Nothing Can Prepare You

Hello all, I’m back once again after a pretty lengthy hiatus from blogging and while I have missed you all I have learned that as write you have to actually life some sort of life in order to have something to write about!

 

Today's topic is: Nothing Can Prepare You

I remember when I was pregnant with my first born at the age of seventeen (yes I was a teen mom) I asked my mother how could I prepare for giving birth. I remember this moment pretty vividly because my mother had this look on her face that spoke volumes yet didn't say quite enough when she said, “Listen honey, can’t nothing prepare you for child birth.” Now you have to remember that from the age of fifteen to around twenty-one we all thought that we knew it all and that our parents were just trying to scare us, so I blew off her words and began to read every book that I could on the miracle of child birth. When my water broke and I finally got into the delivery room and the first real painful contraction hit me all of the breathing techniques and birthing positions that I’d read about flew right out of the window.

 Mom was right.

Nothing on Earth prepared me for giving birth.

Nineteen years later when I look at my gorgeous daughter I can honestly say that every moment of mind altering pain was worth it. I love her more than words can express, but while my mother warned me that nothing could prepare me for bringing a child into the world, she’d forgotten to let me know that nothing can prepare me to let that same child out into the world.

Nothing.  

Seeing my first born saunter across that stage was the most gratifying experience that I have ever felt having almost lost her thirteen years prior in a horrific car accident. During graduation there were a lot of tears that were shed, but none were more meaningful that those of my own. She did it even after all of her surgeons said that she wouldn't live, even after they said that she’d lose her arm, even after they said that she would be permanently brain damaged, she proved them all wrong. She did it. Not only did she walk across the stage, but she walked on time with her graduating class.

Proud mommy moment is putting it politely.

While I was prepared for graduation as well as the graduation party that followed soon after, what I wasn't prepared for was having an adult child. After enduring nine months of my teenage body going through changes that I didn't understand, after countless sleepless nights of teething, potty training, shoe tying, fussing and fighting over curfew and worry and exhaustion no one told me that letting go was the hardest part of raising children.

How do you let go of your baby?

Shortly after graduation my baby girl decided that she wanted to come from underneath mom’s wings and fly out in the world on her own.

I was not prepared.

After many attempts of trying to persuade her to stay home I tearfully watched as my baby packed her car and drive off into the sunset. Well, it was not actually the sunset; she decided to move in with her boyfriend against our wishes.

And like that she was gone.

How do you prepare for when you baby leaves home?

I went through the 5 stages of grief that I spoke about in a previous post:

1.       Denial – No she is not moving out, she is just trying to pull my bluff

2.       Anger—How could she move out after all that I have done for her all of these years!

3.       Bargaining—Hey daughter, if you move back home you can still have all of your freedom and I’ll increase your allowance.

4.       Depression—My baby is gone

5.       Acceptance—Well I've done all that I could do.

The day that my daughter moved out was the hardest day of my life and while nothing could have prepared me for, I can say that I understand. I remember moving out when I was her age and while I thought that I was an ‘adult’ I was only a kid and I was not prepared to live in the real world. The one thing that I was always grateful for was the fact that my parents gave me the tools that I needed to navigate throughout life and they allowed me the freedom to make my own choices and to live with the consequences of those choices.  

They allowed me to be me.

While I was not prepared for my daughter to move out I can say that I am confident in the knowledge and values that I have instilled into my daughter and that I prepared her for life. I will always be there for my daughter, but I have had to learn how to pull back from Smothering and just be there for her.

Now that she is in college and living life on her own my husband and I laugh at the things that she tells us because we remember being there and we are more than confident that she will be able to guide herself out and anytime that she needs Smothering she knows that our door is always open.

No, nothing could have prepared me for the moment when my little birdie left the nest, but I am glad that I was not prepared because no amount of words that I could have read or advise that I could have considered would have given me the feeling that my own experience did.

To my beautiful, talented and creative daughter always and forever I love you.

One down……five more to go!