A parent's checklist before your child leaves for university

Every family has the packing list. Mattress, bucket, padlock, bedding, the right number of shirts.

This is the other list — the one that matters more and almost nobody writes down. Work through it over a term, not a weekend.

Money

• Decide the amount you will send and the date it arrives. Say both out loud.
• Agree explicitly what it covers and what it does not.
• Decide what happens when it runs out early — because it will, at least once.
• Make sure they can operate their own account, M-Pesa and any fee payments without you.
• Agree how fee balances and deadlines get communicated between you.
• Have one honest conversation about what this is costing the family. Not to create guilt — to end the vagueness that lets a young adult assume money is either infinite or catastrophic.

The conversations

• Alcohol and substances — not a warning, an actual decision, rehearsed aloud.
• Relationships, sex, and what standard they want to hold.
• What they do if they break their own standard, and who they tell.
• That first year is genuinely hard for everyone, and struggling is not proof of being a fraud.
• That a serious mistake does not cost them their place at home. Say the words. This is the item that changes behaviour in a crisis.

There is more detail on all of these in setting boundaries before campus.

Faith

• Identify which church and which fellowship they will try in the first fortnight. Actually name them.
• Make sure they have a personal rhythm that is theirs rather than the family’s — small enough to survive a bad week.
• Have the doubt conversation before someone else does. See is it okay to doubt God?
• Agree how you will pray for them, and tell them you are doing it.

Practical independence

Things they should have done at least once, alone, before they leave:

• Made a phone call to sort out an official problem.
• Managed a fixed amount of money over a fortnight.
• Woken themselves up, reliably, for two weeks running.
• Washed, cooked and cleaned for themselves.
• Travelled somewhere unfamiliar and worked it out.
• Registered with a clinic or knows where they will go when ill.

Health and safety

• Medical cover sorted, and they know how to use it.
• Any ongoing condition, medication or allergy written down and understood by them rather than only by you.
• They know how to get home in an emergency, and have the means to.
• Agree the no-questions-tonight rule: they can call at any hour, from anywhere, and you will help first and discuss later.
• Both of you know where to find real help if something serious happens — Kenyan crisis services are listed here.

Staying in contact

• Agree a regular call at a set time. A rhythm beats sporadic checking, which reads as surveillance.
• Agree what you will not do — turning up unannounced, calling their friends, monitoring their movements.
• Prepare better questions than “how is it going”. Who did you eat with? What was hardest this week? What are you avoiding?

For you

The item nobody puts on a checklist.

• Expect the house to feel wrong for a few weeks. It is not a sign that anything is broken.
• Decide what you are going to do with the time and attention this frees up, before it frees up.
• Tell your child you will miss them. Plainly, once, without making it their responsibility to manage.

The last week

Keep it light. Resist the urge to deliver every remaining piece of wisdom in the final three days — it lands as anxiety rather than guidance, and it is the version they will remember.

The work was done over the preceding months. The last week is for being ordinary together.

If you want to do this properly rather than alone, our Rooted in Freedom programme takes families through it over eight guided weeks, with the young adult in the room.