Like a Missing Limb

I dropped my daughter at college four days ago. While I was gone, my partner tested positive for COVID so when I came home I had to stay in my daughter’s bedroom in the basement.

It was strangely comforting. My friends have been worried about how I would fare in this moment of change. I think most of them thought I’d fall apart when my only daughter left home. I’ve always been very attached to my daughter, deeply connected to my role as a mother. 

In the last couple of days, good friends and concerned family members have reached out, “How are you doing?” they call and text. 

“Fine?,” I respond, not quite sure. It feels like my brain is scrambled. I know something is missing, but I’m not sure what it is. I wonder if this is what is like to have a missing limb. I have no immediately detectable pain, but there is a heightened awareness; something is definitely missing.

“How do I feel?,” I ask myself as I make my ten-day COVID home in my absent daughter’s room, tidying her bed and putting away the last load of laundry she did before she left for college.

I miss my daughter, but I’m also excited for her. I get several texts a day of the meals she’s eating, new friends and the beautiful scenery she’s surrounded by. She’s around, but she’s gone.

I’m happy that my daughter chose a school far away. I’m thrilled about the adventures and challenges in front of her. In the short time she’s been gone, all signs point to the fact that she is ready to be on her own. “You’ve done a good job,” one friend tells me, “she’s ready for this.” I take comfort in this sentiment and I trust that my daughter is in the right place right now. But in her absence, something isn’t right. 

It’s not so much that I miss my daughter as that I am confused about who I am without her. This afternoon I went to the grocery and passed by the Kombucha she loves so much. “I won’t need that for a few months,” I thought to myself as I robotically found myself in that aisle. Later in the afternoon, my partner and I went for a walk. When we came in, I looked at the door, making a note to keep it unlocked because my daughter would be coming home soon. 

“Oh wait,” I said to my partner, “she’s not coming home.” The phantom daughter, lurking everywhere but nowhere to be found. A few hours later, my partner ordered pizza. When it arrived, I thought the delivery driver had it wrong. “You ordered two pizzas?” I hollered out to my partner on the porch. She had forgotten again that our daughter wouldn’t be home for dinner.

Is this how the mother bird feels where her baby flies out of the nest? Bye-bye baby bird….. I hope I see you again soon. Once a bird can fly, she is safer out in the world where she has mobility, a way to escape the predators that would swallow her whole when sitting unprotected in a nest.

But we’re not birds. I don’t see my baby as safer out in the world. I spent eighteen years protecting her and now she’s out there. I can’t see her. I can’t feel her. I don’t know where she is or what she’s doing or how she feels or if she’s sad or lonely or hungry or if her sheets are dirty or if she packed warm enough socks for snow. 

I wonder if the mother bird feels this way when her chicks first leave. There’s a delicate period when the chicks first learn to fly. Though they are strong enough to leave the nest, their wing and tail feathers aren’t fully developed and they are still vulnerable for a short period. 

It’s only been four days since I flew across the country with my little bird and dropped her into a new nest. Like the new-flying chicks, she too is developing her strength and independence. She’s learning to fly far away from her mother. 

It really does feel like I’m missing a limb right now. This is hard and I’m not really myself. But thinking of my daughter in her new home, imagining her learning to fly on her own is a beautiful vision, a wonderful distraction. My nest may be empty, but my heart is full. 

This is Me. This is Mine.

In the last few months before my daughter left for college, I said yes to everything she asked me to do. Sugary-sweet ten-descriptor drinks at the Starbucks drive-through? YES! Shop at Ross Dress for Less for workout clothes? YES! Go to Orange Theory at 6am on a Tuesday? YES!

Orange Theory is a workout gym that combines cardio and strength. Each workout is guided by a “coach” and you wear a heart rate monitor that posts your stats on big screens around the room. The vibe is kind of Euro-Club-y — the whole place is mirrored and everything is dark grey. Loud thumping music plays in the background of the coach’s microphoned instructions. 

Orange Theory is something I never had any interest in doing. But because my daughter asked me to go, I did. And then I did it again. And again. Every time she asked me, I said yes. I just wanted to be around her, to soak up her energy, to squeeze out the last moments before she moved away.

Each time we went to Orange Theory, my daughter was gracious and let me sign up for the station next to her. On the tread (for any older generations, this is what we used to call treadmill), I ran next to her, carefully following her actions. Because the music was so loud I often struggled to hear the coach, but even when I could hear her, I didn’t understand the lingo — “base pace”, “all out”, “take it down”.

I watched my daughter manipulate the speed and incline levels on her tread and followed. When she went up, I went up (though not as high), and when she went down, I went down (often lower). Running on the tread next to my daughter, I could see her face in the mirror. I could watch her working hard, giving it her all. 

For years, I watched my daughter play soccer from a distance. It seemed like she was working hard, but I don’t know if that was because that was what was expected of her as a team player or because we signed her up for soccer when she was five and she just did what she thought we wanted her to do. I don’t know if she would have chosen that sport for herself.

A few months before college, my daughter told us, “I want to develop good eating and exercise habits before I go to college.” She started going to the gym regularly. Then, craving some variety, she started Orange Theory. 

She signed up and then got me to sign up. I liked the workout, but I mostly liked working out with my daughter. It was so fun to see her in that element. Watching her face in the mirror as we ran on the tread side by side, I could see the glimmer in her eye, the determination in her focus, the energy behind her exertion. It was all hers. Unlike her efforts on the soccer field, here she was performing for herself. 

Seeing her run hard on the tread, I had an image of myself slowing down, my speed lowering until I was completely stopped. I would fade into the background and my daughter would continue running onward, towards herself in the mirror, towards the woman she was becoming. 

Every time we ran on the tread, I trudged along next to my daughter, more focused on her image in the mirror than on my own. Seeing her dedication was mesmerizing. It was as if, with every solid set of strides, her body was chanting, “This is me. This is mine.” Her choice, her idea, her passion. 

This is what I want for her. I want her to capture that feeling that comes from finding something she loves and doing it! I wish I could harness the energy that flowed from my daughter as she ran her heart out on that tread. I wish I could bottle it up and tuck it into the front pocket of her jeans where she always keeps a tube of Aquaphor. I wish that every time she put the moisturizer on her lips, she could put a little dab of ‘Eau de This is me. This is mine’ on her wrists.

I cherish those sessions at Orange Theory with my daughter. The image of her on the tread running towards her future self—her strength, delight and passion — nourishes me in these early days as I miss her from afar. I feel grateful to have been invited into that space to witness my daughter in her “This is me. This is mine” zone. 

I hope, as she navigates her life in college and beyond, that my daughter keeps looking for and finding experiences that connect her to herself and make her feel as alive and connected as she seemed to feel on that tread. One thing I know for sure — if she asks me to join her, even if it’s something I never wanted to do, I’ll definitely say yes.

The Last Wednesday Morning

This morning I woke before the sun. We’re having a heatwave in Seattle and all night I slept fitfully. It seemed like I sweat and twisted through complicated, weird dreams all night in our hot, stuffy bedroom. Getting up was a relief from the stagnant cage I’d spent the night in.

I made my coffee and went out to sit on the deck. The cool air from the lake dried the baby hairs sticking to the back of my neck. I heard the crows having their morning caw-chats on the power lines circling my house, down the street geese honked on the lake, a tiny flock of bushtits fluttered on the bush below the deck, and a racoon rustled its way along the edge of our rock wall.

It was still a little dark as I took my first sip of coffee and, as I watched the sun coming up over the lake, warm and orange, already bringing with it a warning of the heat to come, I felt the heaviness of impending change.

Upstairs, my partner was still asleep. Downstairs, my daughter was tucked into her bed in her messy room, much cooler in the dark, damp basement. “This is the last Wednesday that my daughter will be asleep in her room,” I thought to myself as I watched the sky lighten.

This last Wednesday at home is a milestone. And next week, on a Wednesday, I will be moving my daughter into her dorm room 1300 miles away, with a girl from Texas, whose parents will be saying goodbye to their daughter too. Another milestone.

Milestone — the symbol of another mile traveled, a marker of time and distance and change. I’ve thought a lot about how I would feel when this day finally came, when my daughter left home. I’ve been preparing for this moment, this particular milestone, for a long time.

With each milestone, I imagine my daughter moving further away. From me.

And she is. With each milestone, she moves further away from the place where she started. Each milestone marks a moment. With each milestone, there is an end to something, but also an opening to something new. With each opening, my daughter gets closer to where she is going, wherever that may be.

Next week when I drop my daughter off at college, say goodbye, and fly back home to Seattle, she will be on her own. That milestone will mark the end of her living at home. And it will mark the beginning of her living on her own. It will mark the end of daily care and contact from her parents and the beginning of more responsibility.

And, on my path, I have my own milestones. When I leave my daughter at college, I will come home. I can already imagine her room, empty of her favorite things, still and quiet. I expect that I’ll feel the fullness of the sadness that’s been peeking its head up like a prairie dog for the last six anticipatory months. And I imagine I’ll feel worried because that old friend is always with me. But what else? I wonder what new openings will come from my daughter’s absence, from the quiet emptiness of her room.

Far away, in the middle of the country, as my daughter experiences an avalanche of “firsts” — first time living with a roommate, first philosophy class, first time taking care of all her own meals and laundry, first time without parents nagging her to make sure she doesn’t forget to [fill in the blank] — I will be back home, experiencing the milestones that come from an empty nest.

This is a big change for sure, but I feel mostly ready. Being a mom has always been this way — milestone after milestone, a series of endings and beginnings, opening new paths along the way.

I have a lot of questions. Will my daughter come back to visit often? Will she ever move back to Seattle? I feel a little scared and a little sad because I don’t know the answer to these questions. Her path is full of milestones, destination unknown.

But if I’m honest, I wouldn’t want it any other way.