Party of 4
As much as I hate it, I need to get used to saying this. Our oldest graduated over a week ago and within two months, this will be our status quo.
My life changed when this child took us from a duo to a trio. We were only married a little over a year when we found out we were pregnant. We were in shock (after some quick reflection, we both knew the exact moment we conceived but that's for another post...) and while we probably would've waited a little longer to have children, I'm so glad it happened the way it did.
My husband and I never talked about how many kids we wanted. No, really...not a once. Is that weird? I started dating my husband when I was 20 years old and married him at 25. You'd think it'd come up a time or two. We got pregnant again when she was a little over 2 years old--this time, planned. *ahem* We were surprised with a boy so with one of each, my husband said "Perfect!"
But I didn't want perfect. I wanted our family to feel complete and having the "idyllic" boy/girl combo didn't feel right to me. I had grown up with one sibling, a sister. She was older than I was by 18 months and it was a love/hate relationship. We laughed and fought almost within the same breath. I had always wished more another sibling, a brother if I was going to get to choose, so that it could give us a distraction from each other.
That never happened and so we were always a party of four. It made it easy for my parents when making dinner reservations, traveling, and living on two small town salaries. But as we became adults and began bouncing back and forth between spouses' families at the holidays, it was pretty lonely when one of us couldn't be there. My mom had three sisters and a brother, all living within a couple hours drive, so we spent many a birthday party or holiday surrounded by what felt like a gazillion people. And it was awesome.
My husband grew up with a brother who was 11 years older, putting him in college when my husband was just learning how to spell. Their time together was short, making both of their childhood's solitary, reinforced by the fact that their mom was an only child and the nearest cousins lived over an hour away. So you'd think my husband would have wanted more kids but what he lacked in siblings, he made up for in friends. Goodbye loneliness.
When our second child was about two, we started having that conversation about more children. I was all for it and he was opposed. When I had been nursing, rocking, and reading books to our youngest before bed, I wasn't ready to walk away from that part of my life. I lobbied hard and in the end, well, you know who won. I got pregnant soon after and was confident walking into our obstetrician's office with our two little one's in tow, ready to hear our baby's heartbeat.
Instead, there was silence. We weren't alarmed quite yet because we were sent to the next room for a vaginal ultrasound. Our party of four was all in there when she told us that there was no baby anymore and that she was sorry. This was right before Christmas and I had two choices...let my body miscarry naturally or go in for a D & C (dilation and curettage) which means they scrape the lining of my uterus to clear things away. I basically spent the holiday bleeding and grieving. Our party of five was barely a blink but it was just long enough for us to know our decision to expand our family was the right one.
I had two more normal cycles before we tried again. We were lucky to conceive right away and our third child, our second son, was born the following December, a couple of weeks before the anniversary of our bad news. That lonely December of 2004 was replaced with a joyous December 2005. We have happily been the party of five ever since.
For 12 years, this has been us. For 12 years, we've had a third row seat, 4 occupied bedrooms, a child squeezed onto a hotel couch or makeshift bed, and three bedroom vacation homes/villas. For 12 years, we've waited longer for a big table when going out to eat and settled many arguments about who has to sit in the way back of the truck. For 12 years, we've been playing a zone coverage as we try to hit bedtimes, ball games, and birthday parties. But we've been happy (I say that in retrospect because, in the moment, it wasn't always fun) doing all of those things because that was just our family. That's how we did us.
In less than two months, we will be a party of four again. My head is full of so many memories of our sweet family but my heart is aching for what I know is on the horizon. She won't be gone forever but she won't be here for the dinners out, the baseball road trips and back seat bickering. If we're lucky, we may get one family vacation a year (looks like over Christmas) but for 95% of our daily lives, it will be just the four of us.
I am going to have to learn how to do "four" all over again since my partner in crime (our guilts being overpacking, binge shopping, coffee shop exploring, road tripping, eye-rolling and sarcasm) is leaving me. But deep down, I know this will be temporary. Our party of four will eventually become three than two. Someday maybe even one. Gulp. But by letting them go, one by one, I know we will gain so much more. They will meet people. Those people will become their friends who will become like our sons and daughters. She may meet "the one" and then they will become a party of two. Then three, four and so on (if we're lucky to be so blessed.) And their party of however many will become part of our party as well. Not the way it used to be but we aren't going to get picky with those details.
Therefore, I'm choosing to see this upcoming void as a short detraction. A lull in the action, perhaps. We are so excited for her to go off and start her own life as a party of one. God, remember those days?! How wonderful that independence was! Scary at times but also wonderful. I am choosing to see what she is gaining rather than what we are losing.
It's been a while since I've taken a math class, but if my calculations are still correct, 4 + 1 will always equal 5.
“Don’t be sad because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”
Any other parents with words of wisdom? Please share any coping mechanisms or tales from your emptying nest. We'll get through this together. ;)