Apr 2, 2019 3 min read

When you’re pregnant with the child, I think the last trimester is the hard part. Then you go into labor and you think delivery is the hard part. Subsequently, you believe not sleeping through the night is the worst. Then it’s the terrible twos, the often-worse threes, and watching them go to kindergarten and middle school. Then maybe the teens are the hardest part. Then comes teaching them to drive, their graduation from high school, seeing them go to college or even beginning their career.

Let me tell you a secret: It’s all hard. Every single step of raising a child to adulthood is hard. Every single step feels like it could be the hardest part. My current hardest part is that my oldest doesn’t live at home anymore.

She moved out last fall to live with her boyfriend. She is mere minutes from the house, but it is not the same. I have gone into her empty room and sat down on her empty bed and looked at her empty walls and cried many times.

Sure, she comes to visit, and sure, we go do things. The weird thing is, now there are times that I miss her even when she’s in the room because I know she is no longer fully mine.

The trick, I’m discovering, is to see the beauty in all the stages. Enjoy the inquisitiveness of the toddler years, and the jokes of the middle school age. Look for the excitement on their face and their pride when they pass their driver’s exam. It does not take away the difficulty – nor the pain – but it mitigates some.

Last week, she came over for advice regarding a letter she had received. When she arrived, the rest of us were outside working on our firewood supply for the upcoming winter. She dove into the work with us, helping her sister and I roll large pieces of wood toward the log splitter. Momentarily it seemed perfectly normal. Like any other sunny day doing firewood. Like at the end of the evening we would all go to the house, take turns in the shower and go to our rooms for bed.

When the realization set in that, instead of heading upstairs, she would head for her truck to drive back to her house, I felt a sharp pain in my chest. So, I tried the trick that has worked for me so many times over the last 20 years.

I focused on her strength and willingness to jump in to help us with work that is no longer hers. I focused on the giggles and jibing between her and her sister. I focused on how she assisted her brother in backing up the tractor. I focused on the quiet moments she spent talking with her dad.

And when we get out enough for the evening, we went up to the house and had a pancake party. We laughed until my sides hurt and tears were streaming down her face. It was an absolutely beautiful evening.

And it is one I will cling to the next time the pain of missing her returns.

Laura Zoeller can be reached at zoeller5@verizon.net.