My only child is a senior in high school and I’ve found myself crying at unexpected times for many different reasons this year.

I had tears in my eyes last Monday night during the awards ceremony for the Wade Hampton High School swim team. As he stood up to accept the coaches award for the second year in a row, it hit me that this is the last time my husband and I would be attending this end of the year ritual and it made me so sad. I was happy that we wouldn’t have to drive to the Middle Tyger YMCA in Duncan at the end of a long work day to sit in a hot, in-door pool, waiting 3 or 4 hours to watch my son swim his events. But sad that I wouldn’t get to cheer when he beat his best time or watched him goofing off with his buddies and cheering on the freshmen who looked up to him as their big brother.

Ben alternates between driving me absolutely crazy and making me so proud I feel like my heart could burst out of my chest. My husband’s new theory is that he has chosen to begin driving us crazy so we won’t be so sad about him leaving for college next year and I’m convinced he’s right.

It doesn’t seem possible that my child is nearly grown up but when he drives off without a jacket on the coldest morning of the year or he can’t find his keys for the 50^th time in a week, or he forgets to make coffee again or close his drawers or bring up his dirty dishes I realize he really isn’t finished growing up quite yet.

The toughest part about this year has been the letting go. The realization that next year he will be gone and I won’t be there to make sure he takes a jacket before he leaves the house or eats a good breakfast or packs a lunch. Perhaps most troubling of all has been the realization that he may make the wrong decision about college and suffers the consequences. I flipped out a few weeks ago and my dad called me with some wise counsel and although it wasn’t the advice I wanted to hear it was the advice I needed to hear at the time. He told me that although the decision might be wrong, it was Ben’s decision to make and I needed to back off and let him make it. I was shocked and appalled that my dad would say such a thing but upon reflection I realized that my dad must have lived through hell raising me and watching me make so many wrong decisions but he never stopped loving me and he never ever said “I told you so.” Maybe that’s why I revere my dad so much to this day; he taught me the meaning of unconditional love by example. He let me fall flat on my face, lovingly picked me up and never said a word about the fall. Parenting a child sometimes means stepping aside to let them fall, hoping and praying that you’ve given them enough skills to catch themselves or at least pick themselves up, dust themselves off and live to fight another day. The letting go is the tough part. The yearning to make their lives smoother and better than yours is almost overwhelming. I don’t want to enable my child to death. I don’t want to be one of those mothers who is constantly bailing out their kid or whose son is 35 years old and still living at home. My goal has always been to raise a strong, independent person, who is capable of supporting themselves, being responsible and making good decisions. That’s the rub…the independence. I want him to want me to need me but in a good way. I always want my son to need my love and approval but to be able to stand alone and be a man that I can be proud to say I nurtured and raised.

If you attend Wade Hampton High School’s High School graduation this year you won’t have to look for me, just listen for me. I’ll be the woman sobbing and snuffling and going through tissue after tissue. It’s going to be an emotional year.