There
are times when raising teenagers that no matter what you do, your relationship
still isn't what you want it to be.
You give space, you give grace.
You pick and choose your battles.
You encourage and try to set reasonable
boundaries.
You love them at their worst and stay
available.
You say yes whenever you can, and no to keep
them safe.
You show interest in their interests, you show
up to all the things.
You listen, you love, you keep trying.
Yet still, there is a distance between you;
still, there is tension; still, it does not feel right.
And even when you've been down this road
before, each and every step is covered with something new, making it harder and
harder to find your way back to a time when you were close with your child,
harder to be in a place you both find comfortable and content.
When you've done all you can to make it work,
and yet it still isn't working, there are only a few choices.
You can give up,
push back,
or keep trudging forward, knowing you may lose
control for a while.
So today, I surrender to the fact that
although my relationship doesn't look the way I want it to, that our growing
pains may hurt a little more than others, I have to believe that teens come back
to their mothers.
I know this because I was once a teen
daughter, too. Almost overnight, I went from feeling like my mother was always
breathing down my neck to her becoming one of my dearest friends and
confidants.
It's hard for me to imagine now, it's hard for
me to remember, but I know in my heart it’s true.
And despite the way I treated her in my teens,
despite my pushing her away and fighting her affections and believing she was
holding me back, she patiently waited for me to come back to her—just as I will
be waiting for my teenager, too.
Because ours is a tale as old as time, and
while she continues to walk farther in front of me to sever the last remaining
strings of our bond, I silently hold on to the few I have left.
And I cling to the hope that one day, not too
far off in the future, my teen will find her path back to me, where I will be
waiting with open arms.
Because no matter how hard the road is between
us, how treacherous the terrain, or how I might lose control, I'll be on it
every step of the way.
As that’s what mothers do for children who spend their teen years breaking free.
