I gave everything to be present. No lads’ nights, no pub culture, no disappearing weekends — I was \*there\*, from day one, consistently.

Now my kids are teenagers and I feel like I’m haunting the house rather than living in it.

Weekdays are fine — work keeps my head occupied. But weekends? I dread them. Everyone’s around and I’ve never felt more alone. I’m background noise.

The hierarchy is clear: Mum is the first call for everything — talking, lifts, decisions, comfort. I exist in a support role. When she’s busy or tired, I get promoted temporarily. When they need money or something fixed, I’m useful. Otherwise I’m furniture.

The cruel irony is I sacrificed the social life specifically to be present for them. And somehow I ended up invisible anyway.

Is this just what teenage parenting is? Or is something wrong with how I’ve played this?

Hi everyone,

I hope it’s okay that I post here even though I’m at the complete opposite stage of life.

I’m almost 33, living in a capital city in Austria, currently pregnant with my fourth and final baby. My husband and I always wanted a bigger family (even though it’s not common where we live), and I truly love my children more than anything. If I’m honest, I wouldn’t trade my life with anyone else’s.

Still, I’ve recently found myself in an unexpected emotional crisis I can’t seem to shake off.

I grew up with a difficult childhood marked by poverty, anxiety, and loneliness, and I never really had motherly/fatherly role models. Because of that, I often find myself longing for the wisdom of people who have already walked this path.

Lately I’ve been grieving the version of life I never lived. I always imagined studying in the United States, traveling, falling in love with new places, feeling like life was wide open and anything could happen. Even though I don’t actually regret my choices, I sometimes panic that my youth and my most exciting years are already behind me.

I know this probably sounds strange coming from someone with a loving family and so much to be grateful for. Rationally, I know there will still be adventures ahead. Emotionally, though, I’m struggling with the feeling that from now on life will mostly be responsibilities, routines, and work. I am really struggling and scared right now.

That’s why I wanted to ask the people here.

For those of you whose children are grown and who are now on the other side of parenting, what did life look like afterward? Did it become exciting again in different ways? Were there new dreams, new adventures, new versions of yourself that you couldn’t have imagined while raising young children? How was your marriage, did you feel in love again?

I think what I’m really looking for is perspective. I’d love to hear from people who can honestly say, “Life didn’t end there. It simply became something different.”

Thank you for reading.

Been raising my children solo for over ten years. All of them will, I think, be moved out by the end of the year. It’s been difficult having them as young adults in the home, the lack of contribution I expect as they’ve gotten older is weighing on me. But I wake up with this pit in my stomach sick feeling thinking about them no longer being here. This year was the last sports, the last of school, the last time they wanted to hang out. I live with them and already feel the loss as they are so distant. Just knowing there will be no noise in the house, no one to run to the store with, no one asking me questions, I’m sick to my stomach each day and they haven’t even physically left yet. I have no friends and no family around, besides work I only get out to shop, I don’t think I can go to places solo. I’m worried of falling into an endless rut or the routine of home and work and back home again. Plus other insecurities that come with aging in general. This is a terribly horrible feeling. I just don’t know what to do, I’ve tried at least making friends but I just don’t vibe with people in my area and moving isn’t an option at this point. For those with no spouse, family or friends, please share anything that has helped or has been a distraction for you.

My family was fragile in ways I didn’t realize, and a few months ago it just ruptured. My husband already lived in his own place (for many years, it was amicable & we were still a family), and a month ago my teen son was (against his will) sent to live with his dad, due to a gaming addiction that had gotten completely out of control. (The very next day they signed up for fiber optic service, so the addiction is now even worse.)

I don’t foresee my 17 yr. old coming home. My days of cooking big nutritious meals for the three of us are over. Mostly I’ve been eating Grape Nuts for dinner. I think they probably have hamburgers 4 nights a week over there, or Stouffers maybe. We were farm family with freezers full of meat and vegetables. Once I get them all condensed into one, I’ll be unplugging the others. Because one person doesn’t need 4 freezers of food, do I.

And today I put the Instant Pot away. It has lived on the counter for years, used multiple times a week. But now it hasn’t been used for a month. Seeing it every day made me sad, so it’s now in storage. Closing that cabinet door felt like closing the door on life as I knew it. I am a very sad mama today.

This is the first Independence Day after our youngest turned 18 - and we had exactly ZERO plans. No cook out, no water balloon fights, no splurging on fireworks. Just a pleasant evening alone together…where we got to stroll the neighborhood and watch other families celebrate the way we used to. It was bittersweet - but liberating! I never knew I could see the fireworks in my downtown from just a block away!

I became a young widow 10 years ago, and raised my son alone since he was 8.. In two months he will be moving away to college, and I will be an empty nester. So proud of my boy; he is independent, social, self sufficient, and ready to take the world.

I have been seeing my partner for 3 years, and we live apart. He has 2 kids and share 50/50 custody. His 20 year old didn’t like the college he was attending and back at home, and 16 year old is a high schooler. Both kids are extremely dependent, and he supports all of them 💯 financially (including the ex wife).

Last night I had this revelation that I would be alone in few months, and I can’t depend on him because his plate is full. He is a great guy, awesome dad to his kids, and he truly tries to make it all work; buy I’m afraid that I will be unhappy spending all my free time alone. My job is demanding and I do have a great group of friends; but his lack of availability over the weekends are bothering me.

Help me sort out my feelings fellow empty nesters. I’m I freaking out over nothing?

First night alone.. like in my whole life. Idk what to do with myself😂😭 its really an emotional night for me. Seeing my mom and my bestfriend leave i was holding back so manyyyyy tears. A part of me is excited but also i have a weird feeling of grief. How did yall do it?

I feel so crazy. My son left for college 3 years ago, very far away. I worried about him being so far but not so much about being comfortable in his tiny dorm, I knew he’d figure it out and survive. My daughter is now going to college only 3 hours away and I’m so scared I have raised a princess. With her brother gone she’s had her own bathroom, her make up and beauty products are spread everywhere. She has a big bedroom with a huge walk in closet, tons of shoes, etc She takes forever to get ready. She’s in for such a rude awakening when she has to confine all of her crap to a shower caddy and live with 5 pairs of shoes. She’s going to a great school though. She’ll be fine right??? First world problem for sure lol

What do your days look like outside of work? I am trying to not be on my phone a lot. I read and watch some television, but it's so easy to grab my phone and scroll.

My child is going off to college and I'll be all alone I have no relatives or friends the house will be empty

Question For All: when your adult kids come home for the weekend (2 day stay), do you 1)simply make the bed after and change sheets every few visits, or 2)change the sheets and then make the bed each visit?
My wife and I disagree and need adjudication. Thanks 🙏🏽

I (56 F) raised my son (22) as mainly a single parent. My alcoholic ex husband left a few days before my son was 6 months old. I had a live-in partner for a while but he was the equivalent of a "weekend fun Dad". It's been jist Sonny boy and me since he was fourteen.

So my son finished college last week. He starts a job as an apprentice in his field, with his preferred employer, in two weeks. Yesterday, I helped him move to a suburb about an hour away, close to his new job.

I'm proud, sad, lost and excited all at once. I don't really have friends in the same boat... Either they are partnered, they are child free, or still are in the thick of it.

So... Pointers? Today I am organizing my house, that looks like a tornado went through. I put on "Glass Houses" , by Billy Joel, which was the first album I bought myself with my own birthday money. I've got sourdough started. I'm planning a road trip at the end of the summer.

I'm looking for my crew who can relate.

I'm new to this, need to see people, not Telehealth.My friends are out of state and denial, family all out of state or deceased, no kids, puppy that needs and deserves my time & husband of 30+ yrs can't understand why I'm not happy 'all of the sudden ': /

In many online support groups, I'm assign counselors that are in their 20's!!

Is anyone out there w/ a line on in person group ,real women going through this in PHX or surrounding?

​

My kids are college/post college. They don’t live at home but I see them fairly often especially one who lives closer to home. Lately I am so sad thinking about the fact that their childhood is over. I mean, it’s been over. But it’s like it hit me late or something. I was a stay at home mom for many years and we filled our weekends and especially our summers with day trips, mini getaway’s, trips for ice cream, etc. How is it over?
I work FT and have a fairly active social life and friend group but gosh it’s just been hard lately.
Thanks for commiserating with me!

When I was younger, I thought adulting was all about finding a job, paying bills, and taking on more responsibilities.

What no one told me was that one day I'd come home expecting everything to feel the same, only to realize everyone had grown up too.

My parents are busy. My siblings are busy. Everyone has their own schedules and responsibilities now.

I've always been a family person, so it's hard not having everyone together like we used to. It made me realize that growing up isn't just about becoming independent—it's also about accepting that the people you love are building lives of their own.

Maybe that's why the little moments together mean so much now. They're not as common as they used to be.

I never imagined that one day I'd count the years since I last hugged my children.

It's been five years

I have missed birthday, schools milestones, family dinners, and countless ordinary moments that parents should never have to miss.

Video calls help, but they don't replace being there.

For anyone who's experienced long family separation, how did you copy with it?

Have you felt the silence that shows up after you finally put something down?

Maybe it was the rescue pattern with your adult child — the late-night texts you used to answer at 2 a.m., the bailouts, the way you’d rearrange your whole week around their crisis. Maybe it was a marriage you finally stopped trying to fix single-handedly. Maybe it was just the role itself — the one where you were everyone’s emotional backbone, on call, indispensable.

Whatever it was, you put it down. You did the hard, brave thing every article and every well-meaning friend told you to do.

And now you’re sitting in a quiet that nobody warned you about.

I want to talk about that quiet today, because I don’t think enough people do. Everyone talks about the relief of letting go. Almost nobody talks about what comes immediately after — the strange, disorienting space where the burden used to live.

The silence isn’t empty. It’s full of a question.

Here’s what I’ve learned, both in my own life and in walking alongside hundreds of women through this exact moment: the quiet after letting go isn’t actually quiet. It’s loud with a question you spent years too busy to ask.

Who am I, when I’m not carrying someone else?

For years, the answer to “who are you” was easy. You were the fixer. The one who held the family together. The one whose phone was always on, whose schedule bent around everyone else’s emergencies. That identity had a job description, a clear use, an obvious value. You knew exactly what you were for.

And now you’ve set that job down — rightly so — and the question underneath it is staring back at you with no obvious answer.

This is the part nobody prepares you for. Letting go isn’t the finish line of the healing work. It’s the doorway into a much bigger question, one that has nothing to do with anyone else and everything to do with you.

Why this question feels more frightening than the burden did

I remember sitting in my own version of this quiet. My marriage had ended. My kids were grown and building their own lives, as they should. My career — the one that had defined “competent, capable Christine” for decades — was winding down. For the first time in longer than I could remember, nobody needed anything from me in that exact moment.

I thought I would feel free. Instead, I felt strangely exposed.

It turns out that being needed, even when it’s exhausting, gives you a kind of armor. It tells you what you’re for. Take that away, and you’re left with a more vulnerable question: not “what do they need from me,” but “what do I actually want?” That second question is harder, because there’s no one to answer to but yourself — and many of us haven’t asked ourselves a question like that in decades.

If you’re in this space right now, I want you to hear this clearly: the discomfort you’re feeling is not a sign that something went wrong. It’s a sign that something real is starting.

The mistake most women make here

The most common misstep I see in this stage isn’t laziness or avoidance — it’s overthinking dressed up as reflection. Women sit with the question “who am I now” for months, sometimes years, treating it like something they need to solve in their heads before they’re allowed to act.

But identity doesn’t usually arrive through thinking. It arrives through doing. You don’t figure out who you are and then go live it — you take a small, honest action, and the doing tells you something thinking never could.

This is why journaling alone often doesn’t move the needle, no matter how many prompts you try. Reflection without structure tends to circle. What actually creates forward motion is a process — something with a beginning, a middle, and a concrete next step, so the question stops being abstract and starts becoming something you can act on this week.

Where to start

If you’re standing in this exact quiet right now, here’s the smallest, most honest place to begin: ask yourself three questions. Where have I been? Where am I right now? Where am I going?

Not as a journaling exercise to perfect, but as an honest five-minute check-in with yourself — the kind you’ve probably given everyone else but rarely given yourself.

I built a short, free guide around exactly those three questions, called the Second Act Soul Check-In. It’s not homework. It’s a starting point — the first honest look at where you stand before you decide what’s next.

And if you’re ready to go further than reflection — if you’re ready for an actual process that turns “who am I now” into forward motion instead of an endless loop — that’s exactly what I built I Ain’t Dead Yet for. Seven days. One method. No vague journaling prompts. Just a structured way through the question, built by someone who has stood exactly where you’re standing.

You put the burden down. That was the hard part. This next part — figuring out who you are without it — isn’t a problem to solve. It’s an invitation. And you don’t have to answer it alone.

Grab the free resource – Second Act Soul Check In

If you’re ready to move further, check out my ebook, I Ain’t Dead Yet

Let’s Discuss: Think of the last time someone asked what YOU wanted, not what you needed to handle for someone else. When was that, and how did you answer?

Yesterday I went to a neighborhood rummage sale. Figured I would get my steps in while looking at stuff. One side of the street had many houses with sales, the other side had only one. I could tell right away the table across the street had Nerf guns because I know those colors. I could see a young person sitting at the table and he looked a little lonely. I figured I might as well go over there just to look.

It was a teenaged boy, no more than sixteen years old. He was sitting in the chair and had two small talbes of Nerf guns and some video games. He had all his things priced and organized nicely. I asked him if this was his whole collection or if he kept some things. He said he kept some things. I told him how my son used to have a big collection and last year he was done with college so I asked my son if he wanted to keep any of his Nerf guns. My son told me to get rid of all of them but I didn't want to do that becuse he might still want to play with them someday. I did donate a lot of them. I told this teenager that I used to play Nerf with my son and I still might play with them someday. I spent time looking at all his stuff and talked about how we had this one, we didn't have that one, that's a good one.

We had a nice conversation. He was so nice and polite. I didn't want to walk away without buying something but I also don't need Nerf or video games or extra stuff in the house.

I told this teenager that my son moved out. I was trying very hard not to cry. I couldn't help it. This cute teeanager. The memories of playing with my son. With tears in my eyes I told him I would like to make a donation. He got a big smile on his face and asked, really? I pulled five bucks out of my pocket and gave it to him. His whole face lit up. He thanked me and we wished each other a nice day. I started crying as I walked away. I couldn't help it.

Then around the corner, at the next sale, I walked up and told that woman why I was crying. We then had a nice chat about being empty nesters. Her oldest kid moved out and is now a cop. She still has a teenager at home. I told her about this sub and how helpful it is. She said it's nice to talk to others that feel the same way about their kids moving out.

I had a nice conversation with an older man who was selling kids stuff. He said all his grandkids are too old for that stuff now. I told him I'm an empty nester and an having a hard time looking at the kids stuff. He talked about how awesome it is to have grandkids.

At the end of the street were two young girls selling lemonade and cookies. I had a nice conversation with them and bought some. My husband and I will always buy whatever the kids are selling at their stands/tables. Gives them practice talking, pouring, money transactions, etc. If we don't want to eat the treats or drink the sugary drinks we don't have to, we can dump them after we leave when we are out of sight. I like giving the kids a chance to experience selling and making money. I know we could just make a donation but I prefer to let them go through the motions of the money, pouring, safely serving the treats, talking. Makes their day.

I had a hard time looking at these rummage sales with all the cute baby/kids clothing and toys. I should really avoid rummage sales, though. I must look like a nutcase trying not to cry...