Wake up and she has gone...

Waking up in the morning to see your daughter’s sleeping face right there next to you. Soft and peaceful. Childlike. Slightly obscured by the bedding that surrounds her but you can still see her. Sense her.

Looking closely, it takes you right back to when she was a small child. Snugglicious. The same tell-tale signs. The softly arched eyebrows set above the to-die-for dark lashes and below, the sleeping eyes that you achingly wish will give her visions and dreams that will make for a very happy, long and fulfilling life.

I didn’t know if I would ever have this experience again.

To steal a moment or two with her has been a challenge ever since she left home. But now here she is. Right next to me in a darkened bedroom, buried in the bowels of a bed like she and I have always seemed to do.

Mother and daughter. It’s quite the thing.

I dare not move, get too close, look lovingly for too long. I just want to breathe in this moment. Drawing this comforting completeness right down into my lungs. It takes me back to the chambers of a past life when all seemed warm and safe. A time when she and I shared unspoken moments, undefined by time or responsibility. Freedom to just be us. To laugh, play, learn and live together.

God I have missed this.

It’s been a tough time over the last three years. Change and challenge, things that I have always sought out, embraced and enjoyed have betrayed me. They threw me full pelt, headlong into a dimension of life that quickly spiraled out of control. Downward I plummeted so fast that I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t see my surroundings as they blurred with the speed of change. I couldn’t seem to find my place or get my foothold to stop the relentless fall.  I couldn’t recognise where I was. And throughout this unexpected free-fall from my life of equilibrium, was my daughter. Right there beside me.

But only for so long.

As I found the edges of my life, I began to climb back up; one hand, one foot after another. Feeling my way against the bumpy sides of life, I pulled hard, testing the safety of the surface before I took another upward step. And all the time, I had my daughter’s soft delicate hand in mine. Pulling her along with me when needed. We took it in turns, trusting each other as we navigated the climb back to safety. When I tired or lost my way, she would take the lead. Gently but confidently, taking me by the hand motivating me to keep pushing upwards. We were a team. Well balanced and comfortable in our space that we shared together. But somehow, as we neared the day-lit drenched summit of life once again, she began to pull away. She felt the need to disengage. Disconnect. Find herself.

She was choosing a different path and I knew that this was her bid to find her own slice of life. But despite knowing, understanding and supporting this, the inner pain was unbearable. We had come so far.

With one final pull, I had reached firm ground. I was out of the darkness that had shrouded me. And as fresh daylight blinded my eyes, I felt her hand slip from mine and she was gone.

Just like that.

And I had to watch as she became smaller in the distance and as we continued to travel in different directions, she became just a faint figure. The tiniest dot against the backdrop of life. And with this growing distance, a dilution of all that we had ever experienced.

Together we had lived a life. Shared dreams, childhood giggles and ridiculous hysteria. Played games, sat in the safe surrounds of a life that was comfortable, inviting and full of expectation.

And now it is my turn to watch as this significant speck of specialness tries to navigate her own path without me. That is quite a thing. 

And I am still learning...