I know this is long, so just click past if you don't want to read it. This is the column I wrote about this subject ...

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Parental Letdown Just Takes Longer By K. C. Compton

When my son was a toddler and first began day care, I discovered a phenomenon known as "let-down." Every time I went to pick him up, he'd be playing happily with the other children, but as soon as he saw me, he'd run to me and collapse in my arms, wracked with sobs.

At first I thought I was making my baby cry. Then one day, poring over my Dr. Spock, I read that this saving of tears for Mom and Dad is a common occurrence with the little ones. They cope and cope for as long as they must, but when they reach safety – Mommy's or Daddy's arms – they let go of the tension and fall apart. Called let-down, it doesn't last long. With some parental patience and freely dispensed cuddling, soon the emotions are knitted up again.

Now, more than 20 years after this initial discovery, I've found that parents have their own version of let-down. It just takes much longer.

Over the holidays, I went to New Mexico to stay with my kids – a passage, sure enough. Until this year, for 25 years, one or both of these children have been together with me, under my roof, to celebrate the holidays. This year, I was the itinerant. My son graduated from college two years ago and has already put together a career, a house and a serious relationship with a gracious, intelligent young woman. My daughter, a college junior, flew down to meet us for the holidays. In her, I saw a new-found seriousness of purpose, a coming together of her energies and focus in ways that inspire my deep confidence.

I found myself watching her talk with friends -- with my friends over dinner, with her friends as they went out to a party, with acquaintances from the church we attended much of her life – and the mantra that kept inserting itself into my mind was, "She's ready."

It wasn't just that she's ready for the next semester of school, or for a successful social life. I know now deep in my heart that she's ready for her life. She's gotten what she needs from me and she's good to go.

I had a similar, stronger, response when I walked into my son's home for dinner. The last time I saw this house, it was a bachelor's place he shared with two college roommates. There was a pool table in the dining room; beer cans played a prominent part in the decor. The pool hall motif is gone now, replaced by an actual table, decorated this night with candles, matching dinnerware and cloth napkins.

"This house looks great," I said.

"A woman lives here now, " he replied with a grin. And that was true – but there was more. An adult man lives there now, one with a sense of pride and direction for his future. He also is ready, even though his confidence sometimes waxes, sometimes wanes.

I got the job done.

Once I started to let that thought in – that I have really, really, really accomplished the most important task I ever undertook – a train of emotion comes barreling my way.

The day my son was born, some part of my consciousness locked its laser on this moment – my children as whole, healthy, competent adults – and, waking or sleeping, healthy or sick, happy or sad, stupid or wise, I have never let go of that vision.

That's a whole lot of holding on.

And now, it's a whole lot of letting go. Since I returned from my holiday, I've been feeling unfamiliar to myself. At home last night, I started crying and, for what seemed like hours, I couldn't stop. I wasn't sad, I was just turning loose.

What I let go of – and hadn't even realized was there – was terror. How odd that we can go along for 25 years without realizing – except in brief, quickly repressed moments – that we are scared to death.

I was so afraid for all those years that I would die, or that some terrible accident would befall me and my children would be left motherless before they had enough of my particular strength to make it on their own. As a single mother for most of their lives, I keenly felt their need for me.

Alternately I was afraid they would die – or worse, that something in their spirits would be killed off because I failed them in some essential way.

None of those fears came to pass. Most of our fears never do. But perhaps where our children are concerned, our terror of doing them harm or failing them helps keep us on a path that by its definition must be straight and narrow.

Austin and Ariel will always be my kids, of course, and we'll always need and depend on each other. But I am now deeply assured that those life-and-death days of childhood have been successfully navigated.

Whew. Way whew.

copyright 2000/Relaxed Fit by K.C. Compton