My boys came home from their first year of college with a comforter, a pillow, and a full bag of unopened supplies I had been absolutely certain were necessities. No top sheet in sight. I had packed like they were headed into a polar expedition, and apparently all a college dorm actually requires is a comforter and a prayer.
I laugh about it now. At the time I remember standing in that dorm room thinking I had thought of everything, and clearly I had not thought of the one thing that mattered least to them and the most to me, which was feeling prepared — literally and emotionally.
The part nobody warns you about
The supplies were the easy part. The hard part was the last hug before I left. Both my boys were ready to go by then. They were excited and already halfway into this new life they were about to start, and the goodbye came quickly, love you Mom, gotta go now. I was the one who wanted to hold on a little longer.
They love me and were going to miss me, that was never in question. They were just ready in a way I wasn’t quite ready to match yet, and I’ll take that kind of ready over the alternative any day. It still caught me off guard how much that quick goodbye stayed with me on the drive home, when the house was quiet and their room was empty for the first time.
That first night is…hard. Knowing they weren’t coming home. Wondering what they were eating, whether they were adjusting, whether they were okay in ways they wouldn’t tell me even if I asked. I remember that feeling clearly, even though I’m well past it now. Although, who am I kidding? The wondering and worrying continues.
If you’re in that part right now, I want you to know something. What you’re feeling makes complete sense. Something that has meant this much doesn’t just close. It leaves a void, and that space deserves to be honored before anything else.
Nobody tells you about this part.
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It gets better than that first goodbye
Here’s what I want you to know, because I’m far enough past it now to say it with confidence. It gets better than that first goodbye. You get into a routine, and they get into theirs.
For me, athletics gave us something to plan around, since weekends built themselves naturally around games and there was always something on the calendar to look forward to. That was a plus I didn’t fully appreciate until later, but it doesn’t mean you need athletics or anything specific like it. Plan a visit. Plan a call every Sunday (or every day). Plan something with friends or family that gives your week some lift.
Finding something new for yourself helps just as much. For me it was fitness, when my foot agrees with me, and it was also this blog. I started Next Chapter Living with an online course and a wing and a prayer, and here we are. Writing gave me somewhere to put my thoughts and helped me build a sense of purpose I didn’t know I needed until the house got quiet.
It’s hard to let go. Keep the connection in whatever way works for you and your family, and they will appreciate it more than they’ll say.
Find the thing that lights your fire a little
If there’s one thing I’d tell a woman standing where I stood, it’s this. Find something that makes you proud you discovered it, something that lights your fire a little while they’re gone. It doesn’t have to be big. It just has to be yours.
I found mine by accident. If you want the whole story of how a grief I didn’t expect turned into this blog, I wrote about it here: Dear Mel Robbins: You Wrote a Book That Felt Like It Was Written for Me, So I Wrote You Back.
Before you know it, parents’ weekend will roll around, or Thanksgiving break will be upon you, and you’ll wonder where the time went. It always does.
In the meantime, some days will feel fine and some days will feel harder than you expected, and that’s normal too. On the harder ones, you don’t need a whole new routine or a five year plan. You just need to know what actually matters on the day you’re having. That’s exactly what Your Plan For Today is for.
Wherever you are in this, the long hug goodbye or the quiet house after, I see you.
You’re doing better than you think you are. And so are they.
