My mom, like most moms, cried the day she finally had to say goodbye after moving me into my freshman year dorm. We were standing outside of a bagel shop, and as I was making my final round of hugs, she burst into tears. It caught me completely off guard and, rather than assure her we would be okay, I settled for an awkward wave and speed walked back to my dorm.
Despite the implications of this interaction, I would describe my relationship with my mom as uniquely close. Growing up, my mom was my greatest confidante. Someone once asked me if I had a secret I’d never told, which I realized was impossible because my mom knows the entirety of my life. We genuinely trusted and supported each other. I saw her as my built-in best friend.
I’m truly grateful to be so close with my mom, a familiarity that many kids may unfortunately lack. And yet, even in such a major moment in our relationship, I was surprised that she showed any emotion. It never crossed my mind that she would miss me, because recently I had begun to doubt whether she even liked me.
As much as I appreciated our closeness, that same attachment also caused tensions. This friction escalated especially during college applications. In the thick of winter break, my mom experienced immense anxiety over my future which she channeled into hovering over me and my glaring computer screen 24/7. During that time, our interactions mainly consisted of brainstorming, writing, and fighting. She doesn’t remember, but we fought often enough where even a slight disagreement made me brace for a four-hour discussion.
As much as I resented her constant scrutiny, it made me yearn for her validation. Whenever I showed her a good test score or told a great story, she affirmed how happy she was with me. So when I would see her tense, or worse, snap at me, I blamed myself. I perceived all of our interactions in this binary and used them to measure my character.
Upon arriving in Georgetown and being newly separated from my parents, I quickly noticed how much my mom determined my self-perception. As I introduced myself to new people, I made an effort to establish myself independently of her and became comfortable with my self-image for the first time. I reflected on this development in therapy which helped me realize that I was not the source of all of her troubles.
Moreover, I was able to understand some of her own separate issues that impacted but did not derive from me. For example, I realized that my mom expresses love through criticism because she wants to help me improve. While well-meaning, I took this as a flawed approach to communicating with me. I began to accept that while her imperfections had profound impacts, she never meant to make me feel at fault.
Upon returning home for summer break, I noticed a distance between us. She stopped constantly checking in and instead nodded to my rants and let me be. When I tried to comfort her in moments when she appeared “off” or lost in thought, she assured me she was fine without proceeding to project her emotions onto me. I would have previously attributed this to something I had done, but because of my newfound self-assurance, I found myself wanting to address our relationship directly.
One night, I broached my insecurities about our relationship to her, admitting that I thought she didn’t like me as a person. She paused for a moment, thinking about it seemingly for the first time.
“I guess a part of me needed to distance myself,” she said. “I needed to learn how to be independent from you.” I silently winced hearing her admission. To me, independence meant giving up on our bond.
She continued, “But, Alex, this doesn’t mean that I don’t like you. I love you, and I will always be here for you. And part of that means letting you go.”
The rest of that night and throughout the summer, we reflected on our relationship with a new openness. But aside from those reflections, most of our conversations consisted of light talks, joking around, and lots of smiles. We were happier together because we finally saw our relationship as something that we both chose to work towards. Our closeness came from intention rather than necessity.
Perhaps nothing compares to the bond between a mother and child. We both spent some of our most formative years defined by each other. When I think about what allowed me and my mother to truly become closer after having years of an ostensibly inseparable kinship, I realize that we had not yet built a relationship as individuals, only as a unit. By leaving for school and temporarily growing apart from her, we were able to finally grow independently, and thus, see each other as people separate from the whole.
In any relationship, it can be difficult to admit that you need space from someone, especially if you still care about them. Tensions can be chalked up to a lack of closeness and a need to pour yourself even more into the bond to fix it. However, any good relationship can and will withstand time apart. If anything, it can be necessary in order to come back together with clarity about who you are and where your relationship stands. Ultimately, that was the case for my mom and me; only through separation could we reunite.
