Empty Nest

There are a lot of things that happened to our family this past year. In short, our son got placed into an Intermediate Care Facility (group home) and our daughter has gone off to college. My wife and I have become empty nesters.

Our son and daughter have both adjusted very well to their new environments. And moving out is, for them, a milestone achievement. The other side of that coin, how circumstances changed for us parents, is no less profound. The change on our lives has been no less dramatic than what our children are experiencing.

First, our son moved out.

It was our goal to transition him from living at home to living at a group home during the school year, to mitigate the things that would be different for him. We were able to do that, and he did well. Almost too good, to be honest. Then, over the summer he picked up some negative behaviors for which we sought additional help. Now that he's back in school (he graduated, but can continue with schooling to help bolster his occupational skills) he is behaving better. Not perfect mind you, and not the way he was before, but better.

A few months later, it was our daughter's turn.

Our daughter, too, took to leaving home better than we thought she would. She has made new friends, stayed in touch with her old friends, is doing well academically, and has gotten involved in campus life. She didn't join the clubs that I thought she would, and she didn't pursue her old high school activities in college. Instead, she joined the hall council and is involved in student government. This is a girl who struggled through school until her senior year. I'm sure she's facing some struggles, but she is tackling them herself.

So what has this meant for us?

Well, for the first time since we've become parents I can do what I want to do after dinner. I don't have to toilet and bathe my son. It wasn't the work. It was the inflexibility that really was a drag on me. The fact that, for the hour after dinner, I had no agency. My next hour was spoken for, regardless of my feelings. It was weird to get up from the dinner table, bus my dishes, then go off on my own to do something that I wanted to do.

When our daughter left, there were tears. Those tears started a couple weeks before she left and continued for a couple weeks after. But there were tears. Because it was different. My son lives a few minutes away, and my wife visits him about six days a week (myself, about twice a week). With our daughter, weeks and soon months will pass between visits. Also, when we visit our son he is, largely, the same as he was before. Our daughter will never be the same kid that we dropped off at college.

I knew what moving away, to college or elsewhere, would be like. I've made that journey. What I didn't realize was that I would be taking no less a journey now, myself.