inherited or learned?

my father doesn't like the new nickname i gave him. his response was, "the only names i will respond to are Daddy, Mr. Dragonfly, or Mack Daddy"

LOL.

i don't know what to do with that man.

he needs a candlelight vigil.

and really Daddy, who says "Mack Daddy" in 2008?

i jokingly asked my mother to see the DNA test results because he can't be my real father. she responded, "yeah...Sorry boo." LOL. i love my mother.

then she slapped me with, "you two share a lot of the same qualities..."

thanks for ruining my entire life, Mommy.

she said that just like my father, i don't share my emotions well.

i can't argue with that. what i wonder is, are these types of traits inherited or learned behaviors? from the years of knowing my father (only a few actually spent in the same household with him), did i, even as a child, learn to stifle my emotions from him? or could i be hard-wired that way?

where did i decide that sharing how i feel was a bad thing, and keeping it all inside was a good thing? did i watch him and learn this? was it an accumulation of events from childhood to adulthood that influenced it? or was it there from conception?

whatever the case, i hope i don't pass that trait on to my children. i don't want my kids to ever feel that they have to be afraid to say how they feel about anything. right or wrong, i want them to feel safe with me, with us (my future hubby and i), no matter what.

i guess i'll have to unlearn this so that my children can learn by positive example.

thank God for Jesus and being reborn. i don't have to be a slave to genetics or environment.