My sons are on their own at last, tho the youngest still has all his ‘stuff" here, he lives elsewhere and pays his own way.
Now what? As a nurse and a mom, I’ve lived my entire life for other people, helping others, doing what others needed or expected. Now, half that need is gone, my mothering is no longer needed. I feel like half my life has been torn away and there is just nothing there anymore. I continue my nursing career, i love my work. But i hate coming home to an empty house, and I don’t know how to fill my need to be needed. I don’t know how to feel wanted anymore. I can’t seem to transition from my satisfaction with my work to satisfaction with my life. Is this "transition fever"? Is there a cure?
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Sounds very interesting.
It’s difficult to lose a part of your identity. We are needed for such a big part of our adult lives. Our time is taken up by the needs of others. Our day and schedule based on when and where we need to be for someone else. You seem the type of woman who enjoys the feeling of having someone need you. That’s important for you to replace. I’m sure you can find something that can do that for you. Give yourself time to discover what it is that will replace that feeling for you. Is there anything you’ve postponed because you were a mother? Anything you always wanted to do but couldn’t? Take some time to reconnect with yourself. To rediscover who you are and what new endeavors you would enjoy in this next part of your life. Who is the part of you that isn’t a mother? What does that part of you want? Good luck. I have a feeling with a little time you’ll find lots of things to replace “mommy”.
Dear essential: Your mothering is still needed — it’s just different now. I agree with emptynest . . . now is the time for you to learn how to pamper yourself, do something you’ve thought about but never had the time to do. Get your sons stuff out of your house and redecorate the room into a home office for you or an exercise room. This will only be a transition time for you if you choose to transition through it. So go get ‘em girl!
wait if you ask for more you will have it, your grown up children are going to give you more work to do, I am in the same stage of life, they’ve gone and leave some clothes in a room, but I feel they want me apart from them. I have been single for many years, I take care of everybody, and that is okay, I was so dependable… they call me only when they need me,
Think back on what you liked to do before you became a mom and caregiver… then take it from there. If you liked to sew …sew something for charities…if you liked to cook …. help out with food for a shut in neighbor…. What ever you like to do can be turned into something to help others. My sister loves to crochet (I cant stand to) but she crochets bandages for the lepers (yes they still exist). There are organizations that can supply you with the list of needs and how to fill that need.
i do sew for charities and nursing homes, always have. But that is meeting someone elses needs, not my own. I guess I am saying that I need to meet my own needs, and I don’t know how, or at least am not very good at it.
What sports would you like to learn? I use to sew alot for my daughter and myself. Are you comforable with yourself to go into Manhattan and have lunch, walk around seeing the sites? Reading a book of your interst? Friends who would like to go out once a week? Have you forgotten how to have fun?
I suppose that fun has never been high on my agenda, too many other things I had to accomplish. I’ve done a lot of things that others considered great fun, but that seemed to me to just be more work for me to do. Camping, I had to do all the cooking, fishing, I got to clean the fish (oh joy), going for drives in the country, I had to watch and take care of the kids. My sewing was and is fun and therapeutic for me, so I am doing that more. I read a lot, but rarely for pleasure, too much professional literature to keep up on. So many of my friends have their own lives to lead, I get out with one maybe twice a month if I am lucky, and those are usually fun times. I could get used to having fun I think, if I had someone to share fun time with.
Do you live in or near New York City?
Alas no, I live in Seattle metropolitan area, a smaller city called Everett. Wish I did live in New York, there is so much to see and do there.
It was wrenching for me when I was fifty and my husband and I separated, and my sons left home — I was really very depressed. Sons are now 27, 30. See them several times a year, but nothing regular. It’s very hard not to be sad about it at times even now, 9 years later. I went to some divorce support groups, worked, went to therapy — hardest time I ever had, I think. I get jealous at times of familes where they are all hanging out together — I now have some friends who are in non traditional roles — two have never had kids — it’s just hard, plus midlife, plus transitioning out of work — I’m exploring things to do, but I get discouraged; feel and felt ashamed that our marriage didn’t work out. My boys and I love eachother, but we aren’t what I’d call close any more. There is definitely a hole where family used to be. Sometimes it hurts…tincture of time, my friends say. Talk about what’s going on for you to others — I was definitely in shock losing several parts of my identity, wife, mother…And my birth family live 2700 miles away….good luck!
I hear you completely. I am also a nurse and an recent empty nester. I too feel at a loss. One thing I did do was to start a monthly ladies night. I invite a bunch of women, some I know better than others, over to my house. These women are then invited to bring other women. Everyone brings an appetizer or something to drink, I make dessert. No agenda, we just hang out and laugh , listen, advise, complain, drink, eat and laugh some more. Sometimes there is very little food and we just eat the dessert and wash it down with wine. Other times there is too much to eat. Sometimes 5 women sometimes 20. Every month is different and I look forward to everyone of them. I did this to have something to look forward to and to make more friends. I keep it very simple, so I don’t stress. It was an easy inexpensive way for me to have a social night. It is always the same night every month so people can plan for it on the first Tuesday. I send out an email to remind people about 3 days before it.
Anyway just one thing you could try to have a fun night once a month to look forward to.
what an excellent idea!! I will have to try that one. I can see how having something to look forward to like that lightens one’s mood and creates something to fill at least part of the void.
Thank you so very much!!!
Is there a cure? I think time and finding an activity you love are the cures that work best. I was a single parent for a lot of years and when my daughter first left for college, I didn’t know what to do with myself. She is quite the chatterbox (^_^) so when I’d come home from work those first few months after she left, I’d wander around the house not knowing what to do with myself. I didn’t want to call her too often at the dorms because I didn’t want her to feel that I was hovering. It was disconcerting at first but eventually I learned to love it. I could eat Cheerios for dinner if I wanted to; go out for a drink with the girls after work and stay out as long as I liked; play whatever music I liked at full volume without having to hear the groan of “Mom, the Beatles? The Eagles? The Four Tops? Again??” LOL!
My daughter is grown and married now but we’ve always been close. We don’t talk every day but we keep in touch on Facebook all the time and when we do talk on the phone, we usually talk for hours. One day we talked for nearly 7 hours straight — gotta love that free long distance plan! (^_^)
I think part of my issue is that I work alone. I run a small health clinic, so the people I come in contact with on a daily basis are clients, not co-workers or friends. BUT, there are other nurses that do the same thing I do in clinics of their own, I am thinking that a get together with all of them once a month might be doable and fun, and tighten our network as well.
My sons call me with regularity to “check up on mom”, and one even comes to see me when he has the time, and we are close, but oh how I miss them.
Thanks for your input, it was helpful.