Breaking the Chain?

I’ve been nervous of late that the less-than-enviable aspects of my personhood will be passed on to my daughter. It would be nice, I’ll admit here, if she never knew a moment of self-pity, brittleness, or depression. But I wonder, too, are these the flip sides of my humor, hope, and exuberance? If they are, would I be willing for her to lose both sides of the coin?

Questions like these are taking on bigger significance for me two days before mom goes back to work and I begin fulltime supervision of baby. One friend said, in an effort to buck me up, that she would have been happy if I had been her father when she was coming into the world. Another said she would have exactly the same fear about negative traits if she were in my shoes but that, at any rate, my daughter’s angels would be present to her and that plenty of prayer would be in order, either way.

For all this worrying about the big picture, I hope and expect that a week from now the learning I do in the small picture (like how to more comfortably move baby in and out of her sling) will give me enough confidence to let the big picture take care of itself.