Tag: empty nest

"Often, it’s not about becoming a new person, but becoming the person you were meant to be, and already are, but don’t know how to be.”  ~ Heath Buckmaster

Lately when I am up in the middle of the night pondering (some might say ruminating) on the sea changes moving through my life, I remember that if I can’t change my mind, I can’t change anything else.

It’s ironic because often during the daylight hours, I am the instigator of change, the one leading the charge to shift the strategic initiatives of Good Clean Love, or the one haplessly leading a bevy of subcontractors in a new home construction.

There’s a growing epidemic spreading its way across the nation with a bullseye aimed directly on couples whose kids have flown the coop.

No, it’s not health issues, retirement money worries, or employment challenges.

It’s divorce.

"The National Center for Family and Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University reports that divorce rates for couples over 50 years old have more than doubled in recent years.

More than doubled.

If you're a new empty nester, know that what you’re going through is a challenging transition. My heart goes out to you because I’ve been there. As parents, we need to honor the significance of the sacred task we spent the last two decades doing, and it is entirely appropriate that there would be some sorrow at its close. There will be a time of adjustment, and that period will be different for everyone. Here are five things you can expect as you adjust to the empty nest.

1. Fluctuating emotions. Intellectually, you can probably acknowledge that it was time for your kids to move beyond the nest.

You’re supposed to feel weepy, forsaken and bereft. And maybe you do. Sometimes. Some days.

However, many parents are realizing that they also feel exhilarated, freer and, yes, sexier, when their kids grow up, leave home and go out on their own. It might be an empty nest, but there’s no "syndrome." At least, not in the negative sense. There’s no malady about it. It’s more like a club whose members are secretly celebrating having more quality time alone with their friends and with their spouse.

Magazine articles and TV doctors still tend to focus on "coping" with this midlife transition, and the identity crisis they say could lead to depression, alcoholism and divorce. But research reveals an empty nest can actually reduce stress and family conflicts.

Being married for any length of time is truly an accomplishment. Just last week a woman asked how long I had been married and when I said 40 years this July, her eyes got huge and she said, "To the same person? How is that possible?"

When we got married people were taking bets on how long our marriage would last. The average bet was between two weeks and two years because of our age difference and personalities. Let’s just say, my husband is calm, wise and conservative and I am the exact opposite. I do remember feeling really shaky when I said my vows. … "for better or worse, richer or poorer, in sickness and health, till death do us part." Now that’s a huge promise! Could I really do this?

"Often, it’s not about becoming a new person, but becoming the person you were meant to be, and already are, but don’t know how to be."  ~ Heath Buckmaster

Jarring is the mildest descriptor I can use to describe the space that is left with the departure of my last child. I feel lost in our home with only photos to fill the spaces that were not long ago embodied with the noise and mess of growing up. I cry intermittently at almost anything and struggle to imagine how to go from here, back to some sense of normalcy. But the truth is that there is no going back, only forward into a space that I cannot yet see.

We get knocked off center, the rug is pulled out from under us, we get slammed by a curve ball out of left field—our life drastically changes, and now what. An unexpected diagnosis, a baby born with life-long issues, an empty-nest home—these are some of the many life challenges that can be considered a loss and therefore necessitate a "rebuilding." When critical life transitions occur, as they naturally do, we are called upon to reconfigure our life.