Stay Close

Years ago I posted on how mothers inherit traits from their children.

I’m finding yet another meaning to it now.

My daughter is off to college next week. First one leaving the nest.

I’m thrilled for her. Starting a new life, getting to know so many others, learning new things. It’s quite exciting.

And depressing…for me. And it hurts.

They say it’s normal for soon-to-be college students to argue with their parents. They say it is part of process of distancing. We went through it in June for sure. July came and we stopped. Somehow it just didn’t fit who we were.

Instead, we decided to try as many different pizza places we could before she left. We like pizza. And it’s been fun.

But that aching? Still hurts. Sometimes it even feels physical.

And I wonder if that was God’s purpose in all this.

Dads have a special connection with their children. Dads are the ones who most times get to say, “Go for it!” or “Get dirty!” or “Skin your knee!”

Moms are usually holding their breath. They don’t want to inhibit their children, so they are usually quietly saying, “Be careful.” and “Stay close.”

Could that hesitation, that need to hold on, be those same silly lymphocytes that our unborn babies sent to us so long ago? Those lymphocytes that sent the message, “Don’t miscarry me, don’t let me go. I’m supposed to be here.”

We know from the Italian doctor in that long ago post that those lymphocytes contain the baby’s DNA and attach to the mother’s nervous system for the rest of the mother’s life. Are they still saying, “Don’t let me go?”

I don’t know, but I know it hurts. And I believe that will be one of the questions I ask first when I get to see Him.

And who knows, perhaps He’ll be saying to me, “All this time, I was saying the same thing to you…stay close.”

It would be just like Him to put me in my place.