Tuesday, April 13, 2010

The Empty Nest

Our daughter is getting ready to graduate from high school. In the last month or so I have been asked questions like, "How are you doing with all this?" or "Are you guys ready for the empty nest?"

Truth be told I think we are doing pretty well. There are a lot of things we intentionally decided to drop or not do when our daughter was born. I think both of us are looking forward to picking up some of those things and investing more time in some newer interests like sailing.

I'm sure things are going to be very different and it will be an adjustment. Guaranteed the house will be much quieter and my husband won't be walking around behind our daughter reminding her to pick up her shoes, books, purse and various other things and take them to her room. But - - I think we are going to be okay.

When our daughter was a newborn a wise friend told us to be sure to take good care of our marriage because even though there would be days when we thought 18 would never come, it would arrive and we would be back to just the two of us. Lately I've been asking myself where the time went and I'm glad we heeded her advice.

So for all you guys who are already emptynesters, what's your best advice?

1 comment:

Lavern Nissley said...

Julie, it is good to hear your honest reflections on this transition in your lives. Our nest of three children has been empty for about two years, but the first several days had us on an emotional roller coaster. Now we absolutely love it.

But parenting still goes on, even though none of our children make our home their permanant residence.

I'll forward the link to a blog post I did: "Fathering When Your Nest is Empty". http://lovinglasting.blogspot.com/2009/04/fathering-after-your-nest-is-empty.html. Blessings!