The role of the family is to facilitate its own self destruction.

That quote never left me though years have passed and I now have four children that I am attempting to raise to eventually be ‘on their own’ ; finding their way so to speak. In today’s culture, I believe it can be difficult for parents to let go of their children’s lives. Sometimes we hover too much and sometimes our children expect us to rescue them.  Now that my own sorority daughter was a sophomore, had I gotten wiser in my parenting? Fortunately, I did come up with a few suggestions parents could reflect upon in supporting their daughter through recruitment and beyond yet allowing them to spread their own wings. I will share them with you too. Take them or leave them but do enjoy this new phase in life for the both of you.

1. Lose expectations or feelings from your own Greek life experience. Whether you have a Greek affiliation or not, you do have some opinion about Greek life if you went to college on a campus with a Greek system. Some of these opinions or biases may be based on a college experience quite a few years back. Try and encourage your daughter to form her own opinions AND only after she begins the process,  not taking to heart any bias from boyfriends, siblings, hometown friends, distant relatives, etc.

2. At each of the recruitment events, encourage her to look around those rooms and really get to know the other potential new members at each of the events. Those are the young women she will be living with and experiencing campus life with and each day of recruitment will help her know where she is most comfortable.

3. For daughters who may be shy or reserved, the recruitment process might be overwhelming. Encourage her to be open minded, taking a risk as she embarks on college. It is a great time to branch out and perhaps lose some of the high school labels we all put upon ourselves. One can really be and should be authentic and sincere throughout the whole process. Even if your daughter decides recruitment might not be a fit for her at this time, remind her that this experience will afford her a great opportunity to get to know other women on her residence hall floor and beyond. New friendships may come from it.

4. She will be exhausted and emotional. Allow her this indulgence and help her maintain her sense of humor. Remind her other potential new members are experiencing the same things.

5. Be a good listener. You don’t have to fix anything. If she can share the ups and downs of her experience she can sort through her feelings about all of it and often doesn’t need or want advice.

6. As she begins college try and become connected to your daughter through technology. NOTHING replaces voice to voice communication, eye contact or hugs…but this generation communicates on Facebook and in text messaging and there is no going back. Learn to text and possibly get a Facebook page (especially if your daughter is encouraging it) just to be connected….not to hover but just to be available. The technology allows a kind of subtle way to be present.

7. Encourage and frequently discuss safe choices especially regarding alcohol and driving under the influence or with others who have been drinking. The more we encourage them to be safe and smart, the more likely the messages will stick when presented with more risky choices. If you are informed about binge drinking and alcohol poisoning then you can help inform her. Awareness is the first essential step.

And finally,

8. Love her up and remind her of the gifts you see in her! As a parent I was not prepared for how difficult the transition was for my own daughter on many levels. One loses a bit of confidence beginning all over again out of high school-especially if the new campus is large. That is why it is EXCELLENT that our daughters want to join a sorority to engage in that support system and in those relationships as they begin college life.

Having my daughter with us all summer was a blessing but now it is time for her to transition back into her college life. Boxes showed up on her attic staircase a few days ago with clothes, toiletries, school supplies and more. The cozy overstuffed chair in her bedroom that I painstakingly cleaned off prior to her arrival in May so she could curl up and “read a good book” is now covered, barely recognizable, with unfolded clothes, shopping sacks, a few pair of boots  (does one need that many boots?) and several other items that I assume are  traveling with her.

I can’t help thinking….we didn’t get it all in…the time went by so quickly. Yet, we did accomplish and share much… late night talks, a few shed tears, some deep laughter, baking cookies, at least twenty batches of the infamous hot Vidalia onion dip (you might want this recipe!), some shopping, mass together, a few days at Gram’s lake cabin, neighborhood walks, a few of her brothers’ baseball games (did I say just a FEW?), cuddling new kittens, volunteering for the International Special Olympic Games held in our home town, several library books…

I remember blogging last August about my daughter’s college start and how heart wrenching it was for both me and my husband. (Honestly, prior to her departure, I do believe it was the only time we both sobbed simultaneously?!) I remember writing that I felt all the color in our home and somehow gone, referencing my daughter’s personality and her love of art which physically has always been strewn here and there in process.  I am grateful for the color that was brought back home this summer (Did I mention she was in charge of decorations for recruitment? Hello paint, glitter, and tissue paper flowers with all the bling!)

Thankfully, this exit is less emotional (thus not so exhausting?), and, while I know I will feel melancholy for a few days after we send her on her way, as a more seasoned parent I have experienced an entire year of the ebb and flow of her presence in our family and it feels more comfortable. As she begins her second year, I hope she is rejuvenated, rested, and settles back into college life feeling loved.  I remember being anxious myself at the start of each semester; nervous, uncertain, vulnerable …Make sure and arm your own daughter with love and courage. Perhaps even write her a letter of encouragement to tuck in her suitcase or to arrive via snail mail that first week of school. If you are a first time college parent, take heart: The journey will get easier as everyone settles in…

A huge blessing in her affiliation with her sorority has been the service culture in which they have immersed her.  As a Millennial, she has grown up in a school system that has a focus on community service so she is open and looking for opportunities to work as a team toward a common goal to make a difference.  Through her sorority, she had many opportunities to have an impact on others.

The volunteer experiences she had have run the gamut:  Sundaes on Sunday, helping young women do their hair, nails, and make up for the School for the Blind prom, reading for the blind, nursing home visits, various walks for hearts, for cures, for life…the infamous Dance Marathon.  There were numerous other events including her support of her other sorority and fraternity friends’ chapter philanthropies across campus.

Delta Gamma's Spring Ice Cream Social Fund Raiser

Certainly all of these experiences have prepared her for a lifetime of giving back in whatever community she settles in upon graduation.  I am so grateful that her Greek experience has fostered this in such a fun and rewarding way, and it is yet another important aspect of sorority life that we need to appreciate for our Greek affiliated daughters.

“Don’t cry because it’s over.  Smile because it happened.”

My fellow NPC blogger, Mary Beth Rice, cited Seuss’s passage in one of her earlier essays and I can’t thank her enough.  The words were my mantra throughout the graduation festivities.

So, I am trying to be a Pollyanna Parent.  I am trying to be glad that it happened – the education and the sorority experience.  I am trying to smile.  But darn it, I am jealous of the parents who have daughters on the verge on this wonderful, once-in-a-lifetime, exhilarating, four-year experience.

I would trade places with them in a moment to relive the little individual events that my daughter shared with me:   Bid Day – posters and poems from “big sisters” –  initiation –  conventions  -  recruitment preparation –  father/daughter events – sorority-motif gift buying -  scholarship dinners – the million printed T-shirts.

I would trade places with them in a moment to appreciate the onset of “bigger picture” happenings:  learning to communicate with my daughter in a new way (Mary Beth wrote about texting, for my daughter and me it was Instant Messaging) -  the making of life-long friendships -  watching my daughter and her sorority sisters learning to take larger and larger responsibilities in the chapter and on campus.  Just thinking about all of this makes me tearful as I swell with pride – I’d better review the Seuss words again.

OK, as I bid sororityparents.com and my daughter’s undergraduate college experience a fond farewell, I am going to smile because it happened.  Also, if I want to relive this experience, I think my daughter might have some photos I can look at.  (Did I ever mention the copious amount of photos these girls take?  Oh my gosh.)

As I reflect on my relationships with all of these special women, the women in my circle with sorority affiliations are certainly on that list –and with great fondness.  Though my mom and I do not share the same sorority membership (She is delighted to be Pi Beta Phi as I am blessed to be a Delta Gamma!), her love of her collegiate experience was shared with me throughout my childhood through the stories she told me and in the special women she introduced me to as her Pi Phi sisters while I was growing up.  I always hoped I would have that same opportunity to forge lifelong friendships.

I so enjoyed the family structure within my own chapter and have several humorous and warm hearted memories of special moments with my own pledge “mom”, Amy, and pledge “daughter”, Anne.  Delta Gamma Mom’s Day was also looked forward to each spring as we paid special tribute to our own dear mothers, shared a wonderful meal of sorts, and then hit the mall for some shopping –financed by mom to no one’s surprise?!

Because my daughter and I do have the same sorority affiliation, we are doubly blessed and our chapter provides many experiences for us to share that enrich our traditional mom-daughter relationship. Of all the things I enjoyed watching Mary Claire experience this year, witnessing her relationships bloom with her new sisters was incredible.

The bond between mothers and daughters is passionately strong. While in graduate school, I remember reading an article shared with me by a good friend (and Delta Gamma sister) about the “Adolescent Daughter/Midlife Mother Dyad” and how complicated it can be –sounds way too academic as I drink coffee this morning trying to rally my mind and body around several cold windy baseball games I am traveling to later this morning but bear with me?! Although I had no children at the time, I somehow knew that I needed to tuck the wisdom from that article somewhere in my heart to utilize on another day (and who knew it could be 20 years later?)

The just of the article discussed the similarities that teenage daughters have with their middle aged moms: those of identity formation (she is trying to discover hers while we are trying to reinvent ours), and the insecurity and frustration that might come from transitions physically as our bodies develop, emotionally as relationships change, and intellectually as we add new experiences in our lives and try to make sense of them.

Certainly Mary Claire and I have both made adjustments and transitions the past few years. She has stretched herself in her development of a wider array of friends, in having her basic values challenged by others around her socially and emotionally, and in finding and maintaining a rhythm of time management and growth in her academic discipline to name a few.  (And me…well the only adjustments that come to mind at this early hour involve hot flashes and middle of the night alertness issues but I will get back to you on the other ones soon!)

Back to the point of the article as I ramble on in this blog– to suggest that instead of “butting heads” or taking out our moods and stress on one another, we should be eachother’s support, lifting up and encouraging one another with enthusiasm, tenderness and a sense of humor so to share our energy and hope for what is to come.  There…whew…heavy stuff to ponder on a sunny, windy, cold Nebraska morning… On this year’s official Mother’s Day weekend, I wish all of you a wonderful time celebrating with those you love most.

I’ve experienced the birth of babies and there is nothing like it: when a child who has been conceived in love is born to a man and woman, the joy of that birth sings throughout the universe.

- Madeleine L’ Engle, author and Mother

Delta Gamma Mom's Day 2010

Last weekend a group of my sorority friends gathered in Monmouth, Illinois (isn’t that where you’ve always wanted to go?  Birthplace of Wyatt Earp!!!) to celebrate  Founders’ Day at the founding site of Pi Beta Phi: Holt House, at Monmouth College.  Two of the group had already been to Holt House, but for the rest of us, it was a place we had learned about at our first formal sorority “new member” meeting, many, many years ago. 

Monmouth is utterly charming and Founders’ Day at Holt House, with the local Pi Phi chapter, was more delightful than we could have imagined.

Who did I travel with?  It wasn’t with pledge sisters, and it wasn’t even with members of my particular chapter.  I traveled with “new” friends.  The nine of us represented nine different college campuses and we had met as alums, while serving our sorority as national officers.  What a great traveling group – if you like tremendously capable participators, who laugh a lot. 

(I'm the one in the lower right corner)

Here is my point – sorority membership makes it possible to continue to make dear friends who share similar values after college – through alum clubs and through service to the sorority organization.  The “new friend” making, the fun, the laughing, the working together for a common purpose, is not just for the collegians

Drug and Alcohol counselors will all say that a tough love approach is the best course for friends who are consistently practicing risky behaviors. There is a saying: Once is a fluke, twice is a coincidence, but three times is a pattern. Doing a favor once for a friend is kind but repeatedly rescuing that friend will only enable the poor choices he/she is making.  Every campus and some Greek Fraternities and Sororities have designated driver programs or taxi services that can be utilized to get a safe ride home late in the evening. Here are some things a parent can do to encourage one’s daughter to make safe choices:

1. Encourage your daughter to create a list of these local services with their contact information. Include the community taxi cab service as well. She can put these phone numbers in her own cell phone and share this list with a friend who may be calling her for rides late at night.

2. Teach your daughter about safe boundaries so she can take care of herself while still feeling like she is being a supportive friend. Discuss the concepts of ‘enabling others’ and ‘boundary setting’, emphasizing that these are key life and relational skills. Suggesting her phone be set to silence or vibrate while she sleeps at night might give her some consistent blocks of healthy sleep.

3. If your daughter is moving home for the summer break and anytime she is sleeping under your roof, make sure and pre teach the family rules and constructively set your own personal boundaries of curfews and other rules that need to be followed to maintain a healthy family culture.

Realizing that we do not control the choices of others, we can still lovingly communicate expectations and hopes for these precious people in our lives…

I share this conversation with all of you because some of us who are not Greek ourselves may wonder if this investment in time and financial resources is worth it, and I want to assure you that it is. Not only because of the leadership skills and connections your daughter will acquire through this process, but most importantly, because of those lifelong friendships.  Yet, the first few months of one’s new sorority membership can be stressful, sometimes overwhelming, and even awkward.

For those of you who do have new members in sororities, perhaps even pledging as recently as the first of this year, you may find that your daughter is excited yet feeling a bit shy about her new relationships. This is typical as these women are all trying to get to know one another gradually amidst a busy college load of classes, part time work, and other involvements. The balance of it all is no small trick! Encourage her to hang in there and stay involved.

I asked my daughter what made her finally feel connected and she listed three events that helped:         1. experiencing an all house retreat that had the sole purpose of relational development,

2. Going through the election process and running for a small office while learning how the leadership roles are developed in her chapter, and

3. Participating in the chapter recruitment meetings to prepare for next fall’s recruitment.

All were experiences that helped her know she was “home”.

It was the recent recruitment meetings, though, that especially provided her time for reflection as to what type of women their chapter wanted to attract, giving her an appreciation for the special friendships and shared values that she has already had with her new member class and the upperclassmen. She realized in thinking about who she wanted to share this with in the future that she was in excellent company!  I feel that moving into her chapter house next fall will truly cement this special affiliation.

For collegians, springtime means the lining up of summer jobs and internships.  So here is what I have been thinking about:  if I ran a business and I was considering two applicants (only one being a sorority member) with similar academic qualifications for a particular position, I would hire the sorority woman.  No question about it.

Why –

1)    Leadership Experience:  The sorority woman has had continual opportunities for holding positions of leadership and observing those in leadership positions.  Over and over, she has been given the freedom to

- try out ideas

- initiate projects and carry them through to the end

- figure out how to motivate people. 

She isn’t just reading about leadership, she is experiencing leadership.  So, when she comes to my business, she has an arsenal of ideas that she has already tried out.  How can the non-sorority member compete?

2)    Open to New Ideas:  The sorority member is a bit of a calculated risk taker.  After all, she DID go through recruitment.  An employee who is willing to (and knows how to) charge into unchartered territories is going to be great for my business.  Can the non-sorority member compete?

3)    Plays well with others:  Hello???  What is a sorority but a group of woman learning to get along with one another in all sorts of situations?  I would feel confident that a sorority member has developed the people skills necessary to fit in well with my other employees.  Can the non-sorority member compete?

4)    Connections:  I know that the sorority member (this future employee) has a large network of friends should I be in the position to hire others.  Can the non-sorority member compete?

Now, let’s forget that I am the “employer” and lets look at this job search from the potential employee’s point of view…If I were composing a resume or interviewing for a job, I would not neglect to mention how my sorority experience enhances my qualifications (see the above #1, 2, 3, and 4).  Sorority member vs. non-sorority member – this is not a level playing field.

MB’s Frosted Sugar Cookies

Dough:

1 ½ cups sugar

1 cup butter

3 cups flour

1 t. soda

½ t. salt

1 t. vanilla

½ t. lemon extract

3 medium eggs

Frosting:

8 T. butter

3 cups powdered sugar

milk

2 t. vanilla

Mix up dough and chill.  Roll and cut out with different size heart cookie cutters.  Bake at 350° 8-10 minutes on greased cookie sheet.  Cream frosting ingredients together and frost cookies when cooled.  Decorate as desired.

Valentine Cookies

Dough:

¾ cup softened butter

½ cup sugar

2 ½ cups sifted flour

½ t. almond extract

Frosting:

powdered sugar

milk

½ t. almond extract

Mix up dough and shape into a ball. Wrap in waxed paper and chill for 20 minutes. Roll out ½ of dough to ¼ inch thickness on floured surface. Cut out and bake 18-20 minutes at 325° on a greased cookie sheet.