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[gina123]

hi girls
do you think there is such a thing as empty nest syndrome?..i miss my kids a lot...eldest stays over 100 miles away..which means to me...1 hour car,3 quarter hour boat ,3 hours car ....i do miss being able to just pop over..we saw him and his fiancee 3 weeks ago and it feels like months....the youngest lives 10 minutes away..but he has his life and i don't see a great deal of him..he phones nearly every day and pops in for a flying visit...i do his washing at the moment as i am not working..so makes me feel useful i suppose..but the house used to be so alive what with them and all thier pals..i try some days to listen and if i do very hard i can almost hear the laughter that surrounded us..
i guess once a mum always a mum
does anyone else feel this way?
cheers guys
gina

[Tanny]

Hi Gina

I am not sure that  I feel the same way, as hubby and I are really quite enjoying this period of life and the freedom we have, however,we do see our grown up children quite often, one still lives at home anyway, although is out mostly so you wouldn't know it, and another lives quite a distance, but comes home regularly.  I think you have got to congratulate yourself on doing such a good job bringing them up that has enabled them to live independently, I also think you have got to let them go at a certain point to allow them to come back.

[Libby Babe]

Gina, my kids are still at home, thank goodness!  My son is 17 and my daughter is 10 but I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like if my son left home.  He still hasn't made his mind up whether or not he will go to Uni next year but I know I will find it very hard to accept if he does - I will miss him SO much.  Sometimes I moan because the house is always so busy and noisy but I know I wouldn't like it if it was quiet all the time!  I feel for you, I really do. 
Libby
x

[gina123]

It is horrible libby..eldest didnt make i home for xmas..came for new year..i cried most of xmas day..
gina

[CLKD]

Yep Empty Nest Syndrome is well recognised.  However, it's natural for kids to fly the nest eventually and I didn't take my parents' feelings into account, thought they would be as glad to see the back of me as I was to be rid of them.  It was only years++ later that I suddenly thought about how they must have felt as we drove away : when I asked them Dad couldn't remember and Mum said she was pleased we were going onto our new life 'as it should be'.

 "I cried most of xmas day ......... " why?  Disappointment.  Sadness.  Lack of opportunity ........  I used to shed a few tears when we drove away from them at Easter or a long weekend but the tears didn't last long ..... too busy getting on with life 

[Dreamer]

Hi Gina, it's awful isn't!  My daughter is in her first year at Uni and rings numerous times during the day but I miss her so much.  She came home for a visit this weekend, arrived on Friday evening after missing her train, spent Saturday with her then she went to a party on Saturday evening and couldn't get a lift home until Monday morning!  I took her back to the train on Monday afternoon and spent all evening crying!  I am counting the days for the summer holidays, although I know she won't be around much then.  I still have a son at home so that makes it a bit easier but doesn't stop me missing my daughter.

Dreamer
xxx

[Jillymoo]

Oh dear,I'm so besotted with my daughter,that even seeing the title of this thread gave me a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I read it 

Shes's 14 now,and already it's something I spend time fretting over,yet I know the day will have to come just as it must for all of us.I've made her my life,which I know is a mistake,but in a perverse way I've sort of enjoyed it!
I think working at her Primary school for most of the time she was there was not a good idea either,as I was with her so to speak,during school time.

I know I've set myself up for tremendous heartbreak when the apron strings finally have to be wrenched from me,but at the moment I just keep putting it to the back of my mind as much as poss.(Apart from today of course LOL)

Hugs to all you mums who are feeling 'empty' 

xx

[Taz2]

Empty nest syndrome does exist - after all its similar to retirement if you have spent, say, over 20 years doing the job of parenting. I still have one at home, unfortunately, so I can't comment. I know when the first one left I was like a spare part - wandering into his room, gazing at his posters, sitting on his bed etc. The second one went and I felt none of these things - taking the opportunity to move into his room myself! 

However, both of my sons who have left home have moaned at me over the last few weeks saying that I never visit them. It has not entered my head that they would want me to    I wonder what sort of mum that makes me? They both flat share so I just think that there will always be someone else there and I would be in the way. Plus, with work and a slightly alternative way of life it is difficult for me to fit it all in.

My eldest son left home 9 years ago and the middle one left in September. I realise that the reason I hoped for boys and not girls is because I thought that once they left I would then be free to do what I wanted. Not that I didn't love bringing them up but I really felt I put my life on hold. Girls seem to need to be part of your life more somehow. The girls I used to pick up from school until their mums finished work never stopped talking and wanted to know all about my day etc. Whereas the boys used to head straight for the toaster or biscuit tin and I wouldn't see them again until it was time for them to go home!

I have promised them that I will visit - they only live 20 miles away - and tried this week but middle son was still in bed when I had my couple of hours to spare as he had been out the night before!! At least I made the effort!!

I would advise all of you with children who are still at home but getting to the "going to Uni/around the world/sharing a flat stage to start making a life for yourself outside the home and to encourage them to be independent of you so that they are not worried as to how you will cope without them.

Taz x 

[Fi]

Gina, I completely understand. I used to laugh at women who couldn't cope when their kids left home - after all, it's the one thing you absolutely know is going to happen when you have them, isn't it?  Now I'm embarrassed in case I was ever impatient with anyone suffering from empty nest syndrome.

My son (only child) left home to go to Uni the same month that my husband died from cancer. It took me so long to get to grips with the grief of losing my husband that I didn't even think about the empty nest until about eighteen months later. Then it hit me 

It is really hard. Like you, I miss the busy house - the friends popping in; I even miss ferrying him about in the car! I think it's like being made redundant; that's how being widowed felt as well. All of a sudden, no one needed me, no one else was justifying my existence. It is traumatic.

I wish sometimes that I could live round the corner from my son, just close enough to be able to pop round to each other's for a coffee and a gossip. But that ain't going to happen. I can't follow him around the country  and he certainly isn't going to follow me. Thank goodness for Facebook and texting - that keeps us going.

There is life after children and marriage though - honest. Three years on, I am doing loads of new things, I have new friends and I am building a new life.  ANd sometimes, on a good day, the bit of elastic joining us feels good and bouncy and it is nice to know that the family stretches all over the country, instead of just being concentrated in one little house. Does that make sense?
  Take care - be good to yourself. It will get easier.

[pj44]

My last child 22 moved out the end of june last year and it was dreadful.  I have 3 children so as each one moved out it was not so bad as i always had one left, but when he said he was moving out and i know that was that and i would be totally on my own it really was heartbreaking.  I cried alot but not infront of him. On the day he moved out i could not speak or i would of just of broken down and i did not want him to see me like that. For the first few weeks i could not go into the empty bedrooms with out crying and though it has got better i still do not like it.  I have got myself a dog now which is great but i still get very lonely and hate this living on my own. I'm lucky i know that i see them most weeks and now my daughter has had a baby i see them so much more. I still feel sad when they have gone and i close the door.  The only good thing is that i have not let them know just how heartbroken i am at them going as of course they are doing what they should and getting on with there lives.

[Fi]

pj44 

[Dreamer]

Fi that's so sad.  It must have been such a difficult time for you, sending you lots of 

I started Uni at the same time as my daughter!! (not the same Uni), and I thought it would help keep me busy and less mopey when she left.  Even though I'm so busy with assignments, lectures, keeping house etc. it hasn't made me feel any better about her moving out.  But you just have to get on with it I suppose.  It'll get better.....I keep telling myself.

Thank goodness for Facebook to keep an eye on them!

Dreamer
xxx

[petal]

I agree its hard when they leave the nest, but its a huge compliment to any parents that you have reared a child/children that want to leave the nest and find their own way in life. This shows that we have raised strong, intelligent children who now enter an adult world and learn to fend for them selves, but knowing Mum and Dad are there if they hit a tough spot. I missed all of mine terribly but now I love it being just the 2 of us. And lets face it you never stop being a parent just in a different way and as the years roll on then like me you become a Grandparent and that returns the joy threefold.

[gina123]

i know petal i am looking forward to the time i become a grandparent....not for a few years yet though...future daughter in la is at uni at the moment...my son just finished in uni...i guess you are right about raising independant,confident kids..but doesn't stop you missing them
and yes its nice to get more tie with hubby
gina

[petal]

But that does ease with time, when oyu go in the room and realise there are no mugs or dishes with cultures growing in/on them and the room smells fresh and clean instead of looking like world war 3 has broken out. When my youngest Daughter went to Teacher Training College I kept going in her room and was shocked how tidy it looked, she was a messy madam.