When children move out of home, they leave school-leaving documents, books and cuddly toys behind. BRIGITTE author Eva Meschede on the abandoned room in her apartment.
"The little witch" next to Rousseau, "Harry Potter" frames "The Foucault Pendulum", the "Funny paperback" collection meets "The devil wears Prada" and at the top of the shelf: Stephan the stuffed monkey, Jakob the hippo and Yasmini cuddly pillows . The things belong to my daughter, 26 years old and long moved out.
Diagnosis: Empty Nest Syndrome
"Why is that stuff still standing around here?" Asks a friend when she is visiting me in the nursery. She diagnosed me with Empty Nest Syndrome, sadness, loneliness and the hope that the child will return. I have long since recognized the advantages of living alone: I can now always be sure that there is still something to eat in the fridge in the evening, that my socks or T-shirts are not socialized, and that Rammstein will never again suddenly echo through the apartment, while I want to work in peace.
Of course, I sometimes missed the natural closeness that living together brought with it. Even the loud music. But I never had the shock of suddenly being abandoned because my daughter and I practiced letting go. At the age of 16 she already had an older friend with a dormitory and was often with him for longer. Or she traveled the world for months. While she was still officially living with me, we decided that we would eat together on Sundays. And we kept that. She stayed in town (because of the boyfriend, not because of me).
But I no longer want a museum room in my apartment. "We have to clear the room now," I have been saying for two years now. The answers: "We can do that in winter", "I have to finish my Bachelor thesis first", "Now? Where do I have the exhausting vacation job?" … "My room," she says. "Your room?" I ask critically. Once I tried to start alone. I found a notebook with poems, school newspapers with their first successes in writing, vocabulary books for the Russian course, letters, postcards – and I felt like a burglar.
Children's room signals safety
Then the other day it dawned on me that it's not just convenience when we're both stuck. My daughter asked if she could move in with me again for a few weeks, should she need some distance in their relationship. As grown up and independent as she is, she still likes to have a foot in the door of her mother's apartment. A half-cleared room signals: "If you need me, I'll be available." That gives security.
Why should you let that go? And why should I force letting go as long as I don't urgently need the space? But I'll dispose of the "Harry Potter" cassettes.
Eva Meschede is confronted with her child's legacies and those of her siblings every time she visits her parents' guest room.
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