The summer before my only child left for college, I texted a friend. She had a year of empty nesting under her belt, so I asked her what was in store for me.
“The empty nest is no fun,” she wrote back. “I’m not adjusting well.” I turned to another friend looking for encouragement, but she told me she cried every time she passed her child’s empty bedroom and eventually closed the door. On social media, parent after parent lamented the “lasts” and endings of childhoods.
My daughter developed a rare autoimmune disease when she was little, and it often kept her from experiencing many of the simple joys of childhood: going to school on a regular basis, participating in activities, and spending time with friends. Given that she had missed out on so many rites of passage, I worried I might have an even more difficult time with letting go of this phase of life. After my husband and I dropped her off at college, friends asked how I was coping.
“OK,” I told them. In truth, I missed her, but quickly realized that for me, being an empty nester wasn’t going to be sad.
It’s a joy to witness my daughter’s newfound independence
First, it helped that my daughter took to college well. All summer, while she was out of earshot, I had worried to my husband about whether she would get along with her roommate, find friends, and deal with the pressures of college classes. Before loading the car to travel the 250 miles to her university, we purchased tuition insurance just in case.
But her first day on campus, she figured out the bus system and began exploring her new city. She joined clubs and communities and eventually found her people. And when classes got tough, she reached out for help and took breaks, spending time doing things she loves. Watching her newfound independence and growing confidence made me realize I had done a good job as her mother to prepare her for life on her own.
I have space to do things for myself
As I watched my daughter transition to life at college, my own life suddenly felt expansive. I’ll admit it was a strange feeling to wake up to an empty house that first day and realize I didn’t have to think about or attend to anyone else’s needs. I got up, grabbed coffee, went to my desk in my home office, and it occurred to me that I no longer had to plan my workday around a school schedule or stop what I was doing to make dinner either.
Did I want to keep working after 5 p.m., or should I go for a walk with a friend? I finally had the luxury of time and could decide how I would spend it. This summer, my daughter was home briefly before returning to campus for a job. One day, she said to me, “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I miss being at school and having freedom and my own schedule.” I smiled and told her that I understood. I really, really understood.
There’s also more room for my marriage
My daughter was a honeymoon baby, so I spent most of the first year of married life with my cheek pressed against the cool tile of our bathroom floor, consumed by nausea and willing myself not to throw up. To go out to dinner for our first anniversary, my husband and I hired a babysitter. It had always been the three of us.
The first year of empty nesting felt like what I imagine most couples experience in the first year of marriage. My husband and I had time to really talk, more about our lives and less about our child. We went out to dinner on random Wednesday nights. We saw movies in the middle of Saturday afternoons. We made most of these decisions on the spur of the moment, and it was glorious.
Recently, when we dropped her off for the start of her third year, I felt a twinge of sadness that this stage of life, which I was told was going to be so sad, was already half over.
