Letting Your Child Grow and Making Mistakes Along the Way

For those who have followed my blog for any length of time, you are well aware of the struggles that my oldest, Artist Girl, have gone through since she graduated two years ago. She turns 21 in a few weeks and is slowly becoming the caring responsible adult that she was raised to be.

She is now working a seasonal job and is opening herself up to me. We are actually have adult conversations in which she shares with me her thoughts, feelings and opinions. This has been a long time coming and I am so very grateful.

This past week-end, I surprised her with lunch. As we sat and talk, she shared with me some of the concerns that she has about her younger brother, Wrestling Fan, who is in the midst of teen-age angst. She wanted to know if it was okay if she took him to one of the local teen-age church groups that she used to attend or if it was okay if she shared with him some of the struggles she had as an 8th grader (the grade he is now in).

We also talked about some of her former boyfriends, two of which I was never crazy about, but knew at the time not to say anything negative about either. Both of these young men are facing serious legal consequences for some of the decisions that they have made. She wryly commented to me, "I sure know how to pick 'em."

These are just a couple of the ways that I can tell that perhaps we are through some of earlier, heart-wrenching struggles. Almost two years ago, we almost lost her. Her dad and I have had to make some tough-love decisions as we witnessed her making really bad choices. However, I think that she has always known that even though we weren't always happy about some of those choices and in fact, felt that some were pretty self-destructive, we still loved and love her.

It is cool to see her starting to become someone that I can not only claim as my daughter, but also my friend.