The children hugged me goodbye and Jeremiah told me to “Have fun!” when he kissed me. As the kids were walking out the door, they asked me what I was going to do. I told them that I had no idea, but I was definitely going to jump on my bed! (They laughed at that and my husband told me to not break it!)

They backed out of the driveway and I waved them down the street. Once they were out of sight, I turned to walk back inside the house. I found it all too quiet for my liking. In fact, it was deafening. And in the silence, I reveled (minus the alcohol, of course). 

I sat down on the couch in complete shock and could relate to the saying of feeling “like a duck out of water.” It had been more than a decade of being responsible to someone else’s needs - whether it was to my husband’s or my children’s. And now I was solely responsible to mine……