Why don't they call?

[meowbunny]

Maybe it is just my daughter but when she leaves home, she seems to totally leave. Never calls. Never drops by. I can cope with her being gone. Even getting used to that concept even if I don't like it but I really would like to know if she is okay. I've called her cell but she's either misplaced it or hasn't charged it. She won't give me another number where I can reach her.

My friend saw her at the fair on Saturday. Said she looked good. She dropped by the house over a week ago to drop off the Netflix movies she'd taken. Stayed for about 1 minute. Other than that, I have not seen nor heard from her in 2 weeks.

When she first moved out, I expected to not hear from her. I was mad at her and she felt that an apology would make wrecking my car okay. But it has been a month now and still nothing.

I know I will hear from her when things fall apart. She always calls then but to not call when things are okay in her life is painful. At least I hope everything is okay. I'm not sleeping very well, diet is a joke, exercise is out the window. I sit by the phone and keep checking to see if it is working even if I've gotten a call 10 minutes earlier. Right now, I am feeling so hurt, so lost, so worried, totally rejected as a mother and a human. Does this pain ever quit? :sad:

 

[kris]

<span style='font-size: 11pt'> <span style='font-family: Georgia'> <span style="color: #6633FF"> i'm sorry this is so painful for you. i can only begin to imagine.

this is the time to start fine tuning those detachment skills. if anything really bad happens you will be notified. eventually things will unravel for her & she'll be back on your doorstep. maybe it's time to evaluate just how much longer you will allow that scenario to happen. personally, i wouldn't have any patience for that guff.

kris </span> </span> </span>

 

[hearthope]

Sorry you are going thru this.

I have not heard from my son since he left either, mths ago.

I will tell you that the more you detach, the less pain you will feel.

You have to realize that your daughter is making her own choices and that you have to make the choice to go on with your life.

None of us here ever imagined the grief we would endure at the hands of our children.

To learn to detach is a gift. It is a gift of release from the bondage of the pain and suffering we experience from the actions of our children

 

[WhymeMom?]

<span style='font-family: Comic Sans MS'>She doesn't call because she isn't thinking about you and if she does think about you it is a fleeting thought and it passes. I don't mean to be hurtful, but you are just not on her mind. You will hear if something goes wrong and if something completely good happens she may contact you, but she doesn't want to answer any questions you may have or be confronted, thus no contact. Would she ever go to a library or place where they have public computers so you could email her. A gmail account or hotmail would be a non confrontational way to communicate. If she would just send an email--"I'm okay." would you be satisfied? Just a thought...

It isn't easy to detach, but for your own health you need to find things to occupy yourself and get off thinking about her to the detriment of your health....

Hope you can do something for yourself.....</span>

:flower:

 

[jbrain]

I'm sorry to say but I think WhyMeMOm is probably right. I remember when my dtr (then 17) left home without permission and I didn't know where she was and she was gone for a couple of days--when she did come home I was so very hurt and surprised to hear her say she hadn't been thinking about me. She needed to "get away" and she told me all the fun things she had done. I really did understand that she had not been thinking of me and she was not remorseful and it hit me in the gut like a sledgehammer. I'd been so miserable and worried and she hadn't!

You really do need to "get a life"--you deserve to be happy and you can have a good life without her engulfing you. She can't be the focus of your life--you need to be the focus of your own life--only way to go.

Heartfelt hugs,
Jane

 

[Big Bad Kitty]

Detatch.

Boy, it is hard, but you have GOT to. STOP sitting by the phone. STOP planning how you will save her if she calls you. It all works together. Once you make an effort, you will be able to get through your day without worrying "gee, did I miss a call from her?" You have to have to have to do this. Only then will the pain stop.

 

[Merris]

What made me realize that I need to detach was acknowledging that I care more about difficult child that I do for myself. That's not healthy for either one of us.

I am so sorry for your pain. We've all been there.

Merris

 

[Suz]

I want to remind you that she is 20 years old. When I was 20 I moved 1500 miles away from my parents. Granted, I was a easy child, but they were still scared to death because I moved to the big city of Chicago. But they forced themselves to keep on living without me.

And so must you.

You can rationalize that she "needs" you but the truth is that worrying about her does her absolutely no good and it doesn't do you any good either.

When was the last time you went out and did something fun......just for YOU?

I challenge you to do that this weekend.

Hugs,
Suz

 

[meowbunny]

It's funny, I once told my daughter I would gladly give my life for her but I refused to live for her. Yet, that's exactly what I'm doing. You guys are right. I can't control my dreams and the pain they cause but I can control my reactions to them and to her behavior.

This detachment may take me a long time, but I will try to get the hang of it. She is everything important to me. I want her to succeed, to be happy, to do the right thing. I have to learn to accept that she is who she is and will do what she wants.

As to the email, yes, I'd be happy with doing that but she doesn't even check her email -- only her MySpace and she refuses to accept me as a friend there. She feels I am invading her privacy when I go there.

I won't give up on her quite yet. As I said previously, I will let her come back home if she needs to but any mistakes made while she was on her own are her own to resolve. I will still insist she pay her bills, go to school or pay rent. I will still try to counsel her when she asks. But, for now, I will try to become stronger and do more for me. Not sure how I do that right now, but I'll work on it.

 

[judi]

My son doesn't call, come by or have any contact with us. It is always husband or me that make the contact. Its okay - we are beyond being hurt by this child.

 

[meowbunny]

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Suz</div><div class="ubbcode-body">I challenge you to do that this weekend.</div></div>

Can't this weekend -- have a major project I have to finish. But I promise to first chance I get. Already have a call in to a friend about sneaking away and going to a spa first chance we get. Will that do?

 

[DammitJanet]

Meow...

Cory still checks in fairly regularly. In fact, I could do with hearing from him less often and be perfectly content! I figure if anything bad happens someone will let me know.

I think I cut my teeth on this with my middle son. When he went into the Marines it liked to have killed us. The boy called us nearly every day at first when he moved into his barracks. Then as time went on he got more involved with his life and we became non-essential to him and the phone calls started coming less and less often. When he was married the first time, his wife was so jealous she only let him call maybe once a month if that. Now he calls at least once or twice a week just to check in and say hi. It all depends on his mood or if he is busy.

Kids grow up. We work out of a job. They dont think about us as much when they are out of our house as we think about them. They dont have our pictures hanging around to remind them constantly about happier times. I think Cory calls home when he gets hungry or needs something. Its not normally a just wanna talk phone call. He wants me to do something for him. Make a long distance phone call, take him something...etc. With Jamie its different, he calls just to chat but then he is older and more mature. Sigh...of course, he isnt a difficult child...lol.

 

[CAmom]

Meow, I can't say I was a easy child, but I was always fairly conscientious about trying not to do anything that would affect my family negatively as long as it didn't interfere too much with my own life.

Despite that, when I left home at age 19, I was simply thrilled to finally be independent and didn't spend much, if any, time thinking about keeping in contact with my parents (who lived and still live less than 4 miles away...) because I KNEW I was loved by them and that was enough.

Now that I'm much older, I can only wonder how much it must have bothered my parents that I was perfectly content, only being in contact occasionally, until around age 25 or so. Now, I don't go a more than a day or two without at least calling my parents.

However, back in my 20's and 30's, it wasn't so much that I was being deliberately uncaring about my family but rather that I felt so secure in our relationship that it never occurred to me that I needed to be in any sort of regular contact to keep it strong--it was a given.

Guess we live and learn as the years go by...

 

[Scent of Cedar I]

I'm sorry this is happening, meowbunny.

Did you ever take a CPR class? And whatever action you take to save someone's life, you are trained to take it with determined intent? Well, it is the same for us, only the lives being saved are our own.

For a long time, nothing helped me.

And I would post here, and post and post.

Finally it began to sink in that if I hoped to recover the rest of my life, I had better start taking myself seriously.

It helped me to look at those feelings ~ the feelings that come for you when the phone doesn't ring, or you are sure there has to have been an accident, or the difficult child has done something so unbelievable that it is hard to hold your head up ~ those feelings are the enemy. Acknowledge them, label them, journal about them if it helps and then, refuse to give them headroom.

Say: I don't have an issue with that.

Whether you do or not, say that to yourself and put the feeling aside ten thousand time a day if you have to.

The Serenity Prayer helps us let go of the feelings too ~ but you have to get to a place you can hear it, first.

The detachment site is listed at the bottoms of my posts. If you have not used this site yet, try it next time these feelings strike.

Begin giving yourself little mini-moments of joy ~ the way the sun strikes the ground, the way a bird sounds. If you can give yourself completely to that moment, there will be a break from the pain, and your psyche will remember how to heal.

The more of those pain free instants you can give yourself, the sooner you will come back into psychic balance.

The way I see it, the kids are in trouble. There is nothing we can do about that, it seems like. But what we can do is to be as strong, as centered, as healthy as we know how to be so that, if the kids ever do come back, we are mentally and emotionally clear-headed and ready to help both the child and ourselves.

Depression will make recovery impossible, will make you weak.

You have to fight it.

For those of us who live every minute of every day with a child in danger, never knowing what we are going to hear next (for all you know, your daughter could show up this afternoon and make your life a living h*** for the next six months or a year ~ it has happened to so many of us here) depression is the enemy.

Barbara

.

 

[SunnyFlorida]

Our children teach us how to become mothers. They teach us how to detach also. Your daughter is teaching you how to detach whether you want to learn it or not. Go with it and find other things to occupy your time. If something does happen, you will be notified...you can count on that.