I remember the day I got my driver's license. It was the best day ever! Until I got my own car, then that was the best day ever!
I remember thinking, I can do anything. I could go anywhere. I no longer needed my parents to drive me. I could just go.
Then you grow up and have children. You spend all of their little lives controlling the dangers that they might encounter. You pick the best child care, the best car seat, you scour watch dog websites to make sure there are no offenders in your neighborhood, you even put oxygen masks on their little faces to prevent the inhalation of second hand smoke.
Then your little one grows up and turns 16 and wants to get a license of their own.
The day your child gets their license or first new car, it is their best day ever but not necessarily yours. All of that control you have had to keep your child safe and secure is gone. It is out of your hands. It is in other people's hands.
The Boy has had his driver's license for approximately seven weeks. Every single time he leaves the house I go into a near panic. He is required to call before he leaves some where and then call again when he arrives to where he was going. If he is late with that phone call, I begin imagining every possible worst case scenario.
My hope is that this panic will diminish. With experience and time I will trust he is safe? My in-laws tell me that on some level you never stop worrying about your children. I keep trying to recall my parents being this worried. Maybe it was because I was a self-absorbed teen but I just don't recall it.
So, I am left wondering, is this normal?
Then you grow up and have children. You spend all of their little lives controlling the dangers that they might encounter. You pick the best child care, the best car seat, you scour watch dog websites to make sure there are no offenders in your neighborhood, you even put oxygen masks on their little faces to prevent the inhalation of second hand smoke.
Then your little one grows up and turns 16 and wants to get a license of their own.
The day your child gets their license or first new car, it is their best day ever but not necessarily yours. All of that control you have had to keep your child safe and secure is gone. It is out of your hands. It is in other people's hands.
The Boy has had his driver's license for approximately seven weeks. Every single time he leaves the house I go into a near panic. He is required to call before he leaves some where and then call again when he arrives to where he was going. If he is late with that phone call, I begin imagining every possible worst case scenario.
My hope is that this panic will diminish. With experience and time I will trust he is safe? My in-laws tell me that on some level you never stop worrying about your children. I keep trying to recall my parents being this worried. Maybe it was because I was a self-absorbed teen but I just don't recall it.
So, I am left wondering, is this normal?
SO WEIRD!! Trevor and I just had this same conversation after practice yesterday... how you feel so grown-up when your friends start driving, then you get to drive, and you find this new "freedom" in going places on your own without your parents around bugging you.
ReplyDeleteThen we talked about how Todd and I FREAK out every time he leaves with friends... are they safe drivers? Does that even matter when so many people are aggressive and distracted and drunk, etc. Is this person checking their phone while driving our precious cargo around!??!? And we get ourselves into a complete panic.
Finally, I come to the place where I have no choice but to leave it in God's hands and trust Him. It's so hard letting go, even when it's a little bit at a time. And although I haven't been in Trevor's life all 16 of those years, we're really close and I love him just the same... and worry the same! :)