Well it’s finally here. You are 18 today, a day I know you’ve been waiting for for ages!
You’re ready to move on, become more independent, head to uni, make new friends and have lots of new adventures. Your life has just begun and I can’t wait to see what it has in store for you or what you do with it. But I’d be lying if I said this day was filled with complete happiness.
It was 4am on the 4th August 1998 when you came into my world. My first born. The one that changed my world forever. I’ll be honest, I had absolutely no idea what to do with you. But there I was 21 and a mum to this tiny, precious little thing. Looking back now, I think I did OK.
I think I was bloody quick in learning that my life would never be the same again. Where I was just about able to look after myself, suddenly there was this little person who needed me, who I put above everything and everyone else.
Although people used to tell me, I had no idea that they years would go by so quickly. And yet here you are 18.
If I could turn the clock back a bit, I would play with you just a little longer, let you stay in the bath until your fingers were shrivelled, let you take all my CDs out of their cases just once more, cuddle up together on the sofa for a nap one more afternoon.
You rocked into my world with your jet black hair and tiny body. My Emma. From that moment I grew up with my best friend. And since then I’ve accepted that everyday you’ve grown a little more and needed me a little less. But today hurts more than the others, as today is the day that you become an adult, and soon you’ll be leaving me for your new adventures.
I’m not worried that you won’t be able to handle everything that life throws at you — you’re the most strong willed, determined young woman I know — no, I am sad today because I don’t want to let you go, not just yet.
But I know that I have to. So before I let you go, there are just a few things that I want to tell you.
Over last eighteen years I have cried many tears over and for you. I’ve cried when you were little and fell and hurt yourself. I cried when you were little and I had to say no and you just accepted it.
I’ve cried more recently during those (nightmare) teenage years when you’ve been short tempered and those arguments that we had left me feeling like I’d failed as a mother — those arguments that are soon forgotten.
I cried with joy when you got your GCCE results and A2 levels. And I know that I will cry with pride next week when you get your final A Level results, even though it means you’ll soon be leaving me.
I cannot put into words how proud I am of you. I am proud of the determined, ambitious, kind, and generous young woman you have turned into. And I am taking some of the credit for that!
I am proud and a little in awe that my little girl has grown up to be such an amazing young woman.
There are exciting times ahead for you — graduating from university, your first proper job, first house, maybe marriage and some children, or maybe you’ll embark on a fantastic career and life changing experiences and travel the world!
There will be times of sadness too. Someone will break your heart, there will be unrequited love, fallouts with friends, disappointments over jobs.
I won’t send you off with any pearls of wisdom. You don’t need them. I just hope that you continue through life with the kindness, tenacity, determination and ambition that you have started it with.
You are a wonderful human being, and I will love you forever.
