<p>Thank you so much for everyone on this forum-the information has been great! My son is leaving for school on Sunday and has all of the sudden been engaged in complete family activity. My husband and my youngest son can not golf one more round of golf. Grannie does not need yet another lunch and amazingly, his sister does not need to be taken to the mall!
He has always liked to do things with us but usually including six other friends.
Tomorrow we are having a dinner party for him then on Saturday going boating but then that's it. I don't know what else to do?
I guess it is normal for them to get this way before they leave???</p>
<p>My S is the complete opposite. The closer the time for leaving gets, the less we see him. He is with friends all day and sometimes all night. He never was one to hang around the house or do things with us anyway but he is literally only here to sleep most days now. He leaves for school in two weeks.</p>
<p>This is really very sweet.</p>
<p>My daughter was just like your son - just couldn't get enough family time before she left, and insisted on us all visiting many spots where childhood memories had occurred. My son, who is leaving mid-month for his freshman year, has also been showing a decidedly sentimental side towards his family, although not yet to the extent my daughter did. I don't take it as last minute jitters --- just kids recognizing that things will never quite be the same again. Enjoy every single second.</p>
<p>You guys...you're bringing tears to my eyes and my D doesn't leave for another year!</p>
<p>Oh man, I need to find an excuse to get my whole family together before I leave. I definitely understand exactly what your kids are feeling. I don't know... I guess it's just the knowledge that when I come home from having a really bad day, that my mom won't be there to give me a hug and listen to me vent. Oh, and that now, instead of having my little brother bug the heck out of me all day long, I now have to deal with some complete stranger that I'm not obligated to love. :)</p>
<p>hyperJulie, You can still vent to your mom through phone calls, email, and instant messages. It's not quite the same, but it helps, and you'll find that if you are close now, you'll tend to stay connected, despite any distance. </p>
<p>About your little brother: it's sometimes hard for a younger sibling when the older one heads off to college. Not only do they miss YOU, but the family dynamics change when one member isn't around. That can make everyone left behind feel a little "off." It took my son (and us) a while to adjust - we'd never realized how much our daughter was a sounding board for him, and it was a little bit of a shock to realize that my son wasn't used to having all of our attention focused just on him. So, call home every now and then just to talk to your little brother, and make sure to set aside time to spend just with him when you're home on breaks. You'll both benefit. :)</p>
<p>Even though it will be a year until our D goes away to college, we're going to set up video conferencing and get all the bugs worked out now. Plus we'll have long distance phone calls and unlimited texting.</p>
<p>Thanks for your post, PackMom - I was beginning to think that my D was a mutant! She seems to spend almost all her time with her friends now (not that she ever spent a lot of time at home anyway...) She IS aware of my feelings and we do spend some time together, but all in all, she's more likely to be with friends than family.</p>
<p>I keep joking with her - I want my "Gilmore Girls" mother-and-daughter moments, but she reminds me that Lorelei and Rory are TV characters!</p>
<p>The hard moment for our daughter was leaving the house, saying goodbye to her room. She felt she was closing a chapter of her life. It was hard for me to adjust not having her in the house. We spoke a few times a day. We also started doing virtual shopping together. We would get on our favorite store's site to browse their latest fashion.</p>
<p>She is going back soon. I am already dreading it, but I think it will be easier.</p>
<p>For my daughter, after seeing her two brothers go off to college two and four years ahead of her, it was hard. She went through a slight panic a few weeks before leaving, and then calmed down. Still, entering her junior year, it isn't easy. And there are many reasons. One is the realization that childhood is over, and she was never one to rush to grow up. She actually relished each age and stage. Also, she now realizes that in two more years, her life changes again, and again she faces the unknown. We're a very close family and we like being together. So each year it's an adjustment. But like everything, we all adjust and grow. There are many things to look forward to for all of us throughout the year and years to come. We welcome the visits home, even though they are few. It's wonderful when everyone comes together. And hopefully we've done what we set out to do, raise our kids to be good, thoughtful, caring citizens who are capable and ready. Geez, sounds like a speech! But we're leaving in a few weeks to take her back to school and it's looming large again...</p>
<p>scout59,lol..your D is not a mutant. When I try to gently suggest to S that we would like to see more of him in his last couple of weeks at home, he looks at me like I'm nuts. Many of S's friends are not going away to college. They are staying here and attending the Comm. College. So for those guys nothing is really going to change. They're hanging out together as usual so S is hanging with them as usual. They are a tight group and he will really miss them (more than us I suspect).</p>