Works For Me – Changes

 *update, below* 

This is harder than I thought it would be, this sending a child off to college, out into the world.

Going days without seeing her face.

 Counting plates over and over at dinnertime, never sure if I actually got it right this time.

Trying to email or call enough to be ‘there’, but not so much as to interfere with this new life she is making for herself.

Hoping she is really doing as well as she seems to be. Hoping the moments of loneliness she must be facing are not too frequent or too overwhelming.

And already feeling the change in our lives. I straightened the living room before she came home, for heaven’s sake. Like she was company. (though not to impress, more to help her weekend feel serene…)

With her gone our family feels off kilter.  I’m already sick of people asking how it feels to have her gone.  I dwell enough on it myself, without everyone reminding me.

Many moments of the day are fine, I must admit.  Though always feeling this gap in our ranks, we are mostly getting along OK.  And having her home this weekend was precious.  I have a new understanding of the blissful smile on my mother’s face when ALL my siblings make it home for Christmas.

I am so proud of her.  I so much want to bravely shoo her off on this adventure so she can unreservedly and joyfully take this opportunity she has worked so hard for.  I don’t want to be a damp clutchy mushball.

But there are moments each day that ache.

So I just have to hold on to the advice that I have given other people.  In the past it’s been a mom with a new baby, or a family adjusting to a newly adopted child, or a new homeschooling mom. 

 But now it’s me, dealing with all the newness of this and so I am giving this advice to myself. And to my precious daughter.

“Get through the first month.  The first month is always the toughest.  After you get through that, things will feel more natural, you’ll get your rhythm, you’ll start to realize you can do this after all.   Don’t panic now, while it’s all so strange.   Don’t be too hard on yourself.  Keep praying.  Trust God.  And give yourself the gift of time.  You’ll make it.”

 I’ll let you know (say, along about October) if this advice works for me.

—–
Update, written in the morning:

Funny how a good nights’ sleep and an email from my daughter can put it all in perspective.  

Turns out her college choir is absolutely awesome– she was over the moon with delight when she emailed me about it last evening. She has a wonderful professor with a passion for music –AND a teaching style similar to her much loved high school choir director.  This is why we’re doing this — to give her a chance to learn and grow and experience life.  

Yeah, I miss her.   But if she learns and thrives while away (and keeps emailing me along the way!) then that makes it all worth while.