Next week my oldest child turns six. The week after, she starts full-day school for the first time.
She’ll eat lunch without me, for the first time. We’ll be apart for longer than we’ve ever been apart before, unless you count that rare weekend I flew out to see friends or a few other random times in life when I was gone all day, but those were exceptions and not typical.
I'm not okay with her being gone, but I have to be. More, I have to be a grown-up and put on a smile because my daughter is a little nervous about going to kindergarten, and because I already cannot imagine how much her little sister will miss her. (Last year when her big sister in preschool, my youngest would ask by 10 a.m if we could go get her.)
I anticipate how I’ll handle this change.
I plan on starting my toddler in a Mommy and Me class, and I envision morning library excursions. But the truth is that I won't be able to activity away the pain and emptiness that we'll both surely feel at this loss of our regular companion, my oldest child and her big sister.
We’ll adjust. People always do. Kids, especially, always do, because the nature of childhood is getting into a routine right before it switches up. We’ll adjust, but my life will never be the same. This point, of my daughter leaving for full-day school, is a marker in her life and in mine, and although I may seem dramatic, I know how important this moment is to the place of where her life with me somewhat ends and her own life shoots off.
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To finish reading the full story, visit the Huffington Post: Parents website: http://huff.to/2bA2vnS.
