Don't understand how you be happy after children grow up

[tikitikitembonoSaRembo]

I know it's not normal but I can't understand people who don't feel this way, but I want to.

My two children are beginning to do many more things without me as they grow, want to be alone. I've realised I don't spend half the time with them I used to.

I was a very hands on mother, didn't work during the first few years, then worked around school and would take them out twice a week, spend Saturdays playing with them.

I even have things in my own life. I'm part of a local group which I love and I still work but I feel like my identity and life are slipping away and I don't know how to be happy without being my children's world.

Maybe I messed up along the way but it's this crippling depression.

I know I can go out, meet people, stay up late etc. as I become free of my children, but I don't want to be free of them. I should have had six and gave my life to it but I realised too late that I loved being a mother and only had two.

I'm single and I own my home so could sell up in a few years I suppose, but I don't want to, all our memories are in this house.

I don't feel my children are my whole identity but they are the best thing about my life and I don't think anything could trump it.

I think we decided to have a baby because we’d reached a point where we’d done everything as a couple (if that makes sense) done all the holidays, partying etc and it felt like something was now missing.

I don’t think I could enjoy my baby as much as I do unless I’d of lived a full life before having him, because then now I can dedicate myself to him fully without feeling like I’m missing out on my pre-baby life. So it probably depends on how introverted you are maybe?

This is such a good explanation. I’ve never thought of it this way tbh.
My mums stayed really social and quite independent all through my life and now we do things as friends now I don’t need mothering (so to speak). She never lost her own personality.

You have nice friends & love home-making: maybe suggest something like a posh dinner club that rotates between hosts?
I know it's only one small thing, but just an example, as well as plans to visit kids/be visited, etc.

I think thats totally normal and natural to feel like that. I dont have that yet because mine are still little but strangely I had that with my sister.

Am a decade older than her and was totally happy to go off to uni myself (I stayed in the same city as my family) but found it emotionally weird once she went off (still in the same city). It was the knowledge that I could never ever simply assume that she'd there when I visit my parents, that I couldnt just assume that we could hang out whenever I came back, that the level of familiarity was gone for ever. I think it was the realisation that the little person who used to clumber all over me for hours on end, with whom I shared a room till I was 16 was gone for ever. That it was truly the end of an era. So I get that it must be even harder as a parent. For me it was the familiarity and the physicality of living with a kid that I missed. But you get used to it. Honestly I think you just get over it.

Today we all still live in the same city - my parents and my sibling and do see each other fairly regularly. It's not the same but I sort of dont need it to be anymore.

Not sure if that makes sense but I dont think you're weird and am not sure that a hobby with solve it. Nor is it only parents that feel like that. But time does help and you move on.

Such a sensible and true post.

You really don't want your children to know that your life is empty without them, that is a huge huge pressure and so unfair on them, and will more than likely push them away.

I have DCs in their 30s. I feel I was as wrapped up in my kids as you were with yours, but honestly it just becomes a natural thing to let them go and see them fly. Don't be smothering, if anything push them away to let them be their own people.

I am really close to mine, we WA endlessly, have long calls, we see each other when we can, but if they go quiet on me (usually because they don't need Mum or advice or anything) I just let it roll. So days can go by and then suddenly it's a rash of whatsapps with stupid stuff between us!

And we have our own lives, travel is our thing, I have hobbies etc.

The bonus of letting them go is... when we get together , we have such fun fun fun. It's the most special of times ever.

You have to get over this and let them go. There will be an almost grieving period but children are only lent to us. They don't belong to us.

and its appalling a social worker is recommending OP do fostering. Foster kids need carers with secure attachments who are not going to be so emotionally dependent on them.

Not only that, for the sake of Op it would be a bad idea because many foster care kids have issues with bonding and may act out (understandably) with emotional behavioural problems etc which can affect not only your own children but the little bubble that she has clearly created me. If you do decide do so and I hope you don’t - please ask your children how they honestly feel .

It can be very disorientating for children to be asked to share their home with a new child who is a non-relative and often (Again understandably) comes with a whole host of issues.

It takes a very specific and special type of person to foster successfully. You’ve got to be the type who is able to give love even if you’re not getting it in return.

I felt this way, I had DD at 17, and I thought, what am I going to do as she ages? At 11, 12, 13 I could already feel a gap in places where she used to be, but I look at it differently now, I see each of these steps, that she's taking further from me, are her moving into her life as an adult. She will make choices of her own, and some of those choices will feel like a celebration of the childhood that I have given her, others will be choices I wouldn't make, but she will rely on me for support, and some guidance as she goes along.

Whilst she grows into her own life, my role changes, but that brings its own beauty. She will have the choice of how close we are. Her choosing to be around me is something I look forward to.

In the meantime, I'm finding other things that will occupy me whilst I give her the space she needs to find herself.

Do make yourself available though... I get invited to the gym most days! I'll usually be able to strong arm her into coffee and cake, and we talk about her hobbies, one of which I had as a teenager. We've got to bend ourselves into interesting people our young adults want to be around sometimes!

Well, I am a bereaved parent who lost her son when he was in his late teens. I thank you Clutchy for remembering those of us who have lost children. It makes it difficult for me to empathise with this comparison, although I can understand empty nest syndrome. I have other children but words need to be chosen carefully. I miss them, but their absence does not make me feel bereft.

and to add the reason I’m so strongly against it was because as someone who worked in social services I seen so many kids screwed up further by foster parents who really were not cut out to deal with the children and their issues.

I seen one foster care was all sweetness and light until her well behaved compliant kid turned 9 and he began to scream or cry loudly in his bedroom every night. To quote her, “my own kids didn’t do that and I buy him so many holidays and toys so I don’t understand why he is like that but it has to stop or he goes” I seen this kind of thing time and time again.

For anyone else considering this please don’t use foster kids as a solution to your emotional issues. They have enough of their own

It's very normal I think to feel this way. Mine are young but I'll definitely feel the same and am already dreading it. Despite a busy career and hobbies. Career and hobbies don't fulfill the void of a love for children. Maybe op, you have lots to give. How about fostering, animal shelters, volunteering, some caring roles, mentoring... Your kids and the world world is lucky to have you as a mum.

Have you looked into fostering?

This, exactly. Mine are in their 30s, doing well. It's different now. Wonderful, but different. I miss the childhood years, with the awareness I am/was very lucky to have great kids.

There are positive and lovely things about every stage, @tikitikitembonoSaRembo, even when they grow up and leave home - I promise you.

I became a granny last year - that is such a joy, and means much more to look forward to.

But your feelings are real and valid, and I do hope that you can work through them, and get to enjoying the way your children are growing and developing. I wonder if you are, in some way grieving for the parts of their childhoods that are over - I can understand that, and if you see it that way, maybe you’ll also be able to see that you can go through the process and come out the other side.

Hi OP. I can’t relate because mine are 1-4 and I’m currently wishing the time away (I know I will regret that). You said you should get counselling. Please do. Then consider training to be one. It is a really fulfilling job and it won’t replace what you’re losing but it is really fulfilling. I have a feeling you would be good at it.

my kids are 24, 21 and 18. I love that they are growing up and don't need me so much. I have taken up time consuming hobbies, had time to devote to my friends and feel fulfilled in my own skin. I'm a single parent - I adore my kids and love spending time with them but at least with the eldest its on a different basis - yes I'm his mum, but he's an independent adult who brings something to the table as another adult ... Honestly if it fills you with such dread OP I think you should have some counselling and support for yourself to work out why this is ...

It’s like you’ve met my mother. We are her entire world, and it’s suffocating when we visit her. I love her, but she’s such hard work.

I think part of it is that people dismiss the feeling and assume it means I'm a neurotic mess who's going to cling onto their legs as they leave home.

I also don't actually think they're dying nor treat them as they are. It's a feeling within myself rather than thinking they are actually about to die. Them not being here as much has a similar effect on me.

This post and this feeling is about me, not them. I know how to fall apart inside without doing it on the outside.

thanks for the insight on the thread, some of it has really helped.

When my children visit they will see me living an independent post-children life full of fun and I will seem happy.

I'm just not sure I will be.

Part of them being my whole world is not showing them this, because I know that's not for them to worry about.

That's my opinion. Lots of people on this thread have suggested that the Op might want to seek some support about the way that she is feeling.

Regarding the "who the hell are you" sentence - you do realise that we are on Mumsnet don't you 😬. I am a poster with an opinion, the same as you.

I think this is sensible OP. You should seek a therapist, to try and work out these feelings.
They are not particularly normal (though it is normal to be sad that your kids are growing).
You didnt make a mistake being involved in their lives. Thats not what this is.

But you need to find a way out of the box you put yourself in to!

You can do it!!!

🙄 no comment

It sounds like you’re worrying about something before it’s even happened and might not happen. I can’t relate to feeling depressed that I might not ever feel as happy as I have felt at some given previous time. Who cares? I can still feel 9/10 happy even if I’m not 10/10 happy again and that’s perfectly good in its own right.

There is a thread somewhere on MN about needy twenty-somethings driving their parents up the wall. I don’t think you’ve seen the last of being needed, not by a long shot.

I don't feel this at all, and think comparing children growing up and going out in the world to a bereavement is distasteful and over the top. I love having older children, one of whom is a 'proper' adult now. It's my favourite part of parenting, they are so much more interesting and less of a constant drag on time.

I did at one time worry but now as they near adulthood - I think I'm more than ready for them to move out and on with their lives - not that I wouldn't have them back if needed.

It found that parents of adult children tend to have higher levels of emotional well-being and life satisfaction than their peers without children.
But there’s a catch. They’re only happier if their grown-up children are no longer living with them.

https://www.minnpost.com/second-opinion/2019/08/having-adult-children-can-increase-emotional-well-being-if-theyre-out-of-the-house-study-finds/#:~:text=It%20found%20that%20parents%20of,no%20longer%20living%20with%20them.

I remember this hitting the news ages ago - and I can see this - time to do stuff I want - not feel so tied down. I really enjoyed having kids and best time of my life was when they were young and really hard work though I've generally enjoyed having teens as well but they were always going to grow up and as a parent it was my job to get them to independence.

How you change your mindset though I'm not so sure - time and persistence.