To our readers who are parents, what are the most important lessons you learned between your first child being born and his or her first birthday?
The question above was the Question of The Day (QOTD) on a newsletter I subscribe to. Below is my response, which I thought worth sharing here, given the nature of this blog. I would welcome your answer to the question in the comments.
My response:
QOTD: Recently, I’ve had reason to repeat Hobbes’ line about the state of nature being “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”. Being a lawyer, Hobbes’ line tended to be proved out in the way most litigants treat one another. As a result, I’ve often been accused of having a negative, cynical view of life. But then my daughter was born in 2004 and we were told in the delivery room that she had Down syndrome. While her mother and I were dealing with being new parents receiving an unexpected diagnosis, life disproved Hobbes’ line and my cynicism. Members of our church flooded us with love, encouragement, and casseroles. My colleagues at the law firm brought gifts and assured me to take all the time I needed, that they had everything covered. A classmate of my brother’s visited the day after we came home to begin early intervention physical therapy. The next day, the executive director and a parent volunteer from our local organization were in our living room sharing with us what our daughter’s life could be like. While my professional and intellectual life has maintained a tendency of being skeptical, our lived experience with our daughter has demonstrated that this life can be full of compassion and love. She will graduate from high school this spring with a diploma with a promising life ahead of her thanks to this life being surrounded by rich, loving, caring support.
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