I’ve just dropped off my youngest son at college. And rather than focus on my home being an empty nest, I like to think of it as my roomier nest. 

You’ll Learn:

• How to find the wisdom in procrastination
• The different ways feelings show up in our bodies and minds
• My take on an empty nest
• What I want out of this next stage

I hope that by sharing my story and perspective, you’ll feel less alone and understand what we’re really going through during this time. 

---------------------------

My Roomier Nest Story

On Sawyer’s drop-off day, I really didn’t know how I would feel. I didn’t start the day in my big feelings, but I recognized that I’d been finding ways to procrastinate and avoid this day all summer. I really didn’t want to even think about him leaving. Even as the time grew closer, I kept myself busy with the practical pieces, the shopping, the planning.

When move-in day came, I noticed that I was grumpy and testy, which is unusual for me. When I got in my car after a physical therapy appointment, I suddenly felt so sick - nauseous and heavy, like I’d been punched in the stomach. 

The closest name I could give the emotion was dread. But it wasn’t in my head. It was fully in my body. Something in my very core did not feel good. As soon as I got home, I started to cry really hard. 

I pulled it together for an amazing call with the Calm Mama Club, and when I got off of Zoom, I went numb. I kept going through the motions of running errands, packing up the car and riding to Santa Barbara. 

But through the whole drive, I could tell that my nervous system was on fire. I didn’t feel safe. I was anxious and on edge. I was breathing quickly and sweating. Again, it was such a physiological reaction. 

We got him moved in and met up with my older son for dinner. Afterward, it was time for Sawyer to go to an orientation meeting and start his dorm life. There wasn’t really a reason for us to go back with him, so we said goodbye in front of the sushi restaurant and he drove away. 

It wasn’t how I pictured it. I thought we’d go back to his dorm, I’d take some pictures, we’d have some more time. As my husband and I started driving home, I wasn’t having a ton of feelings and I got really chatty (the opposite of my reaction when we left Lincoln at school the year before). 

But as we took the exit toward our house, my body went haywire. I got this overwhelming feeling in my stomach. Without getting too graphic, I made it home and spent the next 2 hours in the bathroom. It was like a physiological grief. I wasn’t thinking my feelings. I was feeling them fully in my body. 

To be honest, all of this was a bit of a shock to me. I hadn’t been feeling much. I thought I was okay. But the body never lies. We store stress in our bodies, and our bodies communicate with us. 

Finally, I fell asleep. When I woke up, I felt like someone had died. It was a deep, deep grief. My past experiences of grief have been physiological, too. I get very tired and achy. I need to be cozy in my bed. So that’s what I’ve been doing - getting up for the must-dos of my day and then retreating back to my bed.

All of this to say, your reaction to this change may not be what you expected. It might sneak up on you or show up in a surprising way. Whatever you feel and however those feelings come up are okay.

A New Stage

My youngest son moving out marks the end of my motherhood years. Some part of my identity and my existence has ended. I need to allow this chapter of my life to come to a close.

I loved raising kids, and the experience changed me on a deep level. I’ve used this opportunity to become aware, heal, evaluate and grow. 

Of course, I’m still a mom. But my kids are adults. They’re grown, and I am about to embark on a new journey.

In order to move on, we have to allow ourselves to grieve. To let go of motherhood as we’ve known it so far and make room for the next stage. You can grieve and feel sorrow while also holding hope for what’s next.

I’m calling my next stage the roomier nest. With more room in my home and my life, I’ll have more time, energy and capacity to love my children and love myself more deeply. 

To use the metaphor of our kids’ lives being a sporting event, I no longer have a courtside seat, but I can’t wait to hear the recap. I love hearing their stories and what’s going on in their lives. And I’ve realized that I want even more than that. 

I want them to come to me before the game and share their strategy. Tell me what they’re thinking and the decisions they’re going to make. I want to be their sounding board and mentor. 

In order to make that happen, I have to step back further and further. I have to let go and be okay with the transition we’re experiencing so that I can create space for what’s next. 

I think this is what we all want. The end goal isn’t just to launch our kids into adulthood. We also want to have amazing relationships with them when they’re grown. 

There is life on the other side of motherhood. I want you to know that it’s okay to grieve, and the next best thing is also right around the corner. 

My belly is upset, but my heart is so full of love, hope and excitement.

Free Resources:

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Connect With Darlynn: 

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• Rate and review the podcast on Itunes

Welcome back to become a calm mama. I'm your host. I'm Darlyn

Childress. I'm a life and parenting coach. And on this

episode, I am going to share my experience

of dropping off my

youngest child at college.

I have 2 kids. They are 2018.

And last year, my older one, they're only one grade apart

even though they're 2 years apart. Because sometimes when you have a kid with ADHD,

they need an extra year in school to mature.

Right? So, they're 2 22 years

apart, 1 grade apart. So last year, I brought my son

Lincoln, to college, and we live in Southern California.

And he went to school in Santa Barbara, and so I dropped him off last

year. And now this year, I

dropped my second child off at college.

And he's also doing the same thing his brother did. And he's in Santa Barbara,

and he's living in the dorms, and he's doing the whole thing just like Lincoln

did. So Lincoln is my oldest one. Sawyer is my

younger one. And as of

last Tuesday, so this episode is coming out, like, a week

later, the none of my children live in my house

anymore. So this summer, they were both

here. It was very busy. Lots of hustle bustle. Lot

going on. They had friends. They had, you know, traveling. Like, they were

just around a lot and also really busy. So

a lot of go lot going on. And then on a Friday afternoon,

Lincoln left. He has an apartment. So he moved into his

apartment. And then a couple days later, I drove

Sawyer and he dropped him off at his dorm.

And it's I wanna share a little bit about the experience. And I

noticed that as I've talked about this with a few people that

some moms start to feel, like, almost

as I describe what I'm have gone through kind of like, oh,

my god. Like, they kinda feel dread about this life

stage that I'm gonna talk about in this experience that I'm gonna talk about.

And I really don't want you to feel afraid

or worried or, like, you know, you don't even have to put yourself

in my shoes or imagine yourself going through this experience,

especially if you have little ones like 45 or, you know,

even 7 or 8. Like, you can't really imagine this

experience. But for some of you some of you listening to this podcast, you

know, you are high schoolers or you are already an empty

nester or, like, I'm calling it a roomier nester.

And so this might really be helpful for you to kind of, you know, feel

like you're not alone in this process and maybe understand a little bit of what

you went through. So I say all that because I don't I

never want to put out an episode and then have you freak

out. So, you know, just

listen as if you're listening to, like, a mentor talk to you about something that

they went through, and you can just kinda put it in, like, put a

little pin in your heart and in your head and be like, someday I'll

listen to this episode again. And, like, I'll understand what she's talking about.

Okay. So on the Tuesday morning,

well, let me just say this. I did not I did not

know how I would feel. I was not in my big

feelings necessarily. I was kind of avoiding

packing first packing soya up, buying things. I could tell

all summer that I was somewhat avoidant of what was coming.

But I, you know, was also like, I did it last year. I know what

to get. I'll just get the basics, and it's fine. And but I could also

tell that I was really, like, procrastinating. And I

noticed procrastination, there's always a wisdom to it, or

there's an invitation to explore why you're

procrastinating. So anytime I don't do something in the

timeline that I would typically do it or the timeline that I told myself I

would do it, instead of judging myself and being like, oh my god, what's wrong

with you? You're so lazy. Get your shit together. I usually get

curious like, hey, darling. Why are you not doing that?

Like, what are you resisting there? Or what what is maybe your wisdom, your

intuition telling you there? So I was procrastinating a little bit

and noticed that I just really didn't wanna think about him leaving.

And so I knew there was some emotion, but I don't know

that like, Lincoln laughed and then did bitty

bopity came home, got gathered stuff. Like, I was just in the practical

parts of it. Okay. So Tuesday morning, we know we're gonna leave, like, around 3

or 4 and drive to Santa Barbara. And

I had physical therapy because, you know, I had foot

surgery not so long ago. So I went to physical therapy,

and I was grumpy in my physical therapy appointment. I could

tell I was like testy and I was a little grumpy and that's always

interesting to me when I'm grumpy because I'm usually not. So I was a

little curious. I'm like, I've got something going on. Then I leave

and I get in the car. And all of a sudden, I feel

sick to my stomach. Like, my stomach hurts

and it feels I'm nervous or I'm anxious

or I'm gonna throw up. Like, I don't know what's going on. I just

feel like this is how dread shows up for

me where I get sort of a heavy,

like, like, bids punch in the stomach. Like, my stomach aches. Like, it

gets really tight. It hurts. And that was happening. And I was

like, Okay. I'm feeling

something. Like, it was like, I am feeling

dread if I could describe it. But what was interesting is that

the emotion wasn't in my head. It was like in my body,

like in my core in the center of

me was like tight and not

not feeling good. So I got home

and I immediately, like,

started crying. Like, I went in and my husband was in his office and he's

like, hey. How was PT? And I just, I don't know. I just, like, let

go and I started to cry really hard. And I was like, today, he's leaving.

I don't even know if I said any words. I just felt like,

it's not even sadness. Like, I can't describe it besides saying

dread. And then I had to call mama club. We meet on

Tuesdays at 9:30 if you wanna join us. You're welcome. And I got on

the call and just shared with the mamas

what I was going through, and then I kinda got it together and a coach.

We had an amazing session, you know, talked about all

the things that moms wanna talk about. And then I got off the phone. I

got off the Zoom with them. I, you know, canceled, you

know, end the meeting, whatever. And then I

don't have any other clients that day because I had cleared my schedule so that

I could move Sawyer. And I just go

numb. Like I just go numb. Like I just am not

really thinking or feeling much. I'm just going through the

motions. He has a couple errands to run. We pack

up. He drives and because he took

he took a car with him, and I drove in his car. And my husband

came up a little bit while later. And the

the whole drive, I can tell that my nervous

system is on fire. Like, I'm not I do not

feel safe. And that is true whenever my kids drive, really.

I feel a lot of anxiety about them driving this.

But I was like, on edge. I was like, woah, but it was very

physiological, like my, I was having like, like, my breath

was coming faster, and I just felt tight and like I was

sweating and stuff. So having this experience,

we get there that, you know, get him checked in, get his

room key, you know, move everything in place looks

cute. We realized we don't have a lot. Like, we we brought everything we

needed except one extension cord. And,

we had planned to meet meet up with my older son Lincoln, meet

up with my husband, and the 2 of us meet for sushi. We have a

little tradition. So we were gonna meet for sushi dinner, come back to Sawyer's

place, and Kevin was gonna come with me. And

so we go, we realized it's getting late. We meet at the restaurant.

We pick up the extension cord from Target. I'm sharing

all this even though it's not that important, but sometimes people care about the details.

And then it's we eat our sushi dinner, and it is getting a little bit

late into the evening. It's, like, 7, 7:30 or something.

And Sawyer has an town hall

meeting orientation thing that evening that starts,

like, at 7:30 or something. So he's gonna

go back and go, like, start his dorm life. And there's not

really a reason for us to go back with him because he's kind of

all moved in. And so we say goodbye

to him in front of their sushi sushi

restaurant just on, like, the street. Like, okay. Hug kiss.

Bye. Good luck. And he gets in the car and he drives away. And I

was just like, woah. Okay. That wasn't how I pictured it, but

whatever. I guess he's fine. I didn't even take a picture of the dorm

room. I really thought we were going back. So that was kinda odd. Anyway,

Lincoln goes back to his apartment. We get in the car. We drive. I decide

to drive because my husband had driven up. I was like, I'll drive. Bippity

boppity tick chit chat. I'm talking, talking, talking, which well

with Lincoln when he left, once we dropped him

off and I got in the car, I could not speak

for 40 minutes. I was, like, in shock. I was just like,

I just stared out the window, and I felt extremely sad.

That was my feeling with my first leaving. And then with

Sawyer, I didn't really have any feelings. Like, I was like, well, that was weird.

Okay. Bye. Driving, chitchat, blah blah blah about, you

know, their apartments and the con you know, the dorm and blah blah

blah. Like, kinda like really chatty. And

then as we get off of the freeway, we're,

like, exiting to our home. All of a

sudden, my body starts

to go haywire. I don't know how else to describe it.

And not just my body, but my stomach. And I don't wanna

be too graphic here, but I don't know how else to talk about it.

But it was like everything in my

body turned to liquid. It was like like

my water was gonna break or something. It was just

like a overwhelming, whooshy feeling in my

stomach. And I'm driving, and I'm like, oh my god. I don't know if I'm

gonna make it home because I feel like I I'm

gonna, like, release my bowels. You know? And

I Kevin was joking me with me and I was like, oh my god. I

don't know. And he's like, you gotta make it. Right? You know, like little kids.

And then I pull in the garage, I get home and I proceed

to release every part,

everything in my body, I spent the next 2 hours in the bathroom

just letting go of everything

inside of me. It felt like

I I don't know how to describe it. It was like a physiological

grief. My body released and let go

of everything in it. It was

as if I was emptying myself out.

And I didn't really think about this till the next day, but, like,

they call this the empty nest stage. And

it was like my body was emptying itself.

I did not have a lot of emotion in my head.

Like a lot of times I'm thinking my thoughts and I'm thinking my

feelings. But in this scenario, I was

feeling in my body, my experience

and releasing and letting go and emptying

everything out. I was joking. I was like, I guess my

body took the assignment literally of like empty nest. Do you

know, like my nest in my belly in my body was

like emptying. Okay. I won't go into any more details. I promise.

And that was surprising to me to have

such a physiological reaction. It was a little bit of a shock, to

be honest, because I really had not been feeling

much. I was, like, just okay.

But, apparently, you know, the body never lies. The body keeps

score. The body always tells the truth. We store all our stress in

our bodies, and our bodies communicate with

us. And that was what was happening. And I had no choice,

but to be in the experience and to

just lay in bed and back and forth and just letting go.

Eventually, after a couple of hours, I was able to fall asleep. I woke

up and I felt like someone had

died. I was

in deep, deep grief.

I know what grief feels like. I've talked about it on this podcast

because 3 people very, very close to me

all died, like, 1 year apart of each other.

And there's this very physiological experience I

have when I am grieving. I get very tired. I get

very achy and I like take to my bed. I just, I've got to go

to sleep. I've got to lay down. I've just got to be cozy. I gotta

be in bed. And because I have experienced that, I kind of

understand that it's not forever and I need to listen to it. I can't

fight it. I just give into it. And I trust the

wisdom of my body and what it's telling me. And so I did

my I I was like, oh my god. I I gotta get up and do

I had a little bit of work to do. So I got up. I did

my day, and then I immediately got back into bed. And

I just was grieving, and it was like an existential

grief. And here is what I was thinking about.

I was thinking about how this lee

departure, my youngest son moving out, my older son moving

out, no one living in my house anymore, that this

really marked the end of my motherhood

years. And I know that that might

be really hard for some of you to hear

that it's a season of your life and then it

ends. Now, am I still a mom? Yes. Do they live

close? Yes. Like, I get it. I'm not I

know they didn't die. But in some some identity,

some role, some part of me and my existence is

ended. It's over. I'll never have little kids

again. I won't have kids in k through

12. You know, they're adults. I They're they're grown.

And I am about to embark on the next stage of

motherhood, the next journey, the next part of it.

And in order to do that well,

I have to grieve the end of this stage in order to

create room as I'm calling the stage the roomier

nest, not empty, but roomier as they create room for

the next relationship and room for what comes after this.

I need to grieve and let go of what has already happened.

That doesn't mean that I need to, like, regret

anything or rechange anything. Like maybe I do have

to reconcile some of the mistakes I've made. Maybe that's part of the grief

process, but I know that I need to allow for this

chapter of my life to come to a close. It's not

the end of the book, but it is the end of this chapter. And it

was beautiful. I loved

raising kids as hard as it is and how

draining it is. The life experience

of raising children changed me on such a deep

level. I am not the same person I was at

29 when Lincoln was born.

I'm no longer

that person. I have used this opportunity

of parenting to grow, to

evaluate, to become aware, to heal. It's

been a lifetime, like, opportunity, really.

I've loved it. And it's no longer the

same. It's different, and it's changing. And that's okay.

It's okay for me to grieve and to let go

and to empty out and to have

sorrow while also holding hope for what's next. I

can I can hold both things? I can be

sad that something has ended while also being

happy of the new thing that's coming. I can grieve my

kids little baby childhood selves while also

loving their young adult self. Being able to hold

those 2 tensions can be really confusing. We can oftentimes

squish one emotion. We push it down and

repress it in order to make space. I always think like

weaponizing gratitude. Right? Using gratitude against yourself.

Like I shouldn't feel bad because or I shouldn't feel

sad because because they live so close, because they are so happy,

because this is what's supposed to happen. Like, I don't need to rationalize

myself out of my experience, and you don't either.

If your little one has gone to kindergarten and you're grieving preschool, grieve

it. Yeah. They're not gonna be that little. If you have

a middle schooler, and and they don't want you to lay in bed with

them anymore, it's okay to feel sad about that.

It's okay to feel whatever you're feeling. And

it's okay if your body decides to tell you what you're

feeling because that's what happened in my case.

Now, I want to leave you with a couple of thoughts about what's next.

What does it look like after this? Because I think we

sometimes, like, if you're listening, you're like, that's so

sad. I I want to say no, I have so much hope

about what I'm creating. There is so much room.

It's roomier now. I have more time and energy and

capacity to love my children and love myself at deeper

levels. And I've been thinking a lot about

this this experience of motherhood. And I've been

using the analogy of, like, being at the game.

Right? Being at the game of their life and how when they're

real little, like, you're on the court, really. You know, you're like, pick up the

ball, throw it this way. Like, you're really, really involved when they're super

little, like, you know, 1 to 6 or whatever. And then

slowly you start to, like, just kinda watch what they're doing, but you're really

close. You're in the front seat, like you're in the front of front of the

the front row. You have a front row view of your child growing and

developing, and it's beautiful. And every year as they get older

and older, you move back a row of those bleachers.

And when they're teenagers, you're at the, like, bleachers, like the

nosebleeds. And really, it kinda feels like your nose is gonna bleed all

the time because it's just so stressful. But you're in the nosebleeds

section. Like, you're there, but you're not really that close.

And you can't really be, like, you know, yelling at them from the sideline. Like,

you're further back. And now as with young

adults, I feel as if I'm no longer at the

game. I'm not in the gymnasium

anymore. I'm not watching the game.

I don't have like, tickets to it. Right? I don't get to

see it. Sometimes I get invited to get a VIP box, and I get to

watch something that they're doing or participate in part of their lives. But for the

most part, I'm getting the highlights real. Right? I'm getting

the recap. I'm getting the the, you know, synopsis

of what happened because I wasn't there. And that's fine. I

love it. I love hearing their stories. I love them telling me

what's going on in their lives. It's beautiful.

And that is why we do what we do,

why we put in the time, why we parent the way we parent because we

want our kids to want to tell us what's been going on

in their life. We want the highlights real, right?

We want the story. We want them to tell us their

experience of playing that game. And I

realized that that's not all I

want actually in this next stage of parenting.

I want them to come to me before they play the

game and say, hey, this is my strategy. This is what I'm

thinking. Here's where I'm at. Here's the decisions I'm gonna

make. What do you think? You got any input?

Or just as a sounding board, we're moving away

from parenting and into mentoring. And

allowing that to be created means

that I have to step back further and further. I have to grieve my sadness.

I have to let go. I have to be okay with the change and the

transformation and the the transition that we

are experiencing so that I can create space

for what is next. And this is what I want. This is what

I think that we're all here. We're not just getting our kids

launched into adulthood, into career or college or

whatever it is. That's not enough,

really because we don't want our kids to just grow up

and, like, feel disconnected from them. That's the whole, like, what we all want. We

want them to, like, have a relationship with us when they're grown. So what is

that relationship? What I'm seeing it as, what I

wanna create, I want the highlights real. I want the recap,

right? And I wanna do the pregame,

not the drinking type of pregame. But I wanna pregame with them. What's

going on? What's your plan? What are you thinking? What are your what decisions are

you gonna make? What is it? I'll tell you a

simple little funny thing that happened at that sushi

dinner with Lincoln and Sawyer and Kevin and I.

So Sawyer, I think, was in his own world because he had, like, moved into

the dorm. Now he's at dinner with his family, and now he's going back. And

I think he was just kinda like, you know, he just ate a bunch of

sushi and was kinda quiet. But Lincoln, he had already moved into his

apartment and we hadn't really talked to him. So he says, hey,

mom, I wanna run something by you. Oh,

mamas. That was music to my ears. That's when I

realized, like, that is what I want. I want, hey,

mom, I wanna run something by you. I wanna get your

input on this. I wanna hear your opinion on this. That's the

pregame. That's the, hey, let's talk it through. I wanna be part of the

strategy. Not like me do it. I want them to come up with strategy and

just run it by me. I wanna be the mentor. So he's like, mom, I'm

gonna run something by you. And this is what made me I'm laughing because this

is what he offered to me. He said, hey. So his apartment has

a little patio when he has 3 roommates. So there's 4 of them in a

2 bedroom apartment. He says, mom, we

can get a hot tub on Facebook Marketplace for free.

All we have to do is move it. What do you think? You think we

should get a hot tub and put it on our patio?

I was like, well, as your guarantor

of your apartment, I'm gonna say no. I don't think that's a good

idea. And so he was laughing. He was also

saying, like, they hadn't done their dishes. I'm like, you just said you haven't done

your dishes yet. How do you think you're gonna manage a hot

tub? So it was really funny. It was a silly example, but it really

him just saying, hey. I wanna run something by you. I was, like, oh,

yes. This is where we're headed here.

This is what we're doing. This is why we're we've I've worked so hard.

And yes, I'm grieving. Yes. My

stomach is in knots and I'm, you know, definitely

very, very, very tired. It's like 20 years of fatigue

is all hitting me at one time. I have been in it

physically and my heart has been

so full, so full of love and hope and

excitement for them. It's like my belly is

upset, but my heart is full.

So I wanted to give you that story and help you see that

there's life on the other side and of motherhood

of any stage you're at and that you're gonna grieve these stages as you

go through them. And that's okay. And that the next

best thing is also right around the corner.

So if this spoke to you, please let me know. Share share

it with your friends. Connect with me on Instagram. Reply to the email

if you're on my email list. Tell me what your thoughts were. And I

just I'd love to hear from you so much. It makes my day.

And if you wanna work with me at all, of course, you can join come

on my club and we can talk about where you're at in your life stage

or book a consultation with me. So I'm just gonna leave you with

that story and thanks for listening and thanks for

being just an amazing podcast audience. I I just

feel so loved and bolstered by all of you. And I

know that you're learning so much from the podcast, and I appreciate whenever you tell

me that you shared it or or you found it from a friend, it just

makes me so happy. So thanks for listening, and I will talk

to you next time.