Category — Children

Ginny and Jae, prom 2008

I’ve been prying staples from my teenager’s wall this week, pulling down her collage of images from magazines. Scraping candle wax off her nightstand. Emptying “her” bathroom drawer of lotions and eyeliner pencils. Sorting the tangled necklaces, stray playing cards, and other detritus in her room into logical piles and then packing them in cardboard boxes. Washing and folding the few clothes she left behind. Sewing the torn seams in her lime green cotton skirt and repairing the loose buttons on her new black sweater.

Having something to do has helped, because I’ve been in a fog of grief.

On July 28, I was sitting in front of my computer in the new office building where my work group had moved. The phone rang, and it was my 18-year-old, Ginny, asking me if I could take the call away from my desk. I was busy, so I told her to just spill it. And she did.

She was moving out. Right then. With only her clothes, her computer, her guitar, some books and jewelry, and her tall dresser.

She was moving to Georgia to live with her 21-year-old lover, Jae. They sprang the move on me like this because Ginny was afraid I would not let her take her stuff and also because I “can be intimidating.”

She is walking away from tens of thousands in college scholarships here in the Memphis area. She left without even having a driver’s license yet. With stitches still in her gums from wisdom teeth surgery. Without her ADD medication. Without any money.

I didn’t get to hug her goodbye.

There wasn’t a fight that pushed her toward the door. There was never a lack of love and acceptance for the fact she’s gay (Jae is a girl and has been a welcome guest in our home). The letter Ginny left behind said that I had laid out a path for her that she wasn’t willing to follow. That path was a college major she chose, at a private school she agreed was her best option, paired with our state’s lottery scholarship. I had promised to buy her plane tickets to Georgia at least once a month to visit her girlfriend as long as her grades remained good enough to keep her scholarships. I would help with gas money if she wanted to drive over on other weekends.

It wasn’t enough.

We continued to treat her like a child and would not let her grow up, her letter said. That’s the part that made me sigh. She was referring to how she graduated from high school by the skin of her teeth, and only then because the family spent an exhausting year putting pressure on her to study. She worked hard — eventually — and a few weeks ago told me she was resentful I had not appreciated her efforts more. That’s the part that made my jaw drop and my own anger rise.

In her words, I could hear Jae’s coaching. Because Ginny knows what her girlfriend does not:

• With help from her father, we paid $85/week for twice-weekly private art lessons for a year so she could pursue her passion and beef up her portfolio for college.
• We spent $35/hour we could ill afford on algebra tutoring sessions two or three times per week. I took off work when needed to be sure she got there.
• Her stepfather took her to free before-school algebra tutoring five days a week (including when he was off work on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays), rising at 5:30 a.m. to make sure she was there by 6 a.m. Those were the tutoring sessions we found out she was skipping to go sit in the school library or run out to Starbucks every day — tutoring sessions that would have earned her a point added to her grades each day simply for attending and asking a question. I stopped the skipping by threatening to attend with her and checking her school records daily.
• She skipped out of her first period class many times, earning groundings the two times we found out. The second time, we gave her four major chores to do at home and told her the grounding would be over when she finished the work. (It could have been done in two weeks but she dragged it out for much longer.) We even helped with some of the hardest work.
• She got to go to her senior prom, in the $400 dress she was dying to have, even though it was during one of those grounding periods.
• We celebrated her graduation with her girlfriend coming over, us all eating out, and an expensive necklace Ginny had asked for a few months before. (I would have done more, but money was tight and we could charge the necklace at Kay’s.) We told her over and over how proud we were that she’d had finally dug down inside herself and found the drive and determination to study subjects she hated in order to meet the goal of graduation. I was so PROUD of her. She smiled and hugged us back, shrugging over the necklace. She never wore it except for that night. She wanted a $2,000 new laptop but knew we couldn’t get it right then.
• She was going to get primary use of one of our cars. It’s the car my husband traded in his beloved convertible for because he thought it would be a safer choice for our Ginny. I’m still driving a 2000 car; it runs fine.
• We’ve let her sleep late and be a little lazy this summer because it was such a hard senior year for her and all of us. We’ve made her look for a job but not pushed her very hard.
• We’ve paid for unlimited calls, text messaging, and web access on the new cell phone she got at Christmas so she can talk all she wants to Jae.
• We’ve sat through many a family gathering or meal while she texted Jae or kept the phone glued to her ear.
• We bought her new glasses, the expensive frames she wanted.
• I took her shopping for new clothes for her birthday. Two day of shopping, even though I was exhausted from my own work. It felt good to be at a point in my life where I could finally afford to get a few luxuries for my children. I buy my clothes at Wal-Mart. Hers came from Dillard’s.

She’s right there’s been a lack of respect and gratitude here, but it hasn’t been on our part. I’m angry at her, but there’s nothing you can’t forgive your child, especially when you know she’s immature and naive, in love and in lust, addled by the nagging voice of her selfish lover buzzing in her ear, her own actions driven by her heart instead of her head.

I’m just hollowed out with sorrow. I’m braced for how the real world is going to treat her, for all the bruises she’s going to get with vulnerabilities she doesn’t even know she has.

We aren’t going to help her with money unless it’s an emergency. We’re going to give her the rest of her belongings, of course, as long as she makes advance arrangements to pick them up. I won’t store her things here indefinitely because that’s just enabling her to play adult without responsibilities, and also because it knifes me in the chest every time I see something of hers.

And we’re going to pay for her health insurance premiums as long as our health insurance lets us (at least another year, longer if she does go to school somewhere full time). She is, and always will be, my daughter. I sent her a list of contact information and begged her to pass it to Jae, just in case of emergency.

Ginny eventually gave me an address, after much prompting, but I don’t think it’s accurate. I did a reverse directory look-up on it and it belongs to someone I don’t know. I suspect it’s for one of Jae’s friends or relatives. The address I found online for Jae is different and jibes better with my memory of the street name Ginny once mentioned. But I’ll use the address she gave.

So right now, I don’t know exactly where she is, who she’s with, what her real plans are, or if she’s safe and well cared for. And I can barely breathe.

Let’s see how life has been at the Bahm Shelter lately:

My OB/GYN confirmed with a blood test that I’m smack dab in the middle of menopause. Now I didn’t particularly want to have any more children, and I don’t particularly want to be 20 again (even though babies smell delicious and I miss my abs), but this was not welcome confirmation. I am losing possibilities.

For the next year or two while a new building is going up, my work group moved to a new location in a … what would you call it tactfully? … low-income urban area with an intimate familiarity with sirens and blue lights. I’m leaving my nice jewelry at home these days because I don’t want to be mugged in the parking lot.

I blew three days on my diet, starting with not reading the menu carefully at a friend’s birthday celebration and eating the food anyway (oh GOD the Fuji rolls were good at the sushi house — best damned fried tidbits stuffed with cream cheese I’ve ever eaten). In the only good news of the day, I still managed to lose 4.8 pounds this week somehow. Guess all the guilt I suffered the rest of the week made up for a few excesses.

And the worst of all, I really can’t talk about in detail yet because I have an icepick in my heart and a 1,000-pound weight on my chest. My 18-year-old moved out to live with her 21-year-old lover and (I hope) attend college over there in another state. She called as she was leaving, while I was at work today. She is tired of being treated like a child and wants to pursue her dreams. I was flabbergasted, but I managed to tell her I was terribly sad she didn’t think she could talk to me openly, and I told her I loved her and hope she stays safe and happy. I said I believe she’s making a mistake by walking away from $35,000 in college scholarships (one was recently increased). But I also said it was her mistake to make.

I really don’t know what to do with the rest of the night, to be honest. Or this week. Or this year.

My precious firstborn child, now nearly grown and still just as strong willed as she’s always been, has over the years inspired me to utter things I never imagined I’d say as a parent. Oh, the memories:

• “Chairs are a privilege.” (She’d tipped back her chair precariously on its two back legs, again, and had to eat a meal standing up. The first of several such meals.)

• “Stop sticking my finger up your nose, seriously.” (I would be all stern and shaking a finger at her, and she’d walk up and park a nostril on my pointy finger. Kind of hard to hold a stern line with her at that point.)

• “That’s why it’s called ‘punishment,’ not ‘FUN-ishment!’ ” (From earlier this week. I’m thinking she may need to visit the optician to check for damage from the severity of her eye roll.)

• “Oh, if you are gonna stomp on the stairs, you need more practice to learn how to walk correctly. Walk back down and up again, nicely. Yes, I’m serious. Don’t worry; I’ll watch you practice til you get it right.” (then, minutes later) “Hey, sounds like you need practice closing your door quietly too — I’ll be right up!”

Having a strong-willed child is good, right? It means folks will not be able to walk all over her when she’s grown and on her own. That’s what I keep telling myself. So my goal has been to just enjoy her and show her how to be a good, responsible, caring, sensitive, mature person. To mold her, if needed. To BEND that spirit a little, not break it entirely.

No matter how tempting at times. :oP

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