Daria Doering

Our boys are gone.

In their place are men.

They’re wonderful men who love us,

But it’s not the same.

We’ve done our job well

And they’re independent.

They really don’t want to be with us much.

They want to be with their friends.

I miss being needed and wanted.

I miss pillow fights and silliness.

I miss watching bike-riding and street hockey.

I miss magical family trips.

I’ve got a ball of pain inside my head

With little lightning branches that stretch out from it.

It’s so pervasive that it’s short-circuiting my thinking.

I can’t think straight or get anything done.

If I hadn’t made mistakes it wouldn’t be there.

I was too busy with my teaching degree.

I missed my chance to heal

By being a child with my children.

I sort of knew I was blowing it

But couldn’t manage to do anything else.

I did have to have a way

To make some money at something,

I tell myself I did the best I could

Don’t we always

But the time is still gone

And the pain is now there.

When I was pregnant, and when the kids were little,

I used to think, “This is the best time in my life.

How could things get any better than this?”

Unfortunately, it was true.

My own childhood was so abnormal

That I never got to witness the “human life cycle.”

I don’t seem to have it in my head.

I’m still not prepared for what comes next.

Why didn’t anyone tell me

That when kids turn 13 or 14,

They’re gone?

That it feels like a relationship break-up?

Why didn’t I spend more time gazing at them?

Why didn’t I permit myself to enjoy their beauty more?

Why didn’t I take more photos, write more poems

To immortalize the good times?

Why didn’t I do endless crafts and art with them?

Take all those field trips I wanted to?

It’s so hard to have right priorities,

And I’m afraid I still don’t.

The teenage years aren’t terrible at all

It’s just a different stage

Where it’s all about preparing for college,

For adulthood, for leaving you.

I’ve been so happy and blessed

With attachment parenting

That I thought it would go on forever.

I really had the illusion that it would never end.

Such a miracle for a loner like me

To lose my loneliness.

Such a miracle that a dysfunctional person like me

Could actually be a decent parent.

Maybe my problem was in being too self-centered.

Maybe I now need to focus on the memories more.

We had wonderful times together.

And I guess transitions in life are always hard.

Maybe the attachment doesn’t have to end

It just takes different forms.

If my life is about attachment

I couldn’t ask for more.