Your child grows up and moves away, goes to college...doesn't really matter why...it happens. I know for me, the act of moving my first child into the dorm the first year of college was a BIG deal. Checked off everything that could have possibly happened, or needed...shower rings, a bath mat to match the shower curtain...OVER DONE. I cried the minute I could (alone and away from my child, wouldn't want them to know). Year two or even second semester...not even sure I asked if there was a shower, let alone a curtain with matching anything.
That transition is HUGE...how to describe and help those with high school age children...hmmm
Well, you have pretty much complete control and suddenly...NONE. Then, you have them back on weekends, then it's a laundry issue, then you're just the hotel and restaurant (oh and bank).
The term individuation was introduced to me in one of my many therapy sessions. It was explained like this; as your child starts to see them self as separate from you they will have to 'not like' you to make this all work in their brain and heart. So, remember this when things get ugly. I am not saying 'take it', I'm just saying it helped me to understand this and that it's normal. Figuring out how to remain MOM and manage all the business that has to be managed for your little 'eagle' leaving the nest (by the way....eagles bring thorns into the nest to make it uncomfortable) is difficult. Providing boundaries along the way has been my challenge. My children do not come home much any more. This hurts my heart....But there is a time when lifestyle and respect for someones home has to be a significant part of this transformation in this new relationship with your children. I'll just say it, we WORK here at the farm...and we GET UP early (before 11:00 am), and this is not an attractive thing for most 20-somethings (I know it wouldn't have been for me during college), especially when there are many other places to go and hang out. So, the deli ma you will have to face is....do I entertain, wait on, provide maid service, accept all behaviors and 'added features' that might come with my children in order to have them CHOOSE my home to visit me. Am I prepared for the conflict this will cause for my husband...this is all new with divorced family situations....where and how do you as mom remain mom and where and how do you remain wife, respecting husband? It is such a different concept now, compared to when I grew up and went to college, but my parents are still together....and there's the sting. It's NOT FAIR.
NOT FAIR
From the book A Grace Disguised by Jerry Sittser who lost his wife, mother, and daughter in a car accident talks about fairness. After the trial of the person driving the other car, he was bothered by the fact that this wasn't fair. "...I began to be bothered by this assumption that I had a right to complete fairness." In my life, I have always had worked from the vantage point (comparing place) of 'what is fair'. Well, not having your children visit you in your home is not fair. I like how he thinks through his loss..."I did not deserve to lose three members of my family. But then again, I am not sure I deserved to have them in the first place."
Hmmm consider that....Ye of gotta have it my way...
He continues, "Perhaps I did not deserve their deaths, but I did not deserve their presence in my life either. On the face of it, living in a perfectly fair world appeals to me. But deeper reflection makes me wonder. In such a world I might never experience tragedy; but neither would I experience grace, especially the grace God gave me..."
He goes on to say "the problem of expecting to live in a perfectly fair world is that there is not grace in that world. for grace is grace ONLY WHEN IT IS UNDESERVED." "A fair world may make life nice for us, but only as nice as we are. We may get what we deserve, but I wonder how much that is and whether or not we would really be satisfied. A world with grace will give us more than we deserve. It will give us life, even in our suffering."So, how can I seek fairness...I can't...our children will grow up, we will grow old...and God will be there. It's as if I think He's not going to provide...like if my kids grow up and leave I am left with 'nothing'. Ann Voskamps 1000 Gifts describes a mothers heart as she is holding her youngest child saying to herself 'Stay, Little One, stay....' She is crying over the fact that she can't capture it, hold it, this, her life now, me in this moment. She is leaving me, she's growing up and moving away from me. As she feels this loss, she identifies that she is refusing to face tomorrow, to "walk the bridge that the Bridge Builder made". In this, she calls herself an atheist...a believer who doesn't believe.
This hits me hard....how much of my worry falls in this category....my selfishness...
So, she does what the books is teaching us to do because Thanksgiving always prcedes the miracle. She identifies things she is thankful for, and in the process; this is what she writes about that moment; "All fear is but the notion that God's love ends. Did you think I end, that My bread warehouses are limited, that I will not be enough? But I am infinite, child. What can end in Me? Can life end in Me? Can happiness, or peace? or anything you need? Doesn't your Father always give you what you need?...(page 161)"
Women really struggle here...right here....spend your life raising children, go through menopause, teenage years with kids, college....then they leave and now what???? I think many divorces happen at this stage and in the 30s of a married life for a woman. Understanding and accepting that loss and His bread 'warehouses' are not limited, makes all the difference.
Give thanks....it is NOT fair, and that's a GOOD thing
Thoughts....comments?
God Bless....more to come
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