of ‘how else can I help?’ when I feel like I have nothing left to give.”

A challenge for Mr. Rudar is managing work and home although it is all worth it, and Roman won’t stay little very long.

Mr. Rudar loves when his son smiles: “His whole face lights up.”

Baby Roman has even started to laugh at things. The other day Mr. Rudar and Roman were playing games with hands and feet, and he was laughing.  Later Roman looked at the face of their bulldog and belly-laughed for awhile.

Also, Roman is starting to experience and discover the world around him.

“He is so fun to watch as he responds to new sights and sounds,” explained Mr. Rudar.  “We get to experience the world differently through his eyes as he experiences it for the first time. Everything is new.  Everything is fascinating to him: the sounds of the bathtub water, the lights in Home Depot, cars passing by, whatever.”

Roman was sick when he was 11 days old and was taken to the Emergency Room for a fever in the middle of the night. The doctors thought he had some type of infection. He spent four days in the hospital getting many painful procedures done. The new parents admitted It was hard to see their little baby so sick. They felt so helpless, and one of them had to be with him at all times.

“It was a very scary experience,” the new father said. “We are grateful for all the prayers and support through those touchy couple of days.”

Roman is healthy now. Mr. Rudar and his wife are enjoying being new parents, and the NDA family has a new little Triton.