#27: Exceeding your own expectations.
How my grieving teenagers became empowerment gurus.
Hello, dear reader! I am feeling REFRESHED, finally, after a few whirlwind weeks. Last weekend I got to slow down a bit, exploring my own backyard (aka the DC suburbs) during a flower-moon, leafy-green May weekend. It was the perfect moment to catch my breath, absorb all that’s happened in the last month, and prepare for a summer that promises even more new chapters and new adventures…
On to the post!
In 90 days, Kendall and I board a plane for Tulane.
I’ll come home after a few days. Kendall will stay.
Both of my kids, 11 and 13 when their dad died, will then be in college. I can’t believe it…
WE DID IT.
We made it this far. In one piece! Bruised but not broken. Lost (at times) but eventually found. Connected more than ever to each other and those who have helped us along the way.
When I shared the good news of Kendall’s college acceptance with my dad last December, he said, “Congrats to Kendall… and well done to you, Mom.”
Well done, Mom? Me??
This was all Kendall. Earning the grades, shining in her extracurriculars, writing college essays that embodied her life experience. Not a charity case accepted to her university because the admissions committee felt sorry for her — but a truly different kind of kid, shaped by her proximity to loss.
Not different bad… (We are changing cultural norms around here, so if that was your knee-jerk response, check yourself! Different isn’t always bad!)
Different good.
Kendall and Connor are independent, indefatigable, and internally prioritized in a way teenagers who have not experienced tragedy just aren’t. Yes, sure, they are melting into a puddle on the floor sometimes (bad boyfriends, bad test grades, bad choices), still doing boneheaded things sometimes (uh… has anyone seen the shower-head some teenager pilfered from my house during a “my-mom’s-away!” party??) and deep, deep, deep in sadness sometimes, missing their dad.
But they persevere, they course-correct, they come out stronger. And most importantly, when the wins and losses of the moment are over, they look in the rearview mirror and feel empowered by what they are capable of.
So why was my dad atta-boying me? What had I done to get Kendall — or Connor — into college? Paid the application fees? Drove them to countless university visits? Performed the support-your-kid activities most parents do?
Then I had an epiphany, an a-ha moment, an “oh, I know what he means!”
What I had done was be a mom during the hardest time in my children’s lives, while also living through the hardest time of my own. I had been the leader of our three-piece band — Kendall on guitar, riffing and riling the crowd, me on keyboard, holding the melody and getting lost in the music, and Connor clearly on the drums, making sure no one loses sight of the rhythm and the beat… with the spotlight of our hearts shining on the empty space where our lead singer used to be. Front and center and gone.
Although finding my husband unresponsive,
performing chest compressions, and having an ER doc tell me they could not restart Mike’s heart all compete neck-and-neck for the worst moment of my life, they are defeated hands down by the moment I came home to tell the kids their dad was gone.
That is, was, and will forever be the worst moment of my life.
Everything about it is seared into my memory — the sound of our tan checkered-print couch as Connor and Kendall shifted in their seats, waiting for me to explain why my eyes were so red. The weight and softness of their small hands reaching for mine as I leaned in to tell them the catastrophic news. Confusion. Tears.
(Another reason I am so thankful to be in my new treehouse and not in that vortex of terrible tactile memories any longer.)
When I literally couldn’t do anything for anyone, I could always show up for them. Yes, to lead them, guide them, support them. But also just to listen to them. To see them. To make and hold space for them to express all of them.
This looked like:
1 - A walk around the neighborhood with Kendall so she could process. “Well, at least daddy is with Grandma Mary Ann [his mom] in heaven now. She must have really missed him and be happy he is there,” she had said, already so wise at such a young age.
2 - A car ride with Connor, who dared not look directly at me for fear of melting into tears (again) while he said, “Grandma [my mom] seems to get some peace at church, so maybe I should try going there with her and it might help?”
3 - A sit-down with the kids, doing my best to chart the course ahead for them, “We are going to go through this pain and feel it. Daddy finished the basement and first floor of the house that is YOU, and we are just going to finish off the second floor without him. But he already baked into you all the important stuff. He is part of your foundation.”
4 - Endlessly letting my heart break over Kendall’s forlorn refrain, “I really wish I could have seen him one more time. When he tucked me in, he said to me “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Excruciating moments of just really, really listening despite the sharp edges of each word… feeling like I was sitting in a heap of broken glass with shards slicing me at all angles. Holding their sorrow while I was holding mine.
But without the talking and the listening, there is no processing, integrating, absorbing, moving forward.
And moving forward there was a surprising amount of.
Connor sprang into action to become the man of the house. He took out the garbage, anticipated my feelings, and gave me extra hugs. He became the sticky-note-leaver and letter-writer his dad had been.
Kendall channeled Mike’s mad skills at getting things done. I was sitting at the kitchen island when I heard her dump her heavy backpack in the mudroom with a thud. Rounding the corner, her face lit up in a smile upon seeing me.
“So what did you do today, mom?”
I looked down at my little gray notebook and the grid-printed pages with my to-do list. I’d spent hours on phone calls, emailing, filling out paperwork, and of course also crying. I had not managed to cross one single item off.
I explained an edited version of this to her. She wrinkled up her 11-year-old face with a ‘this will not do’ expression.
“Ok, give me your notebook. Let’s make a different list.”
In her chunky, elementary-school handwriting, she split my list into long-term to-do’s and things I could get done TODAY. (Honestly, still blows my mind at the simple genius of it.) “Tomorrow when I come home, you will have some of these crossed off,” she encouraged me matter of factly.
And she was right.
Turns out Kendall is right a lot.
One afternoon when she was 13, she sat on the kitchen staircase, a few steps up to get a better view of me while I moved around the kitchen, preparing dinner. Fists under her chin, elbows on her thighs, I could tell she was deep in thought.
“You know, mom, people are out there living their la-dee-da lives, and when something bad happens to them, they are not going to be able to handle it,” she said, again, matter of factly.
“But I am going to be ready.”
My reply?
“That’s right, baby, you are. You definitely are.”
Kids, teenagers, young adults are incredible. They haven’t yet been so inundated by (and don’t really listen to) the opinions of adults telling them what they are capable of and what they aren’t that they believe any of it. Instead, they try themselves, challenge themselves, push beyond supposed limits… And they look to the “grown-ups” around them to do the same.
The way that Kendall and Connor trusted me with every single piece of their shattered hearts — and the way that I rose out of my own tatters to hold them — still feels like a miracle. But in the most human, earthly, profound-in-its-naivety way.
They didn’t know “better” than to ask me for such a task. And that simplicity of spirit, that innocence of trust made space for me to do what I didn’t know I could. In their young minds, that’s what humans do. They break beyond imagining, and then they heal to be stronger than ever. Just like Harry Potter.
Looking back, only now do I realize that in this way they saved me.
By simply not even considering that I couldn’t be Superwoman.
So I became the model to fit their mold.
And then they broke the mold, expanding beyond it as they grow into young adults themselves.
Why not? They know they are already capable of exceeding everyone’s expectations. Limits can’t contain them.
While I write The Luminist as a lighthouse
for anyone searching to find the vibrant life that exists beyond loss, Connor and Kendall have been my lighthouses. My babies-somehow-turned-forces-of-nature shine their message on me in hot, white light: refuse to limit yourself. Even when I’m elbow deep in a vat of Chunky Monkey and on my third Star Wars for the night, who knows what I could do tomorrow. Especially once I emerge from the sugar coma.
Like the height marks on the door post, limits, boundaries, cages of expectations are meant to be outgrown.
It’s not about being perfect. It’s about being your own ally, finding the best tools for your toolkit, trying them out, course correcting, and making space for you to surprise even yourself.
In 90 days, I become an empty nester. It’s a daunting transition… but with all this Connor & Kendall insight and inspiration floating around in my mind, body, and heart (always make two to-do lists rather than one), I’m ready.
In my own way, I feel like a kid going to college. Full of potential, bursting with ideas, and ready to sign up for way too many extracurricular activities!
Your turn!
Where have you pleasantly surprised yourself by exceeding internal expectations? As small as finishing a task faster than you were expecting, as big as getting an unexpected promotion… Or as left-field as setting the family record in the hotdog eating contest!
Give yourself a pat on the back too.
It’s kind of like the chicken and the egg.
Did Conner & Kendall believe anything is possible because I decided to, for their sakes? Or did I come to believe anything was possible because they showed me the way? Or did we all just figure it out together by standing hand-in-hand at the rim of the smoldering crater where our lives once were… and letting it transform us from the inside out?
I don’t care to figure out the answer — even if I could. I like the mystery of it.
(Though I say with certainty that we wouldn’t have made it here without the endless open-hearted listening to each others’ “feels”… but that’s a topic for a future post!)
Whatever happened, I’ll take the pat on the back from my dad and raise my gaze to the horizon — letting confidence deepen my breath and a half-smile perch on my lips. For my family, always, but a little bit for me too. Just because I’m curious to see what I can do.
With no expectations… and no limits,
Sue
P.S. If you resonated with this post, I think you’d also like:
Sue Deagle, Despot (part 1): The empowerment of not taking yourself too seriously.
Sue Deagle, Despot (part 2): A new definition of personal power — rooted in humor and humanity.
Wow I remember when you and I discussed the perils of elementary school. How much growing up. Thank you for sharing. Congrats - their accomplishments are their own and a bit of parenting and prayers.
Sue.......You were very fortunate to have you and your children be able to share your grief together. Having the task of getting them through school and into college was a very positive endeavor to focus on. In my case, I have no children, my relatives are 2000 miles away in California, and close friends don't know what to say, so they don't bother saying anything.
It took me 58 years to find my sweet Joan. The 22 years we shared a deep love were precious. Losing her has been incredibly painful, a pain I have never felt before and one that is not going away. My 80 year old heart is truly broken.
I enjoy reading your blogs and congratulations on your success with your children.
Don Leedy,............West Chester, OH