What happens when your ‘children’ become grown ups
This is the card I got for my youngest son this week at he turned 19! We bought the card as joke which he loved. But as I keep looking at it the reality has hit home. It’s got me thinking about what happens when your children become grown ups.
My eldest son is 21 and is still away at uni. My youngest decided against the uni route. He is working part time to enable him to do as much solo travel as possible before deciding what he wants to do.
I’m extremely proud of how both my boys have grown and support them fully in choosing their own paths to walk down.
However, for me as a mum it’s bittersweet. I literally have ‘grown ups’ now instead of children, and with that comes a level of enforced mum redundancy as they branch out and need us less. I have much more time for ME and whatever that entails and this year I have really struggled with that if I’m honest. It got me thinking about what happens when your children become grown ups.
My son is now in his 3rd year at uni ( he still has another year to complete) and I have picked up a few helpful tips along the way on how parents can prepare their teens for their first year of uni.
I was in your shoes a few years ago worrying myself to death about how he was going to cope at uni, cook for himself, budget his money and ultimately not get himself into any awful situations or get hurt!! ( I know, but c’mon they are our little babies after all).
So having learned some things along the way I thought I would share my wisdom to either save you a crap load of money ( no they really do not need everything AND the kitchen sink) or reassure you that your little baby will be just FINE!
Well it’s certainly been a while since I have been on here!
It’s not like there hasn’t been anything going on for me to write about it’s more like I haven’t had the urge to write, but lately that has been changing. So rather than bore you will loads of catch up posts I thought I would do a quick run through everything that has been going on.
So this year I have had more hospital imput for my M.E/ Fibromyalgia than I have over the last 8 years since being diagnosed. Finally I managed to get physio treatment for the Carpel Tunnel in my left hand which has helped ease some of the numbness at least. I have also been referred onto a pain management course due to start late September for 7 weeks and I hope that helps me with at least pacing any activity I do ( I am absolutely rubbish at saying ‘No’ to anyone and generally end up overdoing things and then crashing afterwards!). The course will run me up to almost Christmas when I have been told I may get referred onto an exercise class suitable to help with my illness.
So, the last few months have seen us endure some pretty horrific terrorist attacks around the world as well. 3 in 3 months in this country alone, and I hear more and more people online sharing their fears for their children’s future in such a world.
I too share those fears even though I have older teens now I wonder what will become their ‘normal’ in say the next 20 years with regards to terrorism, policing and our country’s safety. What will they be bringing their future children into in many years to come? But we must teach our children not to live in fear.
I am from Belfast. Born in 1970 and lived my youngest years into my teens throughout the height of ‘The Troubles’ in Northern Ireland. The absolute full extent would probably never have been covered in the national media forums unless it involved the mainland itself. But still it continued on a very daily basis in my area as well as many others.
My parents back then probably had the exact same fears about our future as children with armed police and the Army patrolling our streets and wondering where it would all end up.
I have seen more and more of these style of trampoline parks popping up all over the place taking over (almost) from the generation of kids indoor playcentres, with the difference being that us adults can also now ‘pay and play’!
We were invited along to Jump In trampoline park Tonbridge in Kent over the half term, which has just recently opened in fact. This one was on an industrial estate ( which most of these places are anyway) and although there was a decent sised sign on the outer gate we really had to look hard to make sure we were in the right place as this was the sign on the building itself….
We were advised to register everyone in our group that were actually going onto the trampolines and those under 18 need to be signed in by an adult on the waiver form.
You may have thought I had given up on my little blog it has been so long since I have posted on here, but no, I am still here I have just been having a little break.
It’s not that I haven’t had anything to write about, there have been loads going on in the past few months in my little corner of the world, it is just the fact that I haven’t had the inclination to put it all on here, call it lack of blogging mojo but I have had a total break from my site although I have been active on my social media sites. Last night, however, I attended a lovely event down in Kent which got me back in touch with the blogging community. It was fun, it was nice to meet new people and get a bit of that missing blogging mojo back.
So, what has been happening while I have been away (and I do not mean the obvious political stuff that is all over social media at the minute). In my little bubble, I haven’t been active on here since attending a review for a local spa, which I have now joined myself and try and go there at least twice a week. I cannot tell you how relaxing it is using the heat rooms ( sauna and steam) there and how lovely that has been for my poor M.E/Fibro muscular pain.
There’s been 18th birthday celebrations for my eldest ( in April) before all the madness of his A level exams recently.
*You no longer have every minute of everyday organised and planned to within an inch of it’s life, because even if you do bother to take the time to organise something for them not only would they not want to do it but they will probably have something ‘more important’ that they need to do- like gaming, sleeping or just generally ignoring you.
*You become even more fluent ( like a second language) in the grunting system they have in place for answering you, that is if they haven’t got their headphones on and cannot hear you anyway.
*You automatically turn into an ATM shelling out tenners like they are going out of fashion for the times they actually get out of bed and get dressed to go and see their mates to do something.
*You morph into a waitress in a cafe serving up bacon sarnies to ungrateful customers on a non ending rota working irregular hours for no pay.
*Your normal weekly shop, which would still not last a week with teenage boys, now only lasts 3 days if you are really clever and hide most of the cereal, chocolate, crisps and cakes.
*You have absolutely NO plates, cups, glasses or cutlery left in the cupboards as they will be all languishing in teenage boys rooms complete with rancid milk in bowls and fungus on the cutlery.
*You will still be equally amazed and appalled by the ‘teenage boy’ smell that you thought you had got used to but realise can actually get much worse when they spend a full week in there- I have NO WORDS for that smell!
*You become a 24hr taxi service on call, dropping off and picking up at a moments notice, yet they do not pay the going charges.
*You spend the week going to bed well before they do whilst asking them to keep the noise down when they are online with their mates shouting, laughing and joking whilst gaming.
I can only speak from experience of having boys, one of 15 and one 17 about to turn 18 very soon, I would like to think that girls would be different. The only good thing is that they actually sleep longer than me in the morning ( and that really is going some to beat me) so it means a week of no early mornings and a first coffee of the day in pure peace and quiet……………silver linings and all that!
This is what we have been going through recently, my teen gets an ASD diagnosis at 17. My eldest has always shown Asperger traits throughout his growing up, but appeared very high functioning. It has never been a major issue to him or us as parents to major degree but now looking back we both feel a lot more makes sense.
He noticed himself after being at secondary school for a year or so that he ‘seemed’ different to his friends. That’s also when his lack of management skills came into play big time and and we had a discussion with him then to see if he wanted to pursue it further and get a diagnosis. At that time he said no, he didn’t want to be labelled different or have any spotlight put on him and so we helped him alongside the school to help him with organisation.
It has also not hindered him in any way with friends, he has some great friends in the last few years that just accept him and his sometimes ‘odd’ ways and in fact it was one of those friends who encouraged him to go to his GP for help.
However, as he got older and then headed through the pressure of his GCSE’s it started to take it’s toll resulting in high levels of anxiety. We were totally unaware about it as he hid it very well under a laid back exterior. But this led to a period of very low mood. This happened when he as a 16 years old. Encouraged by one of his friends he then made an appointment with his GP and went off to discuss his possible ‘depression’ before telling us that he had gone. He informed us that they were going to follow it up with a referral to our Children’s and Young Adults Mental Health clinic.
We have supported him in his decision fully and have found out from our consultations that this high anxiety and low mood is very common in undiagnosed, high functioning, ASD cases in teens. They get to a certain age and then start to feel socially awkward and uncomfortable in a time that is turbulent for most teens anyway. Therefore, this can lead to the high anxiety resulting in a secondary ‘depression’.
As my boys are now 17 and 15 years old this is something I am starting to miss. We used to do quite a lot on the run up to the festive season and even made lots of sweet treat pressies like the hot chocolate cones, decorated biscuits and cakes. Once they hit mid teens the enthusiasm for crafting waned and it is definitely something that I miss these days ( I expect I have to wait until I become a granny- although I am in no rush for that just yet!). My 15 year old however, will still decorate his own bedroom and will happily make Christmas paper chains if he is in the right mood……..and he won’t thank me for telling you that! I always think doing Christmas crafts starts all the build up and excitement, any time from Oct/ Nov all parents are already talking ‘Father Christmas’ to the kids and the crafts become an extension of that, I still have their school home made decorations too.
Take a look below for some fabulous and EASY craft ideas to get you started:
It feels like time is just spiralling out of control, there’s no brakes, no way of slowing it down to appreciate what is going on.
This week saw my youngest turn 15, now one of the oldest in his class. To be honest he’s like 15 going on 50 but that’s another story, however, his age now hits hard as he is my youngest, my baby so to speak. It seems like only last week we brought him home from the hospital and felt we had all the time in the world to appreciate him.
So what happens? We blink and they are teenagers, to old to be babied and not old enough to be an adult, yet they are like mini adults with their own personalities and strong views. I am now officially the smallest person in the house with the 2 boys towering over me, making me feel small and old!
Birthdays can make you nostalgic, look back with rose tinted glasses and feel as though you didn’t make the most of the time when they were young. Of course this is never true. They were hard work as babies, they took all of our time, we were up during the nights, nursed them when they were ill, praised every stage of their development and enjoyed all the different stages they have been through.
