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Yes, that's hard.  I too missed my son's graduation, as he thought the ceremony was *stupid* and left early to go on a long hike.


I once took care of a woman at the end of her life.  She had 2 sons, one a surgeon and one a dermatologist.  They both visited her daily in the hospital and were quite loving toward her.  When her nurses would point out how proud she must be, she nodded and smiled.


One day I was sitting with her, rubbing her back and chatting, and she told me that she wasn't comfortable with her feelings, and she did not feel very proud of them.  But she felt a great deal of resentment toward her sons.  She had plans for her life too, and she had sacrificed much for her boys.  Her dreams had been put on the back burner, and now it was too late.


It's easy to think "Wow, *I* should have such problems"...but her feelings of regret and resentment were no less real than the feelings we have.


Then I think of Recovering Enabler, and her story about her heart swelling with pride when she overheard her daughter teaching a friend how to play the guitar; her way of making the young man feel at ease and her patience and encouragement.  A little thing, but an insight into her daughter's true character.  Something to be proud of.


I have a few of those moments as well, such as when my son stood up to a bully teacher, not to defend himself but to defend a friend.  Or the time my 5-year-old daughter remembered to let the birthday boy be the one to break the pinata.


I think that has become my new goal, to take comfort in what we DO have.  Like Pasajes says, expectations = disappointment, but we all have those little things, those moments of insight into who they are underneath all the "hard" stuff, that we can fall back on when we start to grieve what we feel *should have* been.


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