Three years ago, after my daughter Zhang Xinyi left for university, she stopped calling as often.

Once a week became once every two weeks.
Then once a month.
Eventually… silence.

Not complete silence—she texted when she needed something.

But the long conversations we used to have disappeared like migrating birds that never returned.

I told myself she was busy.
I told myself she was independent.
I told myself not to take it personally.

But every night, I kept the volume on my phone high—just in case.

Then one rainy Tuesday, while slicing ginger for soup, my phone buzzed.

Her name appeared on the screen.

A call—not a text.

“Hi Mama,” she said softly.

And just like that, three years of distance began to melt.

She told me she had been struggling—in ways she didn’t know how to articulate.

She felt pressure to succeed, fear of failing, anxiety about not being “enough.”
She didn’t want to worry me, so she kept everything inside.

I listened.

For once, I didn’t jump in with solutions.
I didn’t list all the things she should be doing.
I didn’t remind her to be careful, to eat well, to sleep more.

I simply said, “Xinyi, I’m here.”

She cried.

Not loudly—just quiet tears, the kind someone sheds when they finally stop holding the world together alone.

That evening, we spoke for over an hour. She told me about her classes, her part‑time job, the roommate she secretly adored, the internship she hoped to get but doubted she deserved.

I told her about the garden I planted, the book club I joined, the neighbor who kept returning my containers but not my lids.

We laughed.
We breathed.
We found each other again.

Before hanging up she said:

“Mama, I didn’t call because I didn’t know what to say. But I missed you every day.”

After we hung up, I stood in the kitchen for a long time, hands still smelling of ginger, heart warm and aching at the same time.

I realized something important:

Children don’t distance themselves because they stop loving us.
They distance themselves because they are trying—awkwardly, imperfectly—to grow.

And parents… we must learn to wait.

Not anxiously.
Not resentfully.
But patiently, with love that doesn’t demand a timeline.

Now, Xinyi calls every Sunday—sometimes for ten minutes, sometimes for an hour.

Not because I ask her to.
But because she wants to.

And every time I pick up the phone, I say the same thing:

“Hi my girl. I’m here.”

Because after all these years, that is what motherhood still means.