Matters of the Heart: Empty Nesting

Becoming an empty nester can be both an exciting and difficult life transition for many. I know for myself, I have moments of dreaming what it will be like when my kids are grown and out of the house and all my time and energy are my own. But, really, I can't even begin to imagine what an empty nest will look and feel like for me in the years to come. My friend and fellow blogger, Dottie Pickett, was willing to sit down with me (in the virtual setting of our blogging worlds, that is) and share some of her story and experience. Here's a bit of our conversation.

What was your experience of being a mom when the girls were in the house?

The minute you conceive you become a mom, which means I have been a mom for over 25 years.

I was in heaven being a mom from day one. My mom and I weren't close, so I'm told that I had an extra need to bond with my girls. As a Marriage and Family Therapist I only worked a couple of days a week, so I had lots and lots of time to nurture them, play with them, watch them participate in sports and musicals, and even get involved with their school projects, like being in charge of costumes for their school plays.

One of our favorite things was to do crafts together. For instance, one entire summer we made elaborate masquerade masks for Carly's 16th birthday! So fun!

What has the process of becoming an empty nester been like for you, what are some of the struggles you face, and what's been helpful to you during this transition?

When it began to hit me that my youngest was going off to college I went into a severe depression. I know that not everyone will have the same experience. I have learned that there is a major chemical component with me that others don’t have. With my depression there was a perfect storm: emotional enmeshment and empty nesting, biological/chemical issues and hormonal changes. Thankfully, I’m in a much better place now. Various things have been helpful in pulling me out of depression.

In order to lift yourself out of depression you have to address it from all angles. I began working out consistently, I got a lot of prayer and I prayed a lot, I started in-depth therapy, I got on antidepressants, I started volunteering at a fun organization, I made sure to plan quality time with my wonderful husband and good friends, and I started gardening and cooking more. Interestingly enough, starting my blog, Pickett’s Pearls, was the thing that has helped me the most. I have a strong need to be creative, and when the girls left I didn’t see how I was going to fulfill that part of me. My blog meets so many other needs, giving me something that is all my own and not connected with my girls.

Does your experience differ from your husband's? If so, how? If not, what is it like being empty nesters together? 

It has been hard on my husband as well because he and the girls are very close, but not nearly as hard as it has been on me. He has been unbelievably loving through this whole excruciating time. I really don’t know what I would have done without him.

Being empty nesters has been good for our marriage. We are looking more to each other to have our needs met. For example, I have really gotten into watching football and basketball with him. Of course he loves that! We've also really been enjoying getting into cooking.

What are you most proud of in what you have done to raise your daughters?

Our daughters are both very kind and empathic people. They also have a desire to get closer to Christ.

What are you most proud of in what you are doing now? 

Surprise, surprise! Pickett’s Pearls. Pickett’s Pearls is mostly four ingredient recipes and creative or helpful tips for the home. I don’t know where it will go, but I’m okay with that. I feel like I was made for this and I enjoy every part of it: the planning, the writing with humor and lightness, the photography (my photos are worlds away from where they were), the problem solving needed for things like how to make a delectable lemon rum cake with only four ingredients or how to keep your sponges from smelling icky. I also love to make beautiful things: wreaths, napkin folds, and jewelry. And I really love encouraging others to create beautiful things.

Tell me something about being an empty nester that you didn't expect or that someone who hasn't gone through this process might not know.

Very few parents have the extreme struggle that I have had, but almost every empty nester has a hard time. My advice would be to find “life giving” endeavors way before it’s time for your children to leave the nest. Whether it’s finding a job you really like or taking up painting or going back to school - something that you can immerse yourself in, something involving others, and something fulfilling.

Children bring so much life and energy into the home. They not only physically have more energy, thereby adding energy to any environment, but they also have their whole lives in front of them which usually comes with lots of plans, hopes, and dreams. Also, because they don’t have as many responsibilities as adults do they are almost always more playful and light. As empty nesters we need to create our own energy by planning fun activities with our spouse and/or friends, making sure we are always learning something new, and being involved in things we are excited about.

Dottie is a married momma of two beautiful women (Carly, 24, fine artist, and Abbey, 21, Film major at USC). She's also a licensed Marriage and Family therapist and a fellow blogger over at www.pickettspearls.net.

More posts in this series:

Living with Emotional Pain

Love and Basketball

Waiting in the Pain
An Unnatural Leader

Matters of the Heart: Love and Basketball

Love and Basketball
A Weekly Dose of Inner Peace from an Unlikely Source
by Bruce Overby

A Liberating Routine

Every Tuesday I drive to my mother’s house and load up my special needs brother, Eric, who lives with her, and take him to a local park to shoot baskets. After that we go out for coffee.

It seems like a simple routine, and perhaps it is for him. But for me, over the seven years we’ve been doing this, it’s become much more than that.

Eric and Bruce

Welcome Aboard, Little Dude

Eric was born in 1967, the eighth of nine children. Our parents, gradually discovering Eric’s handicap, which would limit his mental capacity to that of a 5 year old for the rest of his life, must have fretted greatly. Extra care would be needed, additional financial pressures might arise, and they would have to manage it all in a brood that was already large and demanding.

At the same time, I know they saw silver linings: Eric had no physical deformity, and while his development would be slow, it would be steady. And most importantly, we learned over time that his condition was not progressive — it would not get worse. We had all learned by example to help care for one another, so we generally embraced Eric, provided the small bits of extra care he needed, and watched over him with a slightly more protective eye than we had with each other.

Brush with Tragedy

Fast forward to the fall of 2010, our mother suffered a ruptured artery in her stomach that nearly took her life. Her stomach problem was the result of analgesics she had been using to soothe orthopedic pain. In the wake of the crisis we put our heads together to think about relieving her daily burdens so the pain could be relieved without the medicine. In particular, we considered the central burden of her life, which was caring for Eric, who was now a 200 pound middle-aged man with the limited abilities and consistent needs of an energetic five year old.

We considered placing Eric in a care facility, but Mom was insistent: “I need Eric in my life,” she told us, flatly refusing anything that would take him away from her.

We all got a stark reminder that day of not only the strong connection our mother had built with Eric, but also the very simple fact that Eric is, in every sense, a person. He has special needs, yes, but he looks you in the eye and calls you by your name, values his family and his life, and not only mutters the names of his brothers and sisters incessantly, but drops whatever he’s doing at the sound of a sibling’s voice entering the house. And even more than that, he is a man who treasures, to the extent that he can, the person who has been the most constant presence in his life, his mother.

Not So Different from the Rest of Us
In the end, we decided each of us would do what we could to take Eric out so Mom could have at least a few extra hours of respite a few times a week. One brother has taken him for the occasional Saturday outing, lasting much of the day. Each of two sisters take him for an evening a week, providing him with dinner and activities in their homes, or a trip to Target or Home Depot. And I, of course, get him out on the basketball court.

On the court and off, I’ve discovered that as different as this lumbering, clumsy, sometimes silly man is from the rest of us, he is also very much the same. He is more vulnerable, certainly, unable to make rational decisions or move independently through a world that requires complex thinking and sophisticated words. But like any of us, he is curious. He cranes his head and leans in to feast his now failing eyes on any shining, pinging, or glowing thing he sees or hears. He’s also fickle sometimes, growing tired of the basketball court we typically use and asking for “a different park.” And at other times, he’s a creature of habit, ordering the same Javiva iced-coffee drink every week, without fail. And he even gets lazy sometimes, taking a day off from the special needs program he attends or taking a little more time than usual to get motivated for his outings. And who among us doesn’t get fickle about some things and habitual about others, or feel a little lazy every once in a while?

Freedom
But the real discovery I’ve made in these years of basketball with Eric has been one of complete release and freedom. Because in many ways, I’ve realized, Eric’s handicap has set him free. He is free from the burden of difficult choices and challenges to self-esteem, and the hours, days, sometimes weeks of consternation that come with them. And the price of that freedom is actually our gift as members of his family: It is the privilege of providing the support and care that grants him that freedom. Because who knows what kind of person Eric would be without the support system he has? Who knows what might befall a vulnerable innocent like him? The answer is, no one does, and no one ever will, because he does have two hard-working, sensitive, empathetic parents, a brilliant and compassionate stepmother, and eight solid and supportive siblings. (Eric easily matches sibling names to birth order. “Who’s No. 4?” “Bruce!” “Who’s No. 8?” “Eric!” And constantly reconfirms his schedule of visitors. “Cindy’s coming?” “Yep.” “Wednesday, five o’clock?” “Yep.”)

The weather is fine in Silicon Valley and my work is painless, but the distance between the problems I solve and the people I solve them for is so great that I am often left wondering, why? I meet, create, analyze, assess, measure and remeasure, judge and get judged, and after all that, the accomplishment I feel is fleeting, and the question lingers, what’s the point of it all? But for two hours every Tuesday I am delivered from all that. The amiable lummox who is my brother greets me and goes through the routine. Ball and wallet are zipped securely into the duffel bag. I brush his hair — my vanity, not his — and he tucks the brush into the bag for later. In the car, the toughest decisions to make are which Peet’s coffee shop to go to and whether or not we’ll look for “a different park.”

Out in the world Eric draws the occasional quizzical look or frown, but he also draws out astonishing levels of humanity. The clerk at the coffee shop simply smiles as Eric rounds the counter and sticks his big head right into the cash register. A boy, maybe 10 years old, shares a basket with us and soon takes it on himself to shag each of Eric’s misses, returning the ball to Eric carefully while balancing his own ball on his tiny hip. It is a time of human frailty and goodness, and of lightness buttressed by lifelong devotion. And this is where I am set free. Life steps down from ethereal complexity and becomes simple, essential, and palpable.

And the predictable result is that, on those rare occasions when some conflict gets in the way and I miss my time with Eric, it is a bad week. Sadness and a sense of yearning creep in during that long stretch of 13 days, but no matter. For now, at least, there is always the next Tuesday, which will come along and make everything right.

Bruce Overby is a prize-winning author and writer in the truest sense of the word. He spends his days as a technical writer and his off time as a fiction writer. His writing passions lie in the world of loss, addiction, family, relationships, and the human condition in a technology-driven world. You can read more from Bruce at www.bruceoverby.com. He also happens to be my beloved brother-in-law. I hope you all enjoyed his offering.

More posts in this series:

Living with Emotional Pain

Empty Nesting

Waiting in the Pain
An Unnatural Leader

Chat Night

If you've read my "About" page you know that one of the things Matthew and I are serious about is investing in our marriage. You probably already know that this marriage thing is hard and messy work - vulnerable conversations, self sacrifice, swallowing your pride, confrontation, quality time, and so on and so on. One of the things we've learned on our short 11 year journey is how to be intentional about pouring something in instead of expecting it to always pour out.

One of our intentional practices is "Chat Night." Once a week, after the kids go down for the night, Matthew and I leave the TV off (which is a sacrifice for us, let me tell you) and spend some quality face to face time just chatting. Sometimes it looks like wine and cheese over candlelight. Sometimes it looks like mixed drinks on the couch. Sometimes, when we're exhausted, it looks like a short chat full of yawns before we throw ourselves into bed.

This night we played with drink recipes using homemade caramel sauce.

His and Hers.

Sometimes the night feels like a small and easy commitment - sharing a drink with a good friend. Sometimes it feels hard and long because all we want to do is eat dessert in front of the television or just go to sleep. Whatever form it takes from week to week it's always a commitment kept and an investment. 

Chat Night connects us in a way that's hard to experience with a 50 hour work week + commute time, 3 little kids demanding things and attention, a house that collects mess like a hobby, laundry that never ends... . You get the picture. It ensures that at least once a week we will look into each others eyes, remind ourselves of what the other looks like, and say something to each other - it doesn't really matter what - just chatting. Chatting to invest in each other and what we have together. Chat Night!