My Kids Are Grown. I’m Still Terrified Every Time There’s a Shooting.

Yesterday, yet another school shooting happened.  This time, four families, including those of three elementary children, did not welcome their loved ones home.  I called my 19-year-old daughter at 8:01 this morning, as that was as early as I felt allowed, to hear her voice. She is the one who went “away” for college.

They’ll Never Outgrow Being My Kids.

She asked me what was wrong. I told her I had to know she was okay. The truth is that while both of my children are “grown” at 19 and, as of tomorrow, 23, they will never outgrow this fear. Until the day I die, they cannot outgrow being my children and something happening to them, and while they are at school (any school - even college), a shooting brings that right home.

Over the course of their lives, there have been countless shootings and precious lives lost. Each time, I have held my babies closer and prayed for the devastated. This morning, I watched the sheriff talk about the shooting as something you think about happening to someone else, but never your own community, and now it has hit his own. With everything happening lately in the news with Cornell, I have already been extra sensitive about my daughter, and when he said that, tears just burst from me. 

I Learned Not to Parent From Fear — But That Was the Easy Part

When they were children, I had to learn not to raise them in a spirit of fear. But now that they are older, I have to learn faith with them outside of my sphere. It may sound odd, but it is actually harder. They don’t come home at the end of the day. I can’t breathe in relief as I see their heads safely asleep on their pillows. 

The Hardest Part is Not Having Them Home at Night

Many years ago, I heard that parenting was having your heart running around outside your body. No truer words were ever said, except maybe that even as they grow, they may never outgrow my fear.