Empty nest syndrome

It’s that time of year when many young people are preparing to leave home. University or a new job beckons, and for some parents that means facing – finally – an empty nest.

For the young person, this next step may be full of excitement and trepidation. For the parents left behind, it can be bubbling over with conflicting and painful emotions.

What can empty nest syndrome feel like?

Expect it to be emotional, and to be surprised by some of those emotions, which are often confusing. You may be excited for your child, but grief stricken for yourself. You may have found their presence over the last few years taxing and unrewarding, only to be side-swiped by them no longer being around. It is appropriate to both weep and breathe a sigh of relief.

Your sense of identity can be profoundly shaken. Who am I now? How do I approach this next phase of my life? What are my interests? An identity based on your personal likes and desires can become lost or parked in the service of raising children. Now they have left home, you are faced with questions about who you are, and how you want to live.

Grief may be present. You may simply miss your child, but alongside that missing is a larger loss – of their childhood, your youth and of your role as a parent. One client reported feeling excited as her child prepared to go overseas for many months of travelling, until the night before he left. While sitting quietly alone, she was suddenly overcome with grief. “I was struck by the sense that it was all over – raising him, being his mum,” she said. “I wanted to do it all again. I was distraught.”

The empty nest may coincide with other crises and challenges. You may be questioning your relationship or career, dealing with health problems or caring for elderly parents.

You may feel anxious about how your child will cope with living independently. Can they cook for themselves? Can they navigate a launderette? Will they make friends? You will have to learn to parent from a distance, which can raise questions over how and when you communicate, and what they will or won’t tell you.

You may feel concern, even distress about how you parented. Did I do a good enough job? Do they only remember the times I shouted? Did I give them too much space, or not enough?

Anxiety about your relationship with the child’s partner may also be present, if you are still together. How will you get on, alone together for the first time in years? Will you still like each other? Will you both feel the same way about having an empty nest? Is this an opportunity or a crisis? Is it devastating or liberating?

How to approach an empty nest

Maintain good contact with your child

This is your first time parenting remotely, and it takes some navigating. Bombarding your young person with anxious messages is not going to establish healthy new dynamics. Perhaps talk about how and when you might communicate and ask how much contact they would like.

Avoid burdening them with your feelings

It is OK to tell your child that you miss them, but not fair to load them up with all your complex feelings. They don’t need to know that you and their other parent are fighting more or that you are weeping often.

Experience the grief

It is a legitimate and appropriate reaction to loss. Facing it and feeling it will ultimately lead to some accommodation. Repressing it or distracting yourself from it won’t. Keep in mind that grief, like a powerful magnet, has a habit of attracting other griefs to it. So the loss of your child may drag towards it other previous, unprocessed or still-raw losses – jobs, relationships, bereavements, your youth. Buckle up.

Take comfort from evolution

Your task has always been to raise a child towards independence, so they can ultimately fly the nest. Leaving home is a necessary and important step in their journey of maturation. Their leaving is healthy – even if it hurts.

Focus on the gains as well as the losses

A tidier house, the chance to eat toast for dinner, not being woken up by someone making noodles at 2am. Reflect on what has been lost, but remember to consider what has been gained, too.

Embrace larger opportunities

Life beyond parenting can be rich and exciting. In Jungian thinking, midlife is a time for reflection, an invitation to live more consciously. The wins are meaning, wholeness and healing, but the journey there means meeting oneself. Without the role of parent, with its attendant demands, pressures and distractions, who are you? Who have you been and who might you like to become? Asking yourself these questions is tough, but the rewards may be great.

Remember the relationship is constantly evolving

How your child feels about you is not fixed, just because they have moved out. Take comfort from the fact that you can continue to enjoy and work at your relationship with your child after they have left home – indeed, for their rest of your life.

I offer a free 15-minute initial consultation over the phone or online. Please email me and we can set something up.