She waited for me every single morning to start her day. First while standing up in her crib with a big smile. Then even when she was a toddler and transitioned to her “big girl bed” (a twin bed), she wouldn’t get out of her bed until I came in to greet her. Each morning for the first years of her life I would wrap her in my arms, feel her breath on my neck, and we would start our day… together.

At seven, when her dad and I divorced, I let go of half her mornings. I also let go of half her bedtimes, half her holidays, and half her memories. I spilled many tears in our post-divorce years over the parenting losses I choked down while looking at the long view and knowing a divorce was better for our entire family.

Now I find myself here. Here being mere days before her graduation from high school. She already has 2 overnight trips planned this summer with girlfriends miles away from Omaha. She has announced she will be getting a nose piercing because she doesn’t need my permission. She also made me promise on twin tattoos before she moves one thousand six hundred seventy-six miles away to the University of Oregon.


You can find more of Angela's writing in her book Patched Up Parenting.