I am 46 years old, a widow with 4 children. My husband died 6 years ago with a sudden heart attack and our life at home was turned upside down. I did everything in my ability to raise his children to be the best they could possibly be. I never want them to repeat the life cycle of their dad, who was incredibly brilliant but had so many unfortunate life circumstances that placed him in a deep hole where he spent much of his time depressed. My eldest daughter (also the first child) has always been like her dad, in his brilliance and charisma. She is incredibly intelligent, incredibly charismatic but the difference between her and her dad is that she is extremely driven, fierce to no end and just overall wonderful and does not let life circumstances place her into a depression hole or get to her like her dad. It has been such a magnificently wonderful experience to be her mom. Always excellent at school without me asking her to. excellent at everything without me demanding or asking anything. Always delivering. I always knew she will get places. After the death of her father, I was worried for her as she battled severe depression and many other things and I was so out of it that I knew i was not there for her enough. She did it on her own and it made me really scared that she will never forgive me for that. she worked so incredibly hard to change the circumstances we got placed in after the death of her father to get a good college education and she got a full scholarship to a college thousands of miles way. I sent her away with a heavy heart and so much guilt that her teenage life was ruined by so many bad circumstances and I was not able to stop life from being so awful to her at such a young and vulnerable age. I felt so guilty that when all the girls were thinking about boys and that all silly stuff, she was battling the demons of loss and I was able to do nothing. I just felt so guilty and that I failed as a parent to protect my kids. I still feel like that everyday.. with my other children too.Today, I woke up to go to work at 7am and I found this message from her: "Mom, I was contemplating life today and thinking about and feeling of pain of how hard it has been to be me and to have all my circumstances, but as i watched the sun go down listening to a particular song, I determined that I will never let anything stand in the face of my strength or my extreme passion or love for life, and although at that moment I was engulfed by an insane internal drive and impulse to reach the skies, all what my brain kept thinking about was you: how beautiful you are, how extremely important to me you are, how I am extremely grateful that you are my mother and that you are the person that I so highly look up to and think about it everyday. I realize now that my extreme strength and my extreme passion actually come from you. I am loyal to you until the last moment I have on this earth. I love you so much and I can never describe the feelings of respect, love or loyalty I have for you, thank you for being my mom, thank you for everything you've done to get me to this point in life"...I have been crying for hours. I think I have done a good job. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/35wOwKs
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