Letting Go is so Hard

I realized last night that I obviously have some more work to do – courtesy of my youngest daughter. In some ways, my older daughter gave me a reprieve from dealing with a significant chunk of fear due to her lack of interest in being active socially. She was not concerned with being popular, or following the cookie cutter dress codes of her peer group. She could have cared less about the boys at school and had two good friends that were able to appreciate her uniqueness. She never suffered fools which in high school means she rarely interacted with her peer group outside of school.

Not the same story with the younger one. S is extremely social, boy crazy and preoccupied with looking good. She wants push up bras and three inch heels. She also gets straight A's and is planning on going to medical school. Somehow that rarely soothes my concerns. I am having such a hard time letting go of this deep, abiding fear that she is going to ruin her life. Yes – it's that big. Which, of course, is a message to me that this really isn't about her.

When I was her age, I always felt that what my parents didn't know – and didn't ask about – was free game. They never asked if there was alcohol at a party or where I was going and with whom. Much like my mother before me, I had to figure out my own boundaries and sometimes it was really difficult to know what was really in my best interests. I had strong boundaries around drug usage – my sister was an example of what a mess that experience was – but alcohol and sexuality were different and much more unclear. I lied by omission all the time and lived a separate life from the one that my parents thought was true for me. I can't begin to number the dangerous and stupid things that I did in the name of finding love or friendship. I had no skills to think about integrity or personal boundaries or ethical decisions. I had no way to see how low my self esteem was, how abandoned I felt and how my desperate need to be part of my peer tribe was directly related to how bad things were at home.

The world seems to be such a dangerous place. Perhaps it always was and I somehow managed those waters better than I think. I don't think I have fully metabolized the fears and deep pain that permeated my teen years. I haven't really delved into my life at that time and really understood why I not only survived but did well. I've spent time talking about my sister, the deaths in my family, the absent parents and my own emotional baggage coming out of my childhood that was completely unmetabolized. However, I've also never stopped to think about why I didn't self destruct. What kept me from really scary situations?

I think I need to work with this – not only for myself but for S as well. If I can't value the strengths that I had at that age, I can't value the strengths that she has. I need to be able to give her that gift. I want to have enough tolerance to hold her in a larger space that gives her room to explore right/wrong, good/bad, comfortable/uncomfortable. I want to give her room to stumble and support her when she gets back up. Knowing that I have to do my own work in order to get there helps me breathe a little easier.