Saying Goodbye

   Sometimes saying goodbye can be one of the hardest things to do. Of course much of this difficulty lies in the nature of the goodbye and its timing. If your life has included moving a lot, from city to city or maybe even between countries, then you've experienced a wide range of different kinds of goodbyes; to your friends and classmates, and co-workers. These always seem difficult at the time but generally you move on and begin new relationships wherever you end up.
   Moving through life stages creates opportunities for goodbyes of different natures. One of the big ones, of course, is when your children grow up and move out. This is greeted by parents in different ways. We all have this as an expectation, that our kids will grow up and move out. In spite of this being the norm, many of us find ourselves surprisingly unprepared for this when it actually happens.
   Homes that have had kids grow up in them seem terribly empty when those kids are gone. The sights, sounds and even smells have all been altered, even if only slightly. If you take a home (and by home I don't mean house) and change the way it smells, looks and sounds then it is not the same home anymore, simple as that. It is not as good as it used to be.

   I think mothers likely have the most difficult time adjusting when this happens. Mothers have the most investment in their kids and their kids well-being. Both parents can look at their children and say to themselves therein lies a little bit of me. It is only the mother, though, that can say you started in me, grew in me and I will protect you with the same ferocity I would protect myself!
   And then the person they have sworn to protect...moves! They sometimes move to where they no longer can be watched over and kept from harm. Realistically, mothers know their children are fully capable of fending for themselves. Being able to fend for yourself does not take into account a whole wide variety of things that can, and do, go wrong. All of those things are things mothers know about all too well. And when a kid is no longer there and perhaps cannot even be reached in a hurry (and is still a part of you needing protection) there arises the conflict.
   So how do you actually say goodbye? I guess that depends on whether you're talking about the word or the act.
   You can avoid the word. When parting with someone, simply do not say goodbye. Substitute the word goodbye for the words I love you. The two of you well know what is happening but neither of you use the actual word. Almost as if one of you was only headed to a different room in the house. There--you've avoided a goodbye.
   The act of goodbye, of course, cannot be avoided or made any less difficult even though you fully understand its reason and are intellectually (though perhaps not quite as emotionally) in agreement.
   Perhaps a good thing to remember is that every goodbye was preceded by a hello. This hello may have been 25 years ago when your child was born. It may have been a week ago when you met them at the airport or they showed up in your driveway. Those were the good things that made the goodbye possible. What's the next thing scheduled to happen? A hello! A happy event! And what made that hello possible? The goodbye that, at some point, preceded it.
   Yeah, you're right, we're talking the circle of life here, aren't we?

   So if goodbyes are hard, there is something fundamentally good going on. You will feel more pain, likely, than your child does and this is the way it's supposed to be. And if you are the kind of person who finds goodbyes difficult, then you are likely the kind of person who someone will have a hard time saying goodbye to, as well. It means you're a loving person and loving people are missed when they're gone.
   Above all, remember that it does get better! You know this, deep down inside, put some trust in it.
   So, until we speak again, I love you!