Heartache, empty nests and visits
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How I feel about my family is a complex thing - something I think everyone can relate to. And I think people are suprised at how… hard I took the last few weeks, and honestly, I’ve sat down to write this, and I’m still not ok. For complex reasons.
Rewind…
So. As many of you know, my daughter boarded at a specialist school for extra support while she was a teen. It takes a village to raise a kid, and my son got my Uni village, my daughter got a whole other home’s worth of people. And that wasn’t ok, exactly, but it was for the best.
I don’t know how I was about everything over the pandemic. Because of the stuff I talk about in Typing a Blank, I guess there’s been things that I’ve forgotten, but the two really huge things that I kept talking about over 2020 as having my kids near me, and knowing they were somewhere safe.
Titanboi left to move in with his girlfriend about two years ago, and started saving like a dervish to buy a house and put away a deposit. And a year ago, to the week, Artenapan got engaged, and started talking about moving out.
It all sort of snowballed around Christmas. Between T finding the perfect house for them and A finding her first flat, also perfect, both of them changed gears and started packing and planning. And I don’t know what I expected to happen, but it’s all hit at once. In less than a month, she’s moved already, my mum is down for a visit, and a few days after, T will be here to grab his stuff we’ve had in storage, to take to his new home.
There have been jokes
Artenapan keeps reminding me that once they’re out, I get my own home office. Not the attic, which is my writing nook (and I’ll probably keep for the times I need a SMOL space to write and chill and hide from the world), and I guess I was thinking that would be like…summer. Which would make it less usable for a bit because it’s HOT in our house in the summer. And I’ll be honest, I’ve laughed along with the jokes because…well, because it’s just been one of those things. I didn’t really think about how much it would affect me until the final messages started arriving. But it’s affected me really quite strongly. I’m SO SO proud of my kids. Like, unbelievably proud of them. They’ve both overcome and planned and prepped so much to make these things work for themselves, but… I’m also not entirely certain I know how to feel now. It sounds *ridiculous* when I put it like that, but I’ve felt really down and subdued and like I’m no longer needed by anyone. It’s dumb, I know, but for the last….26 years really, a huge part of my identity has been being around my kids. Being their mum. And it feels like that all slid to a stop really fast in the last month, and I’m not sure what to do with myself.
Anyway, I wanted to explain why I was quiet, and why things aren’t coming out and why things aren’t as I’d planned (they never are with me), but I’m hoping that this summer will be a huge breakout period of growth and space for me…as soon as I accept I’ve got that to expand into.
Thursday’s post will be showing everyone what the new subscriber packs look like. I’m excited about that too, but it’s paid subscribers only, and I’m missing only one element.
I hope everyone else is doing well!