When I became a father, I didn’t know much about babies. Fatherhood is one of those “learn on the job” situations. With a new infant in the house, one piece of advice made my life much easier.

Infants cry a lot. The noise they emit is high-pitch, and designed to be irritating to adults. It’s irritating because otherwise you would just ignore the poor child.

Now, to the advice: when your infant starts to scream in the middle of the night, look at the clock. Yes, look at the clock. Before you roll out of bed, before you stumble your way to the nursery, check the clock, and remember what time it is. This is the best advice I ever got.

When you are sleep-deprived and tired, holding a screaming infant in the middle of the night for one minute can seem like 10. Noting the time can put things into perspective. You’ll calm down and have more patience when you realize that the eternity of constant scream is only 10 minutes.

Look at the clock.