Summer is over and school has started. That means early morning drop-offs with maybe some tearful goodbyes (parents and kids alike). Seeing your little ones get on that big yellow bus for the first time can be so difficult. For me, a lot of it has to do with the sheer unknown. Are they ok? What are they doing? Are they making friends?
The good thing about the school day is that in the grand scheme of things, the days are not long. By 4:00 p.m. your children are home and you are able to have all your questions answered. This was not the case for me this summer when my daughter went to her first two-week sleep away camp.
Learning to Let Go
The weeks leading up to camp were filled with excitement for her and dread for me. I was worried about what she would look like when we picked her up (picture two weeks of unbrushed, unwashed hair). Sleep away camp drop-off is not all that different from school drop-off. You get your child settled and then they want you to leave immediately without lingering. How do you leave your child for two weeks without lingering? I knew it would be better for her if we just kissed, hugged, and said goodbye like it was not big deal. However, it was harder than I imagined to give her a hug and walk away knowing I wouldn’t see her for two whole weeks.
Communication Black Out
What made leaving a bit easier was knowing I could “write” to our camper using the camp’s bunk email system. The day after she left I sent her the first bunk email expecting a response right away…..WRONG! It took five (FIVE) whole days for her to write me back. For those five days I had no idea what she was doing or if she was even having fun. Pictures were posted everyday on the camps app, but the pictures don’t tell the whole story. I needed to hear (or read) that she was ok and having fun. I finally got a response back from her saying that she was having fun but she missed us and wanted us to come visit her on the weekend she was there. It broke my heart to tell her that the camp doesn’t allow parents to visit.
In the two weeks that she was there she wrote me back TWICE – that’s to the six emails I sent her. I even resorted to writing Harry Potter trivia in an email, hoping that would compel her to write back. It didn’t. For the entire last week of camp, I didn’t hear a word from her. Not being able to talk to my daughter was by far so much harder than not seeing her everyday.
It Was Nice To Miss Her
Being a stay-at-home mom I’m lucky that there is not much I miss from my children’s lives. This is the first time I did not know what was going on in her daily life. I didn’t know if she was eating or drinking enough, I wasn’t able to remind her to go to the bathroom or tuck her in at night. My daughter is at the age where we are butting heads constantly. I’ll be honest, the break from the bickering was nice. The house seemed quieter and less chaotic. By the time we went to pick her up I was excited to bring some chaos back into our lives.
The two hour drive to get her was the longest two hours ever. I felt like I needed to sprint from the camp parking lot to her cabin. She caught sight of me and ran, jumped into my arms, and started crying saying how much she missed us. We missed her just as much.
It was so nice to be able to hold her and see that she was OK. She had survived. We both survived. She spent the whole ride home telling us about all the fun she had. How she loves to water ski and she made it to the highest swim level. She says she wants to go back next year. I’m all for her going back to have this experience again. Albeit we will need to work on her writing back a little bit faster.
