Everyone in your life is there for a reason, a season, or a lifetime. For those who aren’t there for a lifetime—that’s okay. Let Them. – Mel Robbins
The most influential part of the Let Them Theory for me was the mention of life’s seasons in adult friendships. See, as a child and teen, most of the people around you are experiencing the same life experiences. You have so much in common. Making and keeping friends is simple. Not only do you share the same interests, but you also have scheduled activities to keep you connected. Once you are an adult, none of those pieces are in place. You start to experience life at different rates: jobs, school, relationships, loss, and so on. The gap between the varying ‘seasons of life’ can increase without anyone at fault. That distance, however, can feel personal.
Here’s what I grapple with in this philosophy. Do we have to have matching seasons of life to be friends? Yes and no. For some friends, yes. And others, no. We don’t get to pick who is meant for which of those situations. Reflecting on this made me think about the various seasons of my life. These stages can make a friendship easier or more challenging to maintain, including those associated with college or career, traveling or exploring, and Self-Actualization (Maslow), as well as marriage, relationships, and parenthood.
Now, I feel like I followed a fairly typical path in early adulthood, attending college, meeting my future husband, buying a house, and having a child. What was not the norm for my surrounding village was my experience with loss. I am referring not only to the grief I experienced losing my cousin Jeff, but also to coping with my parents’ divorce soon after. An onslaught of cancer diagnoses for both my parents carried on for years until they both died by my early 40s. Thow in a couple miscarriages and being laid off from a job that meant the world to me, it was rough for a while there. This isn’t a self-pity party, but rather a meaningful reflection of some of the darker seasons of my life. This is me acknowledging that I might have been someone hard to maintain connect. Revisiting my initial conundrum of whether you have to experience the same stages at the same time to be friends? No. Does it help? Hell yes.
Although it helps to have similar life experiences, it’s not everything. There are plenty of people out there who have experienced more loss than I have. It is essential to recognize that grief is a journey and can manifest in various forms. I don’t need people around me who coped the way I did. I do need friends to give me the grace and respect for where I’ve been and where I am currently in my season of grief. I am still grieving. I didn’t even get to do the bulk of my ‘acute grief’, being pregnant at the time when my mom died. Sadly, when my dad passed, I not only grieved for him but also felt the loss of both parents twofold. I am not ever going to be done processing their loss, but I have not even scratched the surface of my longing for them.
I know loss changed me. I’m sure it wasn’t all for the better, according to outsiders. I work every day to make my loss my children’s gain. What I mean by that is that losing my parents made me realize just how important I am as a parent. No matter what. Even considering my shortcomings, the bad days, and short-tempered moments. The good. Bad. and Fugly. The silver lining of my losses is that my children are getting a more present mom. A mom who (most of the time) appreciates the small moments. Not the social media milestones or classic photo ops. But the nitty gritty. The at-home moments on the couch are my favorite. My couch with my family is my favorite place to be. Hands down. Sometimes I feel guilty about that. Like I should want more. Do more. But my grief and longing for those couch moments with my parents brings me back to reality.
So, in closing, if we have fallen away or grown apart because our seasons of life don’t align, that’s okay. I am OK with letting you (them) do you, and I need to let me be ok with that. Let me focus on my family, and know that it’s not personal. I am right where I need to be, and I hope you are too. If we can do it together, let’s! And if not, let’s not allow natural drifting to bring us down. We may meet again in another season we don’t even know about yet!