Back to School Blues

I feel as empty as my house.

No more butts in the bleachers. Too much food in the fridge. No one raiding the pantry at 10 p.m. No one asking where their favorite hoodie is when it is sitting directly in front of them. It is like Mary Poppins is showing up, talking, singing and dancing about how change is in the air, except I am not quite ready for the song.

My youngest is beginning her last year of college today. And yes, I know, it’s so late-quarter systems are weird. Somehow this means I have one more year of college parenting before I officially become an empty nester. I cried writing this. The pain is still lingering, and I can feel it from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. I love those kids so much.

And that is the thing about launching a child. It is not just about where they are going. It is about what their leaving stirs up in you.

I have spent a lot of time reflecting on how each of my kids launched. Every one of them has been different, and every launch has asked something different of me. There have been tears seemingly coming from nowhere, moments of disorientation, incredible pride, excitement, fear and that persistent question:

What am I going to do with my time now?

Then come all the practical questions that somehow become existential questions. Did I teach them everything they need to know to survive? Can they clean a toilet? Will they remember to put gas in the car before the tank is empty? Do they know how to use their medical and auto insurance? Are they changing their sheets? Are they eating enough vegetables, or has their diet become 90 percent pizza? Who will they ask for help when something goes wrong? Who will they call when they don't know what to do?

And then, inevitably, there is the realization that I forgot to teach them how to cook an egg.

If you are launching a child, it does not matter if it is kid number one or kid number twelve. The dynamics of your life change. They shift rapidly, like a stream becoming a river and then changing course again. The banks and shores of your life are altered, and sometimes they become almost unrecognizable. There is no getting used to it because every child is different, every season is different and you are different than you were the last time.

You are a rookie every time.

I think we sometimes underestimate what an enormous transition this is because we tend to frame it as something positive. And it is positive. We want our children to grow up. We want them to become independent, capable adults. We want them to leave home and build lives of their own. We celebrate the graduation, the first apartment, the new job, the college acceptance, the move across the country. We take the pictures, send the care packages and tell everyone how proud we are.

But celebration and grief can exist in the same place.

The laundry is no longer full. The sheets don't need to be changed as often. The bathroom mirror is suddenly free from toothpaste stains. There are no last-minute trips to Michaels because someone forgot they needed supplies for a 3D mitochondria or a mobile of the universe. You don't have to be anywhere at 8 a.m. or 3 p.m. The grocery cart looks different. The dinner table is set different. The house sounds different.

Even the things that drove you absolutely crazy can become the things you miss.

I miss the eye rolls. I miss the socks left all over the house. I miss yelling for the umpteenth time that we are leaving and then yelling again because, apparently, no one heard me the first four times. I miss the morning wake-ups and the noise and the mess and the constant movement. I miss buying their favorite BBQ potato chips or chocolate-covered goji berries and knowing someone would open the package. I miss being needed in all those small, ordinary ways that I didn't always appreciate while they were happening.

This is grief, too.

And grief does not mean you aren't happy for them. It does not mean you aren't proud. It does not mean you wish you could keep them home forever. It means something meaningful has changed, and your mind, body and heart are trying to catch up.

I think this is part of why empty nesting can become a mental health issue. We often talk about it as though it is simply a matter of having more free time. "Now you can travel!" "You can finally do all those things you've been putting off!" And yes, maybe you can. But major life transitions are not simply calendar changes. They affect us psychologically, emotionally, relationally and physiologically.

Change takes time to metabolize.

Think about moving. You pack everything up, make decisions about what stays and what goes, move into the new place, unpack, organize and slowly begin to feel settled. Then imagine doing it again, except this time you are not just moving your furniture. You are moving your identity.

For years, being a parent has provided structure, purpose, community and an enormous amount of meaning. Your days have been organized around other people. You have known where you needed to be, who needed you, what needed to happen next and what your responsibilities were. Then suddenly, one of the central organizing structures of your life changes.

Our brains are wired for familiarity and safety. Even when the change is good, our nervous systems can experience it as disruption. Your child is no longer in the bedroom down the hall, and some part of you may still be waiting for them to walk through the door. The familiar rituals are gone. Setting the table for one less person. Looking at the clock and realizing you don't have to leave at 3:00. Hearing a noise in the house and realizing it isn't your kid coming home.

Your body knows something has changed before your brain has fully figured out what to do with it.

And then there is the question that I think sits underneath so much of this:

Who am I now?

Being a parent has filled me with purpose. I don't lose that purpose when my kids grow up, but the way I show up changes. The way they show up changes. My time is more mine now, and I don't always know what to do with it.

For years, my social life was also built around my children. I met parents at school events, sports practices, games, fundraisers and all the random places parents gather. When that disappears, you can suddenly realize that you have lost more than a schedule. You have lost a structure. You may have lost a community. You may have lost some of the ways you knew how to belong.

That can be surprisingly lonely.

And what happens if you are single and launching your kids? The transition may feel even more pronounced because there isn't another adult in the house experiencing the change alongside you. Or perhaps you are partnered and one of you is devastated while the other is thrilled to finally have the house to yourselves. One person may want to talk about it constantly while the other is ready to book a vacation.

Neither response makes the other person wrong.

This is a time to offer compassion to yourself and to the people you love. Your spouse or partner is also adjusting to a new family structure. The two of you may suddenly find yourselves looking across the dinner table and realizing, "Oh. It's just us." That can be exciting, but it can also be awkward. You may need to rediscover each other outside of parenting, and there is no reason to expect that you should automatically know how to do that.

You are both rookies here.

So what do we do with all of this? We celebrate, and we grieve. We take the pictures. We have the dinners. We send the care packages. We tell our kids how proud we are. And then we allow ourselves to feel the sadness without deciding that something is wrong with us.

We can also begin creating new rituals. Maybe that is a weekly phone call, a standing dinner when they are home, a shared show, a Sunday text, or simply knowing that you are still connected even though you are no longer living under the same roof. At the same time, part of loving our adult children is letting them figure things out. We don't need to rescue them from every problem. We don't need to solve every situation. We can let them struggle a little, learn a little and discover that they are capable.

Our job changes from making everything happen to helping them remember that they can handle what happens.

And then comes the harder work:

What do I want to do with my life now?

I don't mean how do I fill my calendar. I mean, what matters to me? What brings me alive? What relationships do I want to cultivate? What have I put on hold? What parts of myself have been waiting patiently for my attention? What do I want this next chapter to mean?

It is no longer about filling time. It becomes about finding purpose.

That can be an uncomfortable shift, especially in midlife, because so many of us have spent decades being useful to everyone else. We have built careers, raised children, cared for aging parents, maintained homes, supported partners, managed schedules and held a thousand invisible pieces of life together. Then one day, there is more space.

At first, that space can feel like a void.

Eventually, it can become an invitation.

Maybe this is one of the gifts hidden inside the grief of launching our children. We are being asked to become curious about ourselves again. Not the version of ourselves who was needed by everyone else, but the woman underneath all those roles. What does she want? What does she value? What does she want to create? What does she want the next twenty years to look like?

I am still figuring that out.

I know that I don't want to simply fill the time. I want to be intentional about what I do with it. I want meaningful relationships. I want to create. I want to work in ways that matter to me. I want to travel and laugh and deepen friendships. I want to be present for my kids without hovering over them. And I want to discover the parts of myself that may have gotten quieter while I was busy raising five humans.

Maybe you are in that place, too.

Maybe your kids have launched. Maybe they are launching soon. Maybe you are looking at the calendar and realizing that the years went much faster than anyone warned you they would. Maybe you are relieved. Maybe you are devastated. Maybe you are both.

There is no right way to feel about it.

But there is an opportunity here to stop asking, "How do I keep myself busy?" and start asking, "What do I want this next chapter to mean?"

Midlife is not something to simply survive. It is something to understand.

When understood holistically, it can become one of the most clarifying, transformative and powerful seasons of your life. You are not broken or "crazy." You are navigating one of the most complex physiological, emotional, relational and psychological transitions of your life.

And perhaps empty nesting is not just about learning how to live without your kids at home.

Perhaps it is about learning how to come home to yourself.