With recent events just this very week, it has been made painfully clear to me that it is time for me to loosen the grip.  I have tried to allow my daughter to grow up and become independent.  Yet, when she is in trouble or hurting, it is hard for me to sit back when I know that there is something that I can do to help her.  Even if that is intervening, even when others would prefer that I didn’t.

By all accounts, she is an adult.  She is 18 years old, has graduated from high school, and she has entered the work force.  She is an adult!  When situations arise, though, she doesn’t have the maturity to handle them, especially when there is conflict or confrontations involved.  She would rather sit quietly while others carry on ranting and raving about her or pointing out her flaws and imperfections in her work.  There comes a time when you have to stand up for yourself, but she is lacking in that one area because she hates a confrontation.  I do, too, but I have spent way too many years with people running over me to allow it at this stage of the game.  In time, she will gain the maturity, as well as the confidence, to stand up for herself especially when there are injustices being done.

This is where I am lacking … I am deficient when it comes to letting go and allowing my daughter to work it out.  I know she won’t stand up for herself, and it hurts this mother’s heart to see her cowering in the corner over things that people are doing to her when she has a voice.  She just needs to learn to USE it.

Mama bear comes out any time any one messes with her cubs.  That is just how I am built, and I know the other mothers in our reading audience can relate to this 100%!  I have spent 18 years fighting for and taking up for my daughter, and now … why should this be any different?

Oh … right …

She’s an … adult.

But to me, when she faced adversity this weekend and all throughout this week, when trouble was raging all around my beloved daughter … I looked into her eyes and saw my frightened little girl.  My mother’s heart broke in a million pieces as I watched my daughter … tears spilling out of her eyelids and down her cheeks … and at that moment in time, I would do anything in my power to make it all better!

This is where I swoop in and get in the face of all those that try to do my daughter wrong.  This is where I use my wings and swat at the ones threatening to steal my daughter’s peace of mind and sanity for that moment in time … this is where I fling my feathers at them causing them to back away from my daughter!

When the dust settles, she’s thankful that I had her back.  She tells me … yet I wonder if I am doing an injustice to her as well by not allowing her to fight her own battles.

This letting go thing is HARD!

It is so difficult to allow her to take flight when she does not seem prepared.  Yet, I know the time has come.  It is here at last.  It has finally arrived for my daughter.

A time to fly.

And I must watch from a distance as she stretches her wings and prepares to jump from the nest.  As I hold my breath, I pray that the wind beneath her wings will catch her as she takes flight.  And in that moment, I will proudly watch her soar.