Nicky Rennie: The challenge of a nearly empty nest

Nicky Rennie is preparing for an empty nest at home. Photo / 123rf

OPINION:

It's coming to the pointy end for a lot of Year 13 students across the country. They won't consider it for a second, but it's also shifting sands for a lot of their parents.

Final exams are imminent and all the usual things that happen towards the end of the school year happen so fast that it blows your hair back. There is, however, one rather major difference. This will be the last time they will walk out of the school gates as they embark on the next stage of their lives.

My 17-year-old spent 10 days away during the school holiday, and it was something that, initially, I was looking forward to.

Having the house to myself meant my workload would not only be halved, but would be practically non-existent. Oh, I laughed and joked with my workmates about the upcoming serenity and how much I was going to appreciate it. No cooking for me for 10 days, when the cleaning is done it will stay clean and, most importantly of all, my towels won't end up covered in makeup and suffer OOWS (occupational over-wash syndrome).

I'm a bit of a shocker really, in that I do far too much for her (then moan about it), but I'm a looker-afterer, so it's just in my DNA.

I dropped her to her bus to Tauranga (her car isn't safe enough for the drive) and then went back to finish my workday.

After I walked in the front door, I remembered she wasn't home. I saw her winter uniform hanging on its hanger down the end of the hallway and felt a surge of sadness that it would never be worn by her ever again, and she would be with me for only a matter of months before she never lives with me again.

These "sadness surges" used to happen when she was little, and she would go to her dad's for her week with him. On a Monday when I came home, the house just felt odd, and I would have to close her bedroom door because I missed her so much.

Parenting one who is nearly 18 is a combination of aforementioned cleaning, negotiating home times and an inordinately large amount of time pointing out why she can't do some things in order that I protect her.

The current fascination is camping in her car and when she asked if she and another 17-year-old girlfriend could go car-camping at Vinegar Hill by themselves, the personal safety conversation was wheeled out again.

This is generally followed closely by the "I'm 18 soon and you will have no say in what I do and don't do" response from Maggie. I get this and she is, in fact, 100 per cent right but, unfortunately for her, she still has three months left of me feeling I have a basic handle that she is safe, and I do still have a say.

Those three months are going to go at warp speed and I'm not sure I'm ready. I guess it would be different if I had an heir and a spare or a replacement child, but I don't. Poor kid – there's just her. No pressure.

In all reality, they let you down slowly. Since she has had her licence and a car, I rarely see her. There are no set meal times any more and, if I cook something, she'll either come home and say she's going to get dinner with a friend, or give me a heads up that she won't be there, so "don't worry about cooking for me".

She's a lovely kid and it's not her fault that I miss her. As my mum would say, "suck it up Monique".

It's caused me to think back to my own 17 year-old-self, and I was no different to her as a social butterfly and didn't consider my parents might miss me either. Part of life's rich tapestry.

After a lot of thought, she has decided what she is going to do next year. She is going to have a bit of a gap year and she has been accepted to work at Camp America.

I'm really happy she is off on a big adventure and I'm always proud of her, but I think the reason they call it a gap year is because that is what will be left in my life when she goes.