What would you do diffrently if you could go back in time to say goodbye to your freshman?
Nothing.
Agree…we would change nothing.
We did not have a tearful goodbye. I assumed we would, but ended up making a 2 hour run to the Walmart close to the college. Had to fight with them to return/exchange for an item I was SURE my child would die if she did not have at college (and which she ended up not using anyway) left us so stressed and frustrated that when we returned to campus we just grabbed our younger child and headed home.
Best way for the situation to play out. I did not cry on the way home. Did not cry the next day. Actually did not cry until my D came home for a visit and then cried after she left home.
I wouldn’t change anything. I was my usual partly awkward, something efficient, nearly totally sincere and honest self. If I had pretended that the drop-off and leave-taking did not affect me emotionally, my daughters would have been disappointed, I think. But I didn’t embarrass them. I saved my tear for the moment their backs were turned and we were walking in different directions.
ugggg I saw my kid’s favorite towel in the bathroom today and thought “gee after next week, I’ll have to do a final launder and put this towel away FOREVER” :((
ShawWife cried when she dropped off each kid at kindergarten and at middle school. Maybe HS too. With ShawSon, she did not cry when dropping him off at college – she set up his room and when she left, she said, “He is in the right place.” We wouldn’t have done anything different with him.
ShawWife and ShawD have an extremely powerful bond – likely from a medical problem that ShawD had at an earlier age that required a lot from us but that led to difficult and painful separation as ShawD hit her adolescent years and needed space from her mother. We had identified that ShawD’s school offered peer mentors (?) and ShawD didn’t go in for this or for any kind of tutoring that I thought she might need – she is very bright but the ADHD was strong then. ShawD said she would go in and make appointments for these but did not do so for weeks. The only thing I would have done differently was to take her down to the office to make the appointments before we left. Other than that, ShawWife set up her room (much more collaborative than with ShawSon who was happy with anything that his mother did). I can’t remember if there were tears.
ShawWife and I were hoping that this was the right choice for ShawD – fingers were crossed but we weren’t sure. She transferred after a semester and life has been very good ever since.
Honestly, I wouldn’t change anything about the farewell.
What I would change is that I would not urge her to take so much stuff to college. Her triple was just way too small for all that stuff and it made it harder for her to manage her space.
If you have a certain expectation about making it a special, perfect moment and saying the just-right words, get that out of your head right now. It’s a very hectic time. You’ll be running to Bed, Bath, and Beyond or Target a zillion times. Your son will have a dorm meeting he has to run to, or dorm-mates will be having a party down the hall. He may not want to hug you because six guys are hanging out in the room. Expect the unexpected. It won’t be a Hallmark moment. So manage your own expectations.
I didn’t really see it as “goodbye.” The separation had been gradual throughout the years insofar as I and my husband did less and less for her on a day to day basis. She also went away to camp, first as a camper, then as a counselor, during the summers, so that was sort of a practice run. Even after they go to college, they are home more often than you think. Plus, the parenting does not end. At all. It’s not a goodbye. It’s just a change in day-to-day circumstance.
If you have something special to say, do it a couple of days before your leave. Or write it in a letter.
I would have made arrangements ahead of time (before our flight) with my son to have dinner the night before I flew back home across country. He ditched me to hang with his friends/teammates. I think he was very conscientious that half of his townhouse roomies moved in without any parental presence and wanted to cut the cord fast! But we did manage to have some meaningful time during move in weekend orientation activities where I was able to share my last minute advice and wisdom.
If you mean the actual farewell, for D1 I wouldn’t have sprayed that stuff that protects her shoes on in the dorm room… even with opening the windows, I think it took a few days for the smell to dissipate. Nothing else from dropoff that I can think of. Yes, I cried a little for both. But they were both at the right place.
If you mean sort of more what advice do I wish I’d given, none for D1 – she handled college fine. Honestly, though, looking back I’d probably have told D2 not to date in college. Every semester she had a significant other in college, her grades took a dip. 
She’d been a pretty low drama kid in high school, but her relationship drama in college was pretty high. (I realize this is unrealistic advice, and also that kids should probably learn about relationships in college, but you wanted to know…)
Would have taken half as much stuff.
For one kid, there was a room assignment issue. She was supposed to be in a different room (coach ask her to move but no one told housing office) so when we got there we didn’t move into the original room, left everything on the lawn and went to straighten it out. Spent hours doing that. At 5 pm we just moved into the assigned room. wish we had done that at noon. We felt bad for the teammate who then had to room with non-teammates.
If I had to do it again, I would just have gone with the flow and let them deal with any issues. I would have skipped parent orientation as it just seemed to be designed to fill time. We could have left two days earlier.
Nothing
I also think it’s hard to plan even if you wanted to change anything. There is a lot of last minute shopping, dorm activites, etc…
Brantly summed it up perfectly. Also know your child. All I can say is… Boys are soooooo much easier then girls to move in… :))
Just remember this is “their” time. You don’t have to unpack and set up their rooms etc unless they want the help. We made this mistake with my daughter. Her second move was less stressful then the first one in sophomore year. Junior move-in should be a breeze. Guess what… When you come to visit… “most” of their stuff will actually be put away… Ha…
I will add that we did “help” getting their beds made since we use like bed bug covers and the bed toppers etc. Also if we didn’t do it for my son it might never get done… Lol.
We did have most of their clothes already on hangers so when you get to the dorm you just hang it right up.
Also less is more… They can always get stuff later on if really needed. If they don’t have enough sweaters, clothes etc guess what… That’s what college gear is for!
One of my kid has trouble with transitions. I took him down over the summer a couple of times to walk on campus and see where his dorm was. When it came time to move in, I took some of his stuff down and left him there, with plans to go back the next day with some more stuff. That provided a cushion of time for him (and me) to get used to him being there. When I went back the second day he seemed to feel more comfy about the change.
I didn’t have to do that with my other two.
I only cried when it was difficult for the kid. If the kid seemed happy, I was fine.
I agree with Brantly that leave-taking is gradual and happens over many years. Talking about this helps. On the other hand, it is a great moment when they refer to their college as “home.”
Move in day was physically and emotionally harder than I had expected and if I could do it differently, I would have booked a hotel room closer to campus so I didn’t have to drive as far after saying goodbye. D goes to school 9 hours from home. We drove down the day before move in and I had this idea in my head that we’d move her in in the morning and then hit the road after lunch. I did a lot of the actual lifting and carrying (DH wasn’t with us and DD has some physical limitations) and that was tiring. There were two shopping trips for stuff, helping her unpack, a walk around campus with her, and before I knew it, it was getting late. DH had booked me a hotel earlier in the day when I told him I wouldn’t be leaving at noon and would only be able to drive part way home, but I didn’t reach that hotel until 1am.
Oh, I cry at TV commercials. My kids know that it’s part of who I am.
Though I did manage to hold it together until we actually walked back to the car when we first dropped off my son 2 years ago. I wasn’t fooling anyone, and cried on and off though dinner.
My daughter was funny in the car yesterday though… “You guys aren’t planning to stick around all day, right? I mean, no family dinner or anything, right?”
I reassured her that it absolutely was NOT the plan. We’ll help her get settled-- get that mattress protector on the bed, help her sort out her stuff, then it’s back to the hotel and an early exit the following morning.
This would NOT have been appropriate for my son; it would have embarased him.
But I think I’ll sneak a note into my daughter’s stuff, letting her know how much we love her and how we know she’ll do wonderfully at school.
I agree with the “urge them not to take so much stuff with them to college”
Would do nothing different but will do a couple things the same for kid #2. For #1, we spent a leisurely day together, just the 2 of us, a week or so before drop off. No college stuff involved, just a movie, a walk around town, a nice chat, it ended up being a real special memory for me. Another time we went through her closet together figuring out what clothes to bring and what to leave at home. There were a lot of memories in that closet and a lot of good laughs.