With the very first name that comes into your head: who is the most important person in your everyday life? (I should point out here that the dog doesn’t count, regardless of what she thinks… not in this particular instance anyway. The rest of the time, she has a point…)

Now, hold that thought… the thought of the most important person in your world… then ask yourself what you do for them? I don’t just mean the practical things like providing for them, cooking, buying flowers, throwing tennis balls or being on the end of a telephone. They are important, but they are ‘direct doing’. Think about the other things that you do because of them and their presence in your life… Do you make the house a home? Put a bit of extra effort into your appearance? Stay fit and healthy for them? Make real time for them? Even write because of them?

Why? Because you care… because you want them to be safe and well, happy, proud, comfortable…. the list of possible reasons is endless…

But what happens when time changes their needs and your lives? When your partner is no longer there, when your child goes out into the adult world or circumstances separate you from your friend?

These are scenarios that may happen to us all at some point in our lives and the transition is not always an easy one, even if the event that triggers such change is a happy one. Many parents feel bereft when their children finally leave home, even while they are frantically changing the locks and booking that second honeymoon.

Most just carry on as usual, through habit. Some seem to revel in the new freedom. For others, things start to slip a bit. There seems to be little point to the things they have done for a year, a decade or a lifetime. They stop doing things, or they slide back to basics, missing that extra ‘something’ that lifts necessity into pleasure. Eating through need rather than preparing a lovely meal. The house is tidy but not what it was. Appearance no longer matters quite so much… There is a piece of the jigsaw missing.

Continue reading at The Silent Eye