Domestic bliss.

This is what Young finally has. He doesn’t have football. He doesn’t have the sensation of third-and-10 in the deafening Superdome, screaming out the play to Jerry Rice. And he misses that. A lot. But he has something that, for so long, was more elusive to him than the Bay Area’s unconditional love.

“I told Barb that I’m mad at her,” Young, the former 49ers quarterback, said about his wife last week. “If she was going to be the one, why did she turn me down cold when I asked her out 10 years ago? We could have had five kids by now.”

Instead, there is just one, 19-week-old Braedon, who has Mommy’s wide smile and Daddy’s protruding ears and his parents’ complete devotion.

And despite Young’s lament about lost time, his life seems to have fallen into complementary halves. The man who — as his friends say — overanalyzes everything, grinded obsessively on football for 15 years.

Now 39, he has plunged into family life. Diapers, feedings, sleep patterns. He claims to have done more laundry and made more grocery-store visits in recent months than in his entire life. He has read all the baby books. The scrambling quarterback can change diapers on the run and proves it with an efficient demonstration. It’s not his only newfound skill.

“I could have a new career as a lactation consultant,” Young said.

Last week, the Youngs were relaxing at home in Palo Alto. The unpretentious, comfortable house on a quiet tree-lined street off a main thoroughfare is not the spot you would peg as home to a multi-millionaire superstar. There are camellias in the garden, baby carriers and toys all around the house, Toyotas — of course — in the driveway.

The bachelor quarterback bought this quintessential family house in 1997, had it remodeled and lived there alone until March 2000, when he and Barbara Graham were married in Hawaii.

They met through a friend a decade ago, but Barb — a University of Arizona student at the time — had no interest in dating a famous quarterback. When they met again in late 1998, the Phoenix native was more open. They dated for more than a year, keeping their relationship low profile. She converted to his religion, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The third time for Young — who was engaged twice before — was the charm.

“I always knew marriage would be great,” Young said. “I was a horrible bachelor; it’s not like I was really thriving. I just wish we could turn the clock back.”

Or, perhaps, at least not squash a decade’s worth of life-changing decisions into a few months. A year ago Young’s life went through serious remodeling. He got married, learned he was immediately starting a family and faced the end of his career and public identity.

If Young were younger, he would have delayed retirement. He said his health — everyone else’s main concern — was not an issue. He has had no lingering effects from the concussions that ended his career.

Barb did not ask him to retire.

But he grabbed the moment. He retired from football, but not from much else.

“For a stay-at-home dad, he’s hardly ever home,” Barb said.

There was the ESPN gig during the football season, which Young enjoyed because it allowed him regular visits with his parents in Connecticut. He is actively involved with his Forever Young charity, which funds children’s hospitals and Native American needs and which raised $2.5 million at Young’s formal retirement dinner last month. He works with the Children’s Miracle Network. He is helping to coordinate 30,000 volunteers for the Salt Lake Olympics, and he will host the nightly medal ceremonies in downtown Salt Lake City during the 2002 Winter Games. He is also the chairman of Found Inc., an inventory-oriented Internet company.

“It’s all great stuff,” he said.

But?

“But you cannot re-create third-and-10 in the Superdome. I really miss that, where you can’t hear at all and Jerry’s yelling ‘What’s the play?’ and you get on the bus afterward and you’ve won. It was awesome. I loved it. I always saw myself as an artist. And it’s like telling a painter he can’t paint.”

He was fine during most of the fall, busy with birthing classes and taking care of Barb, who felt ill through much of her pregnancy. Fine until he watched the Raiders play Denver on a Monday night in November.

“That felt like the playoffs,” he said. “I went crazy. I thought, ‘I’ve got to go play.’ ”

He and Barb have had the comeback conversation several times. Young played the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am with Rice in early February. During their rounds, they came up with scenario after scenario that involved Young and Rice playing a farewell tour with another team — in Seattle, Detroit, somewhere.

A week later he went to the NFL Quarterback Challenge in Kauai, where current and alumni passers participate in skill contests. Before one competition, he told Barb, “If I win this, I’m coming back.”

And?

“I won it,” he said laughing. “I thought, ‘Now, what do I do?’ ”

He makes such statements with a smile. But if he weren’t turning 40 this year, his comeback talk would be serious. He can rein in his feelings, most of the time. Watching Barry Bonds hit his 500th home run reminded Young of what he is missing.

“It’s about performing, about those moments,” Young said. “And you find yourself saying: I want more of those. I want to go back to Candlestick. I want to do something great.”

Despite not having played for a season and a half, Young remains in regular contact with the 49ers, although not in any official capacity, and talks about someday buying a team with his friend and former teammate Brent Jones. He has three regrets.

“One, I wish I was playing football while I was married, which would be a stabilizing force,” he said. “Two, I wish I had a picture of my son and me after a game. And I wish I could have played my way out.”

Barb reminded him of a fourth regret.

“And you were never able to say goodbye on the field,” she said.

Instead, Young’s career ended with him crumpled on a field in Tempe, Ariz.

But everything else in his life is going just the way he always envisioned. Braedon was born Dec. 6. Barb saw the name during her pregnancy and instantly liked it.

“I suggested Brigham,” said the great, great, great grandson of the Mormon leader. “But she wouldn’t go for it.”

The first six weeks were a daze of sleeplessness, but things are getting easier. They finally went on a date last week, to the U2 concert in San Jose. They left Braedon with a babysitter for the first time and, yes, there were plenty of phone calls home.

Young stays fit by running through his neighborhood streets. He would like to do a triathlon, finding some outlet for his ultra-competitive nature.

He hasn’t changed. He still drinks milk out of the carton. He can still be the neurotic guy Jones had to babysit on game day.

“Now I’ve got the job,” Barb said.

In the crazy sleepless weeks after Braedon was born, Steve stopped Barb in the hallway one pre-dawn hour and pointed out a momentous change in his life.

“At least in football I got Tuesdays off,” he said.

This isn’t football. No days off. No off-season. No roaring crowd cheering every diaper change or cuddle.

But, still, plenty of great moments.

Ann Killion is a sports columnist for the San Jose Mercury News.

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page B9.