Many of us are in our early to mid-twenties. We are all focused on trying to achieve greatness, striving for the best for our future careers. But in the midst of all of this chaos, we must still make time for our parents. I know for many of us one of the reasons why we came to college was to have our freedom.

In the past year, I have learned the hard way, how much my parents mean to me. In the past three years, I have become extremely focused on my schoolwork. There were times where it would be weeks before I would call home, just like many of us students. Essentially, it is hard to make time to call home, as students, we are all busy with school, school work, social gatherings, clubs, gym time, and most of us don't want to call when we are stressed out with everything we are juggling around.

Although, we may not like updating our parents with everything that's happening in our lives. Or if we got a bad grade for something, we don't want to hear it. Sometimes it can be frustrating talking to our parents, because there is so much going on in one moment, they tend to stress us out a little bit more. But what is important to understand is our parents are merely there asking these questions to make sure we are OK. They are here to be our support system and only want to know every detail of our very lives so they may help us in any way that they can.

There are times when I forget I am still my parent's daughter, in the sense of allowing them to help me. Many of us have developed this mentality where we want to do everything ourselves without anyone's help. It is OK to receive help from our parents, they are here to help, no matter what. It's times like this where it's ok to be with our parents, making time for them shouldn't be a problem. They have made time for our softball, basketball or even football games, and it shouldn't feel like a burden to talk to them on the phone for a while. Still allowing them to be our parent, still knowing if we do something wrong we will get yelled at, sometimes our parents are so hard on us because they care. It's the big concept of tough love.

We are at this age where we must realize our parents are not getting any younger, in fact, it's the other way around. Don't take your parents for granted, visit them once in a while, talk to them over the phone, even if they ask the worst questions. One day they may not be there anymore, and as young adults we must remember to ask our parents the driving questions of life, listen to their odd stories, cherish the amount of time we have left because we may not know how long that might be. Treasure them. Love them.