I am too young to be an empty nester!

I have had an exhausting 3 days driving up North and down South, I was so grateful to get home to my own bed last night. I had a great weekend in Manchester with friends, 11 of us stayed in my friends house, I got the comfy bed while everyone else was in tents. I am a glamper not a camper it really does not excite me sleeping in a cold tent on the floor in the rain. Did I feel rotten for everyone in the morning because they where cold and had little sleep, yes a did but not enough to give up my bed. 

So 4 of us went to see "Take That" and it seems everyone has been to see them when you talk to people. Amazing concert it was very nostalgic as we all felt like we were 16 again when the "Pet Shop Boys" came on. Robbie of course stole the show and when he sang "Angels" there were lots of tears. The show was like having 4 concerts in one it was worth the ticket price definitely. The getting home was the traumatic thing, it took 2 hours of walking and queueing in the cold before we got a Taxi. we were at the point that extortionate rates would of been honoured just to get home.

We arrived home Sunday afternoon for a quick change of clothes and then we headed of to Birmingham with the girls for the night. We decided that driving an 11 hour round trip to take Chloe to her new unit was too much. So we broke the journey slightly. So the morning finally arrived I know she was nervous and excited. She handled it really well and she was one of the youngest joining up. We went on a tour of the Training Unit when they had been taken away and that's when the panic set it. I just felt shes too young for this, and I,m her mum not some Major who doesn't understand her. I went through it myself when I was 16 so I do know she will be OK but shes still my little girl. It was funny because we caught a glimpse of her before we left taking her things to her accommodation block. Everyone else was carrying their stuff but Chloe for some reason had 2 army girls helping her carry her stuff, visions of Goldie Hawn in "Private Benjamin" sprung to mind which is what I was called at times. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

So it was when I got home and saw her empty room that it hit me she has gone. This is not a tantrum and she has packed her stuff and moved out and would return in several days, this is the real thing and I really do feel I am too young for this. I still feel like a child myself, its so true what they say "they grow up in a blink of an eye". I still have my other daughter who will probably never leave home, we hoped yesterday might of inspired her but the only thing that brought a smile to her face where the PTI's in the gym. Like mother like daughter as my hubby is a PTI too.