Raising daughters who are getting older…

Just because you remember when they were utterly dependent on you for their very life doesn’t mean it gets to stay that way, nor would you want it to.  I remember in that season counting down the days to when they would sleep through the night, be able to hold their own head up, move to solid food from the expensive Gerber we were feeding them, get out of the diaper phase and go in the toilet, and eventually go to pre-school so mom could have a breather to think about herself for a little sliver of time.  Yet it’s amazing how their increasing independence makes you long for the days where they were all yours.

They couldn’t go anywhere without us.  Their friends weren’t 24/7 accessible.  They didn’t have phones to distract them.  They played with each other. Their worlds were simple and under the management of us as parents. 

We could protect what they watched on TV.  We could guide them toward healthy relationships.  They spent the better part of their time at home in the evenings.  Rarely were they out of our sight.  When they were hurt, we were there to take care of them.  When they were laughing, we were there to laugh along and capture it on video.  We tucked them into bed every night before 8pm.  We ate together as a family and talked about our days.  We watched movies together (Lots of animations).  They listen to largely Christian music and were protected from the perversion of society at large.  I knew the time wouldn’t last forever, but for the time being, their innocence was very easy to guard and guide.

But as the years have unfolded, they each have stretched out to test their freedom.  They have formed opinions and perspectives that are both similar and dissimilar to ours.  They have needed us less (that takes time to get used to) and have bonded with friends more.  I’m fine with that, but their need to touch base with home diminishes by the day it seems.  I want them to thrive in society, but like I said in the beginning, it’s tough to get used to the waning need for your presence for survival.  There are days it seems that they don’t need you at all as they bounce from school, to a friend’s house, to a soccer game, to someone’s house to spend the night.  You see them the next day and there are times they won’t even say hi or hug you not even realizing they haven’t seen you for days.  I’ll feel it, but they don’t.  Their minds have so many other things to think about other than connecting with me.  I suppose it’s all preparatory in nature, stages they move into to test their ability to survival and thrive without your involvement, your presence.  They need to be able to do that eventually, I suppose.

Kami is off to college and has adjusted swimmingly.  She has made great friends, has a wonderful RA, loves her roommate, and digs college immensely.  Something inside me feels like she should be writhing in withdrawal, but she’s not.  She’s perfectly fine with an occasional bout of homesickness.  I would rather have it this way, but since I have a frame of reference that includes seasons where she was utterly dependent on us for life itself, it’s weird to think that you raise kids, if you’re doing it right, to not need you anymore.  It’s not to say that she doesn’t call or fill us in on what’s going on, she does.  But there’s not a burning need to keep us in the loop and from our side, she’s out there experiencing “who knows what” with “who knows who” and we will never know to even share the memory because it is happening entirely apart from us.  That’s just weird to adjust to after all the years of getting nightly updates on each day and taking an emotional and spiritual inventory on a regular basis to assess the state of her heart.  She has to find other people to do that with now, or to self-regulate and self-correct…you can only hope you’ve taught them how to do that with unadulterated self-awareness.

Aly is dating a young man for the last month and has been friends with him for a good year now.  She wants to spend time with him and he with her.  I can see her thinking about him and right after she gets done spending time with him wondering when she can do it again.  I’m like, “Hey, you just got to hang with him tonight!  Chill out and enjoy being with us for a bit!”  But that’s not how this things works when they hit age 16 and begin to realize that they are attracted to the opposite sex and feel awesome when someone pays attention to them and thinks they are the bees knees.  I think to myself: “I’ve always thought you were awesome, what am I chopped liver?”  But my opinion has a vying counterpart, not a counterpart in the sense that we are against each other, but in the sense that two men are giving her value now rather than just one.  It’s forcing me to share affection…and not just affection, but a kind of affection that I will never be able to give her, one that eventually a husband with give her.  It’s inevitable…(she’s not there yet obviously) there will be a day where she loves another man more than me.  I shutter to even write that last sentence because it doesn’t seem like any other guy will be able to appreciate her from beginning to end like I will since he picked her up 16 years in, 20 years in, 24 years in…or what have you.  That just doesn’t compute, but love isn’t about what computes or adds up rationally, it’s about “leaving father and mother, cleaving to your love interest, and becoming one with them”…and that’s what I’m staring down today though it’s a little ways away still.  Again, the feeling of being kicked to the curb in due time is hitting me today…their dependence is dividing as well as their devotion, as it should.  But I don’t have to like it even though it’s the way it ought to be.

And then Tay is going through a unique stage of pulling back lately.  I feel like she could care less whether she spends any time with me.  Honestly, and Heidi and I have recently talked about this, it feels like she lives with more freedom with her friends that at home with our family.  She is alive and personable and then when she comes home she is withdrawn, quiet, and non-responsive.  I don’t feel like she cares if I hug her, and when I do she seems to want to squirm out of the awkward moment like her skin is really sensitive and every second of me hugging her feels like a minute of being in a torturous straightjacket.  It may not be that way, but it feels that way.  She used to want me to put her to bed at night, now she is content with a quick kiss.  She used to open up with me as we laid there before bed talking about her day and her thoughts, now it’s short answers and non-reciprocated affection.  With every day I attempt to stay close to her, the more sensitive I am that she doesn’t want me to and it frankly makes me self-conscious.  That insecurity causes me to wonder if I should give Tay her space and pull back some, but for the life of me I can’t believe that’s what she wants no matter what her behavior may indicate.  Again, it comes back to watching each of my daughters break away in their own way and charting life on their own terms.  I so much want to be a part of every move, every moment, like “the good ole days”, but I suppose these are “the good new days”.  The days were we prepare them for our absence and we prepare ourselves for theirs.  The days were we celebrate more from a distance, and less close to the action.  The days when we see the value of them needing us less because they are just fine on their own, no matter what we tell ourselves.  It’s just a difficult adjustment, that’s all.

A few things this week have happened with each one of them that has only exacerbated this reality.  I wish I could say it isn’t painful, but then I wouldn’t have gotten two hours of sleep on Wednesday night because it was vexing my mind then, would I?  It’s a tearing apart that feels unnatural and, like I said, it’s a good thing but I don’t have to like it. 

I miss the days when life was smaller, simpler, and safer for my daughters.  I still feel very protective of them, but I know less of what is going on in their lives, so I’m left with feeling the need to protect them with nowhere to go with it.  I wonder if this instinct will be with me my whole lifelong with very little use other than to remind me that I was once a father that used to be essential to my daughter’s survival and now I’m not so much. 

Just a few thoughts from a dad who is wrestling through how to let go.