I admit it, I occasionally shout at the radio when driving. It could be a news item, someone waxing lyrical about something or other, or even a bad piece of music.
But only once have I ever screamed aloud at the speaker, stamped my fists on the steering wheel, and wanted to pull over and call the radio station. Which needless to say I didn’t do – this was in the pre-WhatsApp days – but it was also a busy period in life when I was no doubt running late for work or to pick up a child.
I remember it so clearly. I was queuing to get through the lights in my hometown and the Jeremy Vine Show was on Radio Two. The subject was ‘empty nests’ – namely when the last of the children have left home for work, marriage, or, as seemed to be most common, university. I was listening with half an ear – my own children at the time were a long way from leaving home – the youngest was barely out of nappies!
But then one woman came on and described her youngest child leaving home for university as being ‘like a bereavement.’ And I saw red.
Because if that woman had had a child die, she would never, never compare the emptiness left behind with that of a child leaving home to follow his or her dreams, whatever they may be.
How do I know this as, thank God, I have not been bereaved by the loss of my child?
That is true, but I did lose my little brother when he was just 16. And the heartache, the pain of that, is still raw and the wound that that loss inflicted continues to throb and it was opened wide when I heard that woman’s comments.
For I watched my parents suffer in the immediate aftermath of my brother’s sudden death as a result of a grand mal epileptic seizure, the shock and horror that first morning, then moving through a wake and a funeral, through the days, weeks, months and years that followed. I felt the emptiness every time I walked into our family home, where I, at the age of 22, was still living that devastating morning he did not wake up.
Keith was gone. Not forgotten. But gone. Physically from our earthly lives. Forever.
He was not away at university learning how to feed himself and do his own washing for 10 weeks before coming home for lots of TLC and long lie-ins. He was not making new friends from different backgrounds, joining interesting clubs or societies, or competing for a place on a team in the sports at which he excelled when at school. He would not call home to complain about a housemate not washing their dishes, or an essay deadline being brought forward. He would never meet a girlfriend, carve out a career, build his own home, have a child of his own. He would never hug his mother, father, grandparent, sisters, again. Never. Never.
Fast forward to January 2025. The last of my three children had headed to university in England from our home in the north of Ireland the previous September, but we not ‘empty nested’ at that stage because our eldest son, aged 28, had been living with us for two years as he set up a business locally and his girlfriend studied in Germany. (This son had stayed away for seven years after he moved across the water to university when he was 19 – how very blessed we were when he decided on a complete career change and now runs a board game café half a mile from our home!)
But he and his fiancé have had their own place (a whole mile away!) since December, and it was only at the end of January when the youngest returned to her studies, dance society and uni socials, that, with our middle child based in Scotland, we truly became empty nested.
Several weeks on, how does that empty nest feel?
Well, firstly, I am not in any way ‘mourning’ my children’s departure. I miss them immensely, but my overwhelming sensation is one of joy and pride that they are all pursuing their lives in the way they wish, be that child number one serving coffee to the passionate D&D players, war gamers etc who have become the community his café serves; child number two involved in animal rescue in cities and rural areas of Scotland; or child number three, just 18, washing her clothes in softner (she didn’t realise you are meant to add detergent too!), exhausting herself with nights out that go on to 5am, drawing her new-found friends to watch her perform a musical or dance with energy and beauty, and yes, calling home because her throat hurts, or because she is anxious, or because she has said something that has offended someone. This is life – life with all its wonders and its challenges.
Secondly – and I can only speak as someone still married to and living with the father of those children who have moved on – being empty nested has brought additional changes to my life.
I won’t say I wasn’t concerned to suddenly be alone constantly with this person, having shared our space with at least one other human for the past 28 years. We have been married for 33 years and were together for five years before that, but we have faced challenges. For the first nine years of our relationship, five of those married, we had no one to look after but ourselves. My brother died just months after we met. I expect I was not the happiest person to have as a girlfriend in the weeks and months that followed. But we were young, we had our lives ahead of us. We travelled, forged careers, holidayed, lived on the edge of overdrafts, rented dodgy houses, and eventually bought our first home.
Then the children came, and our focus changed. For 28 years the focus was on them. We lived our lives around them. And as time moved on, there were new challenges. Our parents needing us, the huge loss when three of our four parents died. Trying to get the work/life balance right. Covid-19 and the intensity of being together all the time. The desire to pursue our own interests and, at times, conflict when those interests didn’t tally.
Always, children in the house. The go-between, or simply a presence behind closed doors to remind us to keep down voices raised in anger.
To suddenly be alone together – it could be great of course – but perhaps that which brought us together in 1987 has gone, and we can no longer just be two?
It is early days, but thankfully the worry that being on our own would be too difficult has so far proved unfounded. Yes, we have had the odd row about the usual silly things, but we have so much to enjoy together – having the choice of what to watch on TV; just having to get the agreement of two people, not five, when organising dinner; planning a weekend break without having to consider other people (okay, my amazing Dad, but he is an incredibly undemanding 89-year-old!); giving each other time to do what the other wants without thinking ‘oh, but that means I will have to….[insert grumpy faced emoji]’
I find I am hearing what he says more, laughing with him more, and that is because we can concentrate on each other, and don’t always have an ear out in case the child or young adult in the house has something to say to us, because they always came first.
Now, we have time to put each other first. To rediscover the pleasure we had in each other’s company when we first met.
And of course, sharing news from those three wonderful children, planning when we will next see each one, enjoying dinner at my son’s home, or catching our breath on a mad road trip, daughter number two in tow, to see our happy student perform in a musical theatre production on a Saturday night in Brighton, and compete in a dance competition in Cardiff the next morning! It takes time, energy, money (life seems to always be about being on the brink of an overdraft!) but brings such joy.
For while we may be empty nested, we are so very far from being bereaved parents. We are blessed with young adults who are indeed following their dreams, making lives for themselves which, like our own lives, will bring challenges and rewards. And the fact that they can do this just fills me with so much happiness.
I know that is what my parents wanted for me, my sister and my little brother, who is with me every day, who sees what I, so very young myself when I suffered the huge loss of him, have achieved with my life, and who I know is with my children too in all they do in life now they have indeed flown the nest.
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