Quote:
Originally Posted by Edward64
Kid is continuing to text and send pics and we do the same, so pretty much daily touchpoints. If not already, recommend everyone in similar situation setup a group/family chat to stay connected.
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On this point, well, I can only say that we've been pretty blessed.
We've let him largely dictate the pace & timing of calls, txts, etc. And he's been amazing. Most of last year I knew one of two times of day I was likely to get a phone call, different times a day my wife knew the same pattern.
In my case, he used lunch first semester last year as his kind of "personal time", found a little out of the way spot in the student union where it was quiet & got out of the flow. He'd call during that quite a bit. His parking situation sucked last year too, about a 15 minute walk from his room to his car, so a lot of conversations during those hikes.
He was very conscious - and respectful - of how tough this was for us, and went out of his way to try to help ease the transition. That said, one of the very last things I said to him before he left last fall was that "sooner or later, there's gonna be a day where you don't talk to either of us ... and that's fine, don't freak out when you realize it happened, it's just part of it, no worries".
Now in year two, there's still been probably less than ten days where he didn't talk to at least one of us on the phone, and well below that where there wasn't at least chat/text communication with one or the other or both.
All that said, we probably have a fairly weird relationship. I mean, I've got a kid who isn't afraid to drunk dial his parents just to share some weird/funny shit. He very much has "his own life", he's just not reluctant to let us be part of it. Like I said, I just count my blessings about that.