Letting go of adult children is hard yet necessary part of life
by CLARE MARIE CELANO
While struggling to craft a phrase that would accurately depict my relationship with my grown children, WI found what was searching for in lines delivered via my TV screen. Messages often come from the most unlikely venues. The lines were spoken by Sarah Jessica Parker in her role as "Carrie" on "Sex in the City." Carrie is trying to describe how she feels about her friend Samantha, who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, to her lover "Aleksandr" (aka Mikhail Baryshnikov), but Aleksandr is not getting it. Finally, she looks directly at him and with raw emotion, says, "She's my insides. That's how important she is to me." Her response is untamed, visceral and absolute.
"That's it," I thought. "My kids are my insides." My heart melted and I recalled how it felt when they literally were my insides, growing within me, their presence, no less significant than every other cell in my body. Like a soothing balm, I remembered the comfort of knowing their little bodies were safely and cozily tucked inside me - all the time. Many years have passed since I've felt that "literal" comfort, and still my kids remain my "insides."
It's hard for my children to grasp this concept - that they are still an integral part of my being. In their heads, they are fully grown and no longer require tending to. And logically this is essentially true. They don't need watching. But parenting is never logical. It is an emotionally driven experience that does not often respond well to pragmatism. So, if my kids are my insides, then it stands to reason that they are entwined within the cells of my mind, the emotions of my heart, and the longing of my soul - even if they have left their first "home," so to speak. This connection, while relatively easy to nurture and foster when kids are young and a part of our 24/7, becomes more difficult as they grow. Much like a marriage, the bonding between two souls flourishes when they are in close proximity but can easily wane and falter when faced with long absences. It's at this point that we need diplomacy, moxie and finesse to keep the strands of that bond sliding alongside one another in sync.
As our kids become adults, I think we go through a kind of inner power struggle between the control we once had and the lack of it now. With that control, however, came the responsibility to meet all their physical, emotional and spiritual needs. It's tough to accept that we're no longer responsible for those needs. But how could it be otherwise? Their needs and the power of our touch linked us to one another for years. Watching our kids grow away from us is like losing an appendage. Feeling the loss of control we once had, we search for some steady ground to plant ourselves on until the chaotic dust settles and we can let go of it all. We know intellectually we're no longer responsible for the events that happen in our kids' lives. But, just like an amputee, who knows his or her appendage is no longer there but feels the pain of the limb anyhow, as parents, we can't seem to let go of the desire to want to do it all. We have a hard time letting go of our kids. When discussing this subject with a friend, he shined a light on what my heart was feeling, but my head could not seem to put into words. "You're not letting go of the child," he said, "you're letting go of the responsibility and guilt. "We make deals," he continued. "We bargain. We ask to take on any pain ourselves, rather than have our kids take it." He's right, of course.
We bargain with God, fate, or whatever forces we feel are responsible for giving our children anything less than complete happiness. And then, after years of attempts at deal-making, it dawns on us that we cannot alter the course of our children's lives, and even if we could, we can't win this hand on the table - it's not our hand. It's theirs. It belongs to the children. I think it take a few decades as an adult to be able to see this.
Eventually though, we discover the emotional acceptance of a situation we can do nothing about, and this shift keeps us sane. This acceptance relieves the phantom pain - somewhat. I still feel their emotional pain, but rather than spend hours on end trying to figure out how to take that pain away, I use my time more judiciously, praying they'll figure out the root of it and learn to ease it themselves. I still feel their fear, as much as ever, but rather than struggle with the "why" of their fears, I pray they'll eventually learn to confront whatever goes bump in their nights, just as I've had to do.
Letting go of certain facets of our lives, although difficult, is like completing a chapter in a book. Moving along life's pages is our gift. If we get stuck ruminating in one chapter, no matter how incredible it is, we break the rhythm of the rest of the story.
