6 jayplay
thursday, august 28. 2003
LEAVING HOME NOT ALWAYS STRESSFUL
With modern technologies, students and parents have fewer anxieties about leaving home
Brothers Stephan Maxwell, sophomore,and Kevin Maxwell, senior,stand near the 2000 Phi Gamma Delta composite picture,the year which their two older brothers were both in the fraternity.
By Megan Hickerson
mhickerson@kansan.com
Jayplay writer
The once heart-wrenching process of leaving home for college has become a time of anticipation and excitement for college bound students and their parents.
There were no tears in Nanette Maxwell's eyes when the last of her four sons departed for the University of Kansas.
"When our boys left for school, my husband and I felt like this is what we've been working for," Maxwell says. "We would have been more sad and disappointed if they weren't going to college."
Stephen Maxwell, Fairway sophomore and the youngest of the brothers, says his parents were more than ready to have some time to themselves. With his dad's new interest in gardening and his mother's travel business, his parents are too busy to mope around the house and think of the absence of their boys.
The boys no longer live at home, but visit during the holidays and summer vacation and when they're home they still have the same chores that they did in high school.
Like his brother, Kevin Maxwell didn't experience any anxiety or sadness from his parents when he left for the University four years ago. "My mom knew it was coming," the Fairway seniorsaid. "My older brothers softened her up, so it wasn't bad."
Students often find it difficult to change gears when they move back under their parent's roof.
Rules and regulations that existed at home disappear at school and make it extremely hard to readjust.
"When we're home, my dad still feels like he needs control of us," Kevin Maxwell says. "I still have to mow the lawn and help out around the house. All of which seem to preoccupy all of us when we return."
Dee Dee Warner, mother of four has enjoyed her time since her kids left home to attend the University. Warner has seen three of her children pull out of the family's driveway one last time before college.She had a difficult time when the first child left.Warner says separation becomes easier with a little time and adjustment.
"When my first child left, I sat in my driveway and cried," Warner says. "By the time the last one left, I was ready for them to go and get out of the house. Each time they come home to visit, they are more self-sufficient than the last time."
With extra time on her hands, Warner can concentrate and devote more time to her booming real estate career.
"I don't feel guilty spending time away from home anymore," she says.
College students will soon bombard her house, which is quiet and orderly for now. She only has a few months to rest before their Thanksgiving Break.
Warner's free time is not indefinite; all four of her children were home during the summer and will return again this fall.
Michael Warner, Dee Dee Warner's youngest son, kept in constant communication with
his parents after he left for school at the University. He talks to his mother at least twice a week, but he still misses a few things from home.
"I miss my golden retriever Brewsky, and I miss my mom's home cooked meals," the Shawnee Mission junior says. "She makes a mean plate of spaghetti."
In some extreme cases, students experience separation anxiety that requires them to seek counseling.
Linda Waxse, student counselor at Park University, deals with separation anxiety and
family relationships on a daily basis. She attributes positive relationships between college students and parents to constant contact between parent and child. She says that while contact is beneficial, excessive contact could be detrimental to the adjustment of new college students.
Waxse suggests three tips for students to help maintain an ongoing, constructive relationship with their parents:
"Being over-involved is a big problem for new students," Waxse says."Parents need to allow their kids to find new support systems at school."
Stay in constant contact with your parents
Develop a support system
- Participate in collegiate activities
Waxse attributes parents' current ease of their children leaving for school to advances in technology, which today's society embraces. Students are constantly using the Internet and most students have e-mail access from their homes. Because of this, students are prone to drop a random e-mail or receive one from their parents who are alone at home.