<p>Good friend and family took the final visits road trip last week with D, and it was not pleasant for Mom. D was cranky and awful to mom the whole time, and Dad and D wound up going off some, leaving Mom sad and waiting in the hotel. </p>
<p>Please share some love here for my friend - she feels very alone in this, and I'd love to send her a link with tales of others' similar experiences. Kids do this, right? </p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>They do! I recommend that your friend reads "Letting Go; a parent' guide to the college years" (title is something like that) which covers all the pychological implications of the growing up and away. It's a very emotional experience for kids to look at colleges and anticipate their own lives away from parents. Often they push parents away, so as to make the actual parting a relief for all involved.</p>
<p>There is this book, "Accept My Kid, Please!". One of the chapter titles is "Wonderful day for visiting colleges. Too bad you have to take the kid." </p>
<p>Happens with all sorts of stuff, not just college visits. H was feeling good the other day, beautiful weather, and decided to take us all for ice cream. Well, some of them wanted to get home, some of them did not want icecream, some of them started a fight, some one dropped his ice cream, and I don't think Jamimom's family is going to have another family ice cream outing in the near future--shame on all of them!</p>
<p>I think one or two fights with the kids are nearly obligatory, otherwise we really wouldn;t want them to leave! Beyond this, the selection visits (as opposed to general visits) are wrought with tension for all the predictable reasons...I tried to distance myself from my son so that the experience was his...just as the decision was (it helped a bit!!)...</p>
<p>Two college visit jaunts = two "family meltdowns". </p>
<p>One occurred in the airport before we even got on the plane! S' monologue along the lines of "why are you making me do this... I don't want to go to any of these colleges.... you're ruining my vacation... yada yad yada" and with the obligatory adolescent tone. One complete stranger (but maybe no Mom is a stranger to another Mom) came up and whispered in my ear: "They leave home and you actually miss them :rolleyes:!" Naturally, S found the school of his destiny at the first stop on that journey.</p>
<p>The only antidote is to NOT take it personally, maintain your humor. Second, emphatically, jamimom's recommendation re "Accept my Kid, Please: A Parent's Descent into College Application Hell." It's a fast read, full of laughs and will make her realize she is not alone!</p>
<p>I think they do get really grumpy when they're facing some big change in life--some sort of subconscious way of enabling us to push them out. </p>
<p>The couple of weeks before my D packed up to move to her college dorm, she was almost downright nasty to her brothers, her dad and me. The day she packed in the last shoe, closed the trunk and hopped in the car, she was all smiles and grace itself. She gave us a big hug and kiss, and the girl we knew was back--but she was pulling out of the driveway and waving good-bye.</p>
<p>Love how these fledging adults act so mature at times, then revert to being 2 year olds!!!! You just want to say, if you want me to treat you like....</p>
<p>Its like when I take Ds shopping, if they could possibly find a person more annoying than me, they would let me know, but so far, there hasn't been anyone!!!</p>
<p>Next time she should do what my wife did. She went to Hawaii and had me do the visits with my son. One of my wife's best friends broke up with her boyfriend and they had already booked a 10 day trip to Hawaii. The condo was already paid for so my wife only had to come up with her air fare and personal expenses. so she went! </p>
<p>My wife deserved the trip she worked the hardest during the whole process by doing all the paperwork and making phone calls.</p>
<p>What a great hubby!</p>
<p>It's understandable. We feel like we're adults now, and shouldn't be constantly with our parents. We want to move out on our own, until we really think about it, then we want to stay at home. It's conflicting. I'm over it though, and hopefully I haven't been too cranky.</p>
<p>This is why I favored sending my kids off on their own to visit colleges, or at least off as a guest of some other kid's parents.</p>
<p>I will never, ever forget driving from Earlham in Indiana to Knox in Illinois (almost Iowa) this past spring break. Daughter said exactly 10 words to me during the entire 5 hours: "I'm booooored. I'm sick of visiting colleges. I'm sooooo boooooored. " I was ready to drop her off at the next bus stop and finish the visits by myself. :)</p>
<p>I'm a community college student who will live at home, as college is only a couple minutes from dad's work. Note that I will live at home, but I probably won't really be there too much.</p>
<p>Dad's opinion: We love having you here, but I won't stop you if you want to go.</p>
<p>Mom: We love having you here, but I don't want my birds to leave the nest. </p>
<p>I will probably be moving on earlier than my older brother (who has a 2.6 or so GPA at the same college), my mom will go INSANE when he leaves.</p>
<p>Hey, I have an idea - why don't we set up a co-op, kid swapping arrangement for college visits. That way we could ALL visit campuses with somebody-else's kid in tow. My observation has always been that teenagers are quite human and often even polite and respectful when not in the presence of their own parents. </p>
<p>To take it one step further... why not set up a nationwide home-exchange program, where we could host students from other parts of the country and take them around to visit local campuses? Anyone in Boston or New York with a kid interested in Stanford and Cal? How about swapping kids for a week? </p>
<p>This could be the beginning of a new reality tv show, too. "Teen swap". In which the teens discover that the world is full of embarassing adults who dress badly and say moronic things, and their own set of parents weren't so bad after all.</p>
<p>ROFL, calmom. ROFLAC. Hurry and get the TV rights. No more worries re cost of college. You will be a zillionaire. But even better, the teens will</p>
<p>
[quote]
discover that the world is full of embarassing adults who dress badly and say moronic things,
[/quote]
.</p>
<p><em>rushes to Writing Awards Thread to nominate calmom for the CC Brainstorm Coward</em></p>
<p>"I think they do get really grumpy when they're facing some big change in life--some sort of subconscious way of enabling us to push them out."</p>
<p>Last year a friend of mine whose daughter was heading off to college said something very similar. After bemoaning the fact that her daughter (who everyone else outside her family thinks is just wonderful) had been grumpy and miserable to live with for several months, she said "I guess that is just the way it needs to be. Its almost as if God is preparing us so that we won't be as sorry to see them leave."</p>
<p>"To take it one step further... why not set up a nationwide home-exchange program, where we could host students from other parts of the country and take them around to visit local campuses? Anyone in Boston or New York with a kid interested in Stanford and Cal? How about swapping kids for a week?"</p>
<p>I LOVE this idea!!!! Sign me up...I'm in the close-in Washington, DC suburbs...and will have an "empty nest" come AUugst...I can "do" Georgetown, George Washington U, American, Catholic, UDC, U MD, Galludet, JHU, and lots of other smaller schools located here-ish...not sure I'd always be free to do the college tours...but the "home base" and local geography and neighborhood and restaurant input would be available most of the time...</p>
<p>Hey, this idea might really fly.... in urban areas with good public transit, the kids could pretty much get around on their own if the hosting parent can get them pointed in the right direction. I know my daughter could navigate the DC metro system easily -- it's virtually identical to BART. I think I'll put some thought into the logistics of this. I suppose if the moderators allow it, we could simply set up an exchange thread listing locations -- leaving it up to the individuals involved to use PM's to get in contact with one another and get a little better acquainted. I'll bet the kids would end up doing better, too -- I mean, how many college visits have been marred because parents took a wrong turn in the rental car, drove 30 miles the wrong direction, and by the time they finally find the campus, everyone is grumping and they've missed the tour? The in-loco-parentis idea will give someone who might have some inside info on the must-sees in the immediate vicinity of the campuses too.</p>
<p>If you think the tensions are high during the visits, wait until the last week before they leave in August. The whole family and all their friends are in simultaneous meltdowns.</p>
<p>calmom,
I totally agree with you on the in-loco-parentis idea (if it was yours, I forget!). My older D was fortunate, i.m.o, not to have me along on either of her 2 visit journeys. And yet we have one of the smoothest relationships that I've ever known of in mother/daughter land: it is definitely not characterized by conflict or pressure or communication problems. Yet, I felt that the distant from me was just psychologically beneficial. (I was not able to accompany her, btw, on either visit, but that impossibility turned out to be fortunate, I feel.) I think owning one's college decision free & clear is so important, & parental absence just helps in that process.</p>
<p>As to the comment by several others that the student's behavior is a subconscious way of helping the parents not regret the departure, I think it is much more a manifestation of the student's own conflicted feelings about leaving home -- his or her misgivings, anxiety, etc., including anxiety about what lies ahead in college -- not just concerns about independence per se. I think the subconscious thing is much less about parent/child "responsibility," much more about student responsibility, feelings, futures. However, I do agree that the <em>result</em> is that it <em>may</em> make the departure less "painful," or at least appear to be mixed, rather than a full kidney punch.
And thanks to all the comments from the experienced parents regarding what to expect. I have my hands full already with all the emotions I'm feeling & anticipate -- never mind yet my D's feelings & future behavior.</p>