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Parents, is there ever a time after your kids have grown and left, that you come to the realization that this is your time and your life now? I see and hear a lot of parents who are overly involved in their adult children's lives, but are there some parents out there who are looking forward to and willing to step back and live their lives unselfishly (again) for themselves, like they did before there were children in the picture?
I have the type of parents that dont call and dont set up regular times to see me because they are living their lives, traveling, going out with friends etc. My boyfriends parents (divorced and living with gf's/bf's) are the same way.
They just simply have no guilt about saying they are busy doing their own things and living their own lives. Not to say we dont see them or talk to them occasionally (once a month or so). I just find that empowering. I was wondering if other parents felt the same way (look forward to the day their children leave and they can focus on their marriages/husbands/wives/hobbies/work etc again).
I'm counting the days until my kids grow up and become their own people, able to decide things on their own, support themselves, decide what to wear without me picking it, wash their own laundry, cook their own meals, wake up without me screaming at them, etc. I will always have time for my kids, no matter how old they get, but at some point I will have time for myself.
I haven't decided yet if I will be tired of cooking, cleaning, doing laundry for, and putting up with a grouchy husband at that point, and if it will be just pure ME time, or if it will be him and me time, and I'll spend my declining years still waiting on him hand and foot. Somehow when I picture traveling all over the country, I don't picture a second bicycle riding beside mine.
Yep... I am there now.
The baby was married in 2010, so it is just DH and I.
I am sooooo grateful that we "came out on the other side", pretty much picking up where we left off before kids. And it is nice to spend money on US for a change!
Oddly enough, the kids are surprised when the read (esp on Facebook) about all the things we do. They are all "Gee, guess you don't miss me much!"... but we do.
Hard to judge the future, as I have plenty of years before that happens, but I assume it will be a mix of us and them. I assume when they are in their 20's, they will be off on their own with a few check-ins with us, but as they get older we will be wanted more. I'm ok with that, as it is what my life path has been.
I have lots of things I want to do, and I want to do them now, but some things have to wait. We will easily have things to do, as we are pretty active socially and we have lots of traveling we want to do.
It took my parents about a year and a half of spinning their wheels before they were like "Holy Crap, we can do stuff!". Now they have all these hobbies, I feel like I'm learning more about who my parents "are" as people now than when they were raising me, it's interesting and fun!
My mom was counting the days until the empty nest. And then my youngest sister had a baby and a breakdown and now my parents have custody of the baby and are in the process of adopting him, so now they are starting all over. They are now raising their third cycle of kids - first me, then my sisters 13/15 years later, and now their grandson 17 years later. My mom will be 80 when he graduates high school. They don't get much of a life after kids. I'll have an empty nest before she does at this point.
And then there's my mother, who just shoved the last chick out of the nest two years ago. Now my dad has early-onset alzheimers and my mom says it's like taking care of a giant toddler.
I am there. And loving it. I will admit to some strange dementia when my youngest was 16, I wanted another baby...trust me, this only lasts a month or two. Then, I got over it.
Now I am happy to see my kids when they come visit, I go to yoga class every day, read on the weekends. I am happier now than I have ever been.
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