Letting Go While Holding On

To My Dearest Baby Girl,

You are the dream of my heart. And it is with more sadness than I have ever fathomed that I prepare for you to leave. 21 years ago as I pressed my hand to my abdomen to feel you move within this day seemed unimaginable.

And yet time can be friend and foe. For over the years I have had the privilege of watching you become the young woman you are today. I have relished each triumph and sorrowed with each hurt, each failure you have faced.

Now comes the hard part. The part where I watch you load up your things and embark on your own life, a life without me there for all of your moments.

The time has come to let you go.

It is not an easy thing, you know. Loving someone never is.

But if love is the language of our hearts, then TRUST must be the action that drives it.

I have taught you to love this Truth, taught you to love the Word, our God, and the man of God.

I have lived this to the best of my ability in front of you, praying faithfully that I would be an example of everything godly, that I would be the mother I needed to be for you. Because I knew, I knew this time would come.

Now, I'm trusting you will all that I have given you. I am trusting you because that is what I have to do, that is how I am showing you how great my love truly is.

It is never easy to let go. And although I know you are only an hour away, even though I know there are people there you can turn to and who will watch after you, it doesn't help the hole I feel inside.

Although I have to let you go, I'm holding on. I'm holding on to the promise I have for you. I'm holding on to the faith I have that you will continue to walk the walk and talk the talk. I'm holding on to my memories of that bright eyed little girl that wove love into my life with cords that cannot be broken.

I am giving you the greatest gift I have ever given you, my trust. Should problems come I will be here, on my knees, lifting you up before the God that has never left us, never forsaken us.

And when you just don't know what to do, when life steps in and trips you up, listen to your heart, for I will be there, whispering to you. I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you will be the rhythm and I will only be as far away as the next beat.

Don't depart from all that you have learned, hold fast, remain faithful, keep your eyes on the prize before you.

Always, always know you are my treasure in an earthen vessel my beautiful, sweetest baby girl.

And because of you and your brother, I am among women, most blessed.