As a parent, do you ever get a break from worry?

Pandora, you never stop being a parent that worries, even after they are married. my son and daughter finally moved to Seattle and the worrying finally ceased. what would be the point of worrying, when they are 3,000 miles away? there is nothing i could do. wait a minute, i guess i did not tell the whole truth. yes, the wife and i still worry, but on a smaller scale. when your daughter marries a good, honest man…..your worrying days will be over….maybe.

@john65pennington :( Maybe??

Pandora, our daughter is now with her 5th husband, yes number 5, and we are concerned that all is not good in this marriage, either. do we worry? yes. we have been throught this situation so many times, that honestly, its old hat to us. we are concerned for her, but after all, she is 42 years old and can take care of herself….....we hope.

Oh, my. I hope she can. One thing to be said. She is a very optimistic person to go 5 rounds. My husbands grandmother got married 6 times and she was the most fun optimistic person I ever met.

Worrying about your daughter when she is 25 and living on her own is pretty natural. However, there has to come a time when you wean yourself off the worry. I imagine it’s different for each person. For me, my son went immediately into military service as a Naval Officer. I stopped worrying at that point because I knew I would be getting a call from his superior if he didnt show up for work the next day.

For my daughter, she was super independent (to the point of being non-communicative) and I knew there was nothing I could do to know if she was ok.

So it was a bit easier for me than for you.

I would say though, that tracking your 25 year old daughter on a daily basis, expecting her to call or text when she gets home, seems a bit intrusive to me. (Note, I said “to me”). Does she have a job she is expected to show up for the next morning? If you are her emergency contact, they would call you…or you could ask her to have them call you if she doesnt show. If she has always been responsible, I would lean toward this, and I am guessing she has been since you and she are so communicative now.

I know this does not solve the problem of worry now and if she lives alone, I would be worried too. Just a thought.

No. My oldest son suffered a severe stroke three years ago and has been disabled since then. The real problem for me is that he lives on the other side of the world and I can’t help him. He had gall stones last year from losing weight too fast, and just last week, he tripped over his cat and broke his femur.

I am borrowing the money to fly over there and visit him for his birthday later this month.

@plethora I don’t call her on a daily basis. She only lets me know when she is going out and will be home late at night. If she were to go missing and a few young women in her area have gone missing, than know one would have a clue till the next day. (She lives in dc.) But mostly she only goes out on the weekend. So most Friday nights and Saturdays she will let me know. I don’t force her to check in with me.
We are actually great friends when we live apart.
@YARNLADY Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Hope you have a good trip and a pleasant surprise when you see him. (like hes doing better than you thought)

@YARNLADY WOW!!! That’s enough to worry anybody. Hope your trip is good, and the visit with him too….and that he returns to reasonably good health.

@Pandora I retract my comments. I would be worried about her too and would at least want a text when she gets in.

Yes. When you are asleep.

@AstroChuck : How come you get to stop worrying when you’re asleep and I don’t? not fair!

My 85 year-old mother says that the worrying never stops, day or night..

No. Not even when you’re asleep.

I found that when my children were home for college break, I worried more each night until they came in. For me, where they were away, I didn’t worry as much, because I wasn’t waiting for them to come home. I did my best to raise them to be responsible independent adults and the only thing to do is pray a lot. I must say at first, I would find any excuse I could to call them. They knew what I was doing, but graciously they did not call me on it.
It does get a little easier, especially after they get married. My children are in their 40’s and I will admit it, I do still worry a bit.
Maybe you could talk her into getting a roommate. If you are really worried, call her. She knows you well enough by now to know you would worry, so a call from you wouldn’t surprise her. call her!

Thank guy. :( Sorry to hear its a forever condition. Just to let you all know. Her date went well. She did get home late and figured I would be in bed. As I said she did text me earlier before she went home and funny enough her date wanted her to call me and let me know he wasn’t a serial killer. He thought I may think the text came from him. LOL. She told him not to worry because the cops wouldn’t consider her missing for the first 24 hours.
She did call me early this morning to let me know she was fine.

@RANGIEBABY yeah, I wish she would have a roommate. When she did, I use to be able to sleep at night knowing I would be notified if she didn’t arrive home. However, she has done the roommate thing for 3 years and hated it. (She’s not the neatest girl in the world.) :(