, mamas. Thank you for this thread.
My oldest child is 14 and very independent. I'm already blown away by how early the "leaving of the nest" begins. When I started out on my mothering journey, it seemed so black and white. Like, I'll have 18 years of solid influence on her life and then she'll go "out there". But the truth that I'm finding is that she's already got one foot out the door and is much more ready than I am to let her go. Plus, she has already begun offering her critical feedback that leaves me speechless. I am thankful to have a process of self-inquiry with which to hold onto (or come back to) my sanity after these times.
I can only imagine how much more of this will continue before she comes back to wanting intimacy with me again. I know that, for me, it was not until I was 30 that I wanted to be close to my mother again . . .
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Originally Posted by noordinaryspider  . . . and my dd call me "gullible" and blame me for everything i did not have the power to protect her from.
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| My older children will remember me as somebody weak and foolish and there isn't much I can do about that. |
Noordinaryspider, I have really learned a lot from your posts at MDC. Thank you so much for sharing yourself with us. I want to respond to your quotes above because I see so much of myself with my own mother in them. I was so very critical of my mother when I was a teen and young adult. I felt a lot like you describe your children as feeling.
Where was it that I read (Reviving Ophelia, maybe?) that girls need to push their mothers away in order to establish independence because it would be so difficult or even impossible otherwise. I really went through that, and now I see my daughter at the forefront of that place, too.
My childhood situation was such that I needed many, many years of independence in order to establish myself as separate from my own mother. I was even a mother myself for over 6 years when I began to come to a place of wanting closeness with my mother, again. It was possibly a tragic but so deeply poignant twist of fate that brought such openness just before the time that my mother would unexpectedly pass on from this earth.
She has been gone for 7.5 years, now, and I feel bittersweetly more intimate with her than ever before. I understand things, now. I understand why she did what she did that I used to mercilessly scorn her for as a rebellious teen and young adult. I tell her every day that I understand things now. It has been so humbling and so healing for me to keep this realization alive. I see so much of my mother in me now that I couldn't/wouldn't before.
Trust that your efforts, no matter how unnoticed they are by your children (for the moment, because we can't know what the future will bring, but my experience tells me they'll see it, too), have laid a foundation that is everlasting. Trust that your own acknowledgment of your work is enough to validate its rightful existence. If what you gave/give is right for you then that is all there is. Because you're the one you live with. Let that be enough.
I look forward to learning from you all as our journeys continue. Thank you for being here and for sharing your stories.
IMO the late teen and early 20's have been much harder then the challenge faced as a parent of a toddler--at least its felt differently! Anyone out there share this feeling? Little kids, little problems, big kid big problems--isn't that how the saying goes 
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to all of you great mamas.
