You were busy. You were distracted. You screwed up.

Whatever it was, you were not the parent you wanted to be when they were younger (or even just yesterday). Ok, it’s good that you realize that. It’s reasonable that you feel guilty about that. It’s good that you want to fix it.

But do you understand that worry—as we said recently—doesn’t count?

Constantly fretting and being anxious about your kids does not make them feel like you care about them and doing it now certainly doesn’t compensate for any neglect in the past.

There is a great observation from the writer/editor Roger Angell about his mother Katharine White, the legendary editor of The New Yorker. “I think a source of endless pain for her was that she’d given up her children,” he said about his parents’ divorce. “I think she tried to make up for what she perceived as her defection as a mother by worrying about us more than any mother had ever worried. She was this way with her writers—she’d worry about her writers’ health, money, happiness, their success, their children. She was a terrific worrier—she was a major-league worrier—and for an editor to be a major-league worrier is a wonderful thing.”

It might be a great professional skill, but for parenting, it was a problem. And surely didn’t come close to making up for those moments when her kids needed her and she wasn’t there.

The same will be true for us and our relationship with our kids. Worry will not make them feel better. Worry is not a form of repair.

What they need isn’t our anxiety. They need our presence. Our attention. Our time. Our apologies. Our earnest effort to do better.

And not later. Now.