As I sent my oldest off to kindergarten this year, ready for life’s challenges and the independence that comes with it, I sobbed my heart out. Seriously, I could hardly talk. I spent the week leading up to the big day crying myself to sleep. The finality of the moment was so enormous, to immense to grasp… that part of our lives with her as a pre-school child was over.
She was now a third of her way to adulthood, and this was a massive step towards her spreading her wings. My mind raced with heavy thoughts, weighing me down with the emotion of it all.
Did I cherish my time with her enough? Did I give her what she needed from me to make it through this next phase? Did I love her enough? Did I spent enough quality time with her? Did I put her in front of the TV too long when I could have been connecting with her? Have I done enough? Did I love her enough? Did I appreciate the time enough? Am I enough? Was it all enough? Will she be okay?
I realised with a jolt that none of that mattered now anyway, because it was over. It came with acceptance that I had simply done my best. We were now moving forward with life, getting dragged along at a great pace into our next chapter of life as parents of a school child.
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Whilst I really admire this child's skills at negotiating childhood relationships, this ultimately ignores factors that prevent people from exiting abusive relationships- examples might be having to pay rent and bills and a high unemployment rate for someone wishing to escape an abusive boss (and unabletoget help through hr channels or similar); or dependant children, no alternative accomodation, access to employment and childcare etc for those in abusive marriages. Nobody wants to feel like they are stuck spending time with a person who doesn't like them, but sadly it's never as simple as it seems.