So many years ago for the very first time, I witnessed the pink lines on the stick. That was scary. What was happening in my body at that moment felt scary. The feeling intensified when a “helpful” co-worker told me, “Just you wait. A few weeks ago before my first child was born, I sat weeping on the steps in my house, wondering how something the size of a watermelon was going to come out of me.” “Thanks for the encouragement,” I did not say.
Outside the entrance of Mercy Hospital nine months later, Marcus and I loaded up our first born, trying to make sense of the car seat situation. We were now responsible for a human being’s survival! That felt scary.
In the next several years, we would leave our kiddo and then kids with a babysitter, then a day care provider, then a teacher. Each time, that felt scary.
We would leave them behind at a new school, a camp, a sleepover at a friend’s. Today, one of my sons walked alone into a room to take his permit test. He didn’t say it, but I knew it felt scary. Big questions, big stakes. He passed.
He left behind the part of his life in which he could not drive, only bike or walk or sit in a passenger seat. He left behind some of his dependence upon me and in doing so, he now shares some of the scary feelings with me. Moving into a new season of life is never without them. The scary feelings accompany independence.
In an audiobook I’m currently reading called Learning to Pray, James Martin, SJ, suggested talking to God about feelings such as these, and asking God what these feelings might mean. What does it mean, God, that I am scared when my kiddos gain independence. Along with that question, he offered another. Who is Jesus for me?
What do these feelings mean? Who is Jesus?
I feel scared when my kids gain independence perhaps because I worry whether Marcus and I have equipped them enough for that particular new independence. Of course, I feel scared for what might happen, scared for so many reasons. The scary feelings are simply too much for me to carry on my own.
Kids absorb some of the scary feelings when they gain independence. While I am still responsible for a human being’s survival, my kids are big enough to carry much of that responsibility, too.
Still, the scary feelings can be overwhelming. Jesus, then, is the porter who carries the heavy, scary feelings not only as far as your hotel room, but to all places at all times. He is the companion who does not leave my kids even when I leave them at a new school or a friend’s sleepover. He is the friend at camp and the passenger in the car.
Jesus is the one who reminds me the scary feelings are fine as along as they do not hinder the independence. (Easy for him to say.)
In years to come, at my child’s graduation, wedding, or who knows what, I will look back on the day of the permit and giggle at myself. “You thought THAT felt scary?” I’ll say. But I’ll say it more nicely than that co-worker. I don’t need to be a jerk myself.
Lisa Lewton 