Cutting the Apron Strings

As a parent, there are so many stepping stones we have to overcome with our children. For me they are more like mountains; in fact, I’m thinking of the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland. I listen to those other parents with their confident laid back drawl and wonder how is it that I’m not more like them. How did I end up seeing this world as such a big scary place that my son would have to enter head to toe in armour (including helmet, especially helmet) sword at the ready, preferably two, with a friendly non-human eating dragon by his side?

In my late twenties I was diagnosed with a rare and incurable skin cancer; well, they told me I had cancer and I had four months waiting to be referred to the top specialists in London. During that four months, I was terrified, I had no idea what to expect. One of the things (other than dying) at the forefront of my mind was if treatment would make me infertile. I’d previously had an ectopic pregnancy and already had doubts as to whether I’d ever be able to have children. At a time when most of my friends deserted me, through fear maybe, I met a man who was kind to me, this kindness resulted in me giving birth to a wrinkly, little bundle of joy. To be honest the joy came much later, after the initial shock, horror, and responsibility of keeping this human alive. And there began the terrifying roller coaster ride, also known as parenting.

The first "letting go" stepping stone (humongous mountain) is when they go to a friend’s house for tea, without you. Initially, you think how great it is that you no longer have to sit around making small talk with a total stranger that you have nothing in common with other than your children like each other. Then the reality dawns. You don’t know this person; being a mum is no guarantee they’re a good person. The thing is, you can’t really ask if they have a certificate from the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS, used to be CRB). But you let them go. On their return you very subtly ask probing questions.

The next hurdle in letting go is the first time they go out by themselves. I lived in London up until my son was 12 years old. In his short life he witnessed a lot of violence and aggression on the mean streets of North London. I knew I was not capable of letting him out and about on his own without having a nervous breakdown or putting the fear of God in him. Off we moved to the relative calm and safety of the countryside. We started off in a tiny village, my dreams of him being able to skip along the road to the village post office came true. He had children calling for him and they played football on the village green. I enjoyed a few years of parental sanity as we lived the chocolate box life.

The next phase was the most terrifying, he started college and had to travel on the train for the first time by himself. Ironically this is when I wished we lived somewhere with a busier railway station. The first time I dropped him off I hated seeing him on the platform all by himself, a whole new anxiety rose deep within me. This is when my acting skills really came into play, acting being all nonchalant and laid back, “just send me a message and let me know you made it on time.” See what I did there, I avoided using the words "arrived safely". In my head I was really saying, "Oh Dear God in heaven, call me, message me, send a pigeon to let me know you are still alive and I can breathe again!"

I will say at this point, I have been truly blessed. Once he hit 18 and it was time to go out clubbing and coming home in the early hours of the morning, I always knew who he was with and whether he was coming home or not. And the best bit about living in the country is we don’t have night buses, so they all share a cab and get dropped home one by one. Ha! There is a part two to this tale of Apron Strings, keep an eye out for it, because you don’t want to miss the first time he headed off to university or his very recent road trip to Berlin with a mate who has only been driving for a year. He returns home tomorrow, I will finally get out of bed and open the curtains!