WHAT IF THIS IS HARD AND EVERYTHING YOU'VE EVER WANTED WHEN PARENTING TEENS AND NAVIGATING THE EMPTY NEST?| EP. 291
Welcome to the Almost Empty Nest Podcast, where we moms of teens and college kids reframe what letting go really means to feel more connected, confident, and at peace. I'm your host, Master Coach Jennifer Collins.
What if the reason the stage of motherhood feels so hard isn't because something has gone wrong, but because you're living something you really, truly wanted, and your brain is still looking for what needs to be fixed? In this episode, I'm talking about what happens when parenting teens and navigating the empty nest brings both gratitude and grief, pride and worry, beauty and discomfort, all at the same time.
You'll learn why your brain keeps looking for problems, why the finish line with our big kid always seems to move, and how to make room for what's hard without letting it become the whole story. Because sometimes the most powerful shift isn't fixing everything that hurts. It's learning to see what else is true. Let's dive in.
Hello, my friend.
I was talking to my son the other day. He's the one who transferred schools. And at the time we talked, he was in week two. Classes had just started, and he was telling me about how things were going.
And at one point he said to me, Mom, last night I was walking home and I just felt this immense wave of gratitude. This is where I've always wanted to be. My whole life, I've wanted to be here, and I'm here.
He said he was walking around campus, looking at how beautiful it is, thinking about how hard he had worked to get there and how long he had wanted this. And he said, I did it. And it was honestly so beautiful to hear.
But what was so interesting was that before he told me all of that, he had spent probably 20 minutes telling me everything that was wrong. He didn't think the school had done a particularly good job supporting transfer students. The food was terrible.
He hadn't found his people yet. A couple of the things he'd been interested in weren't turning out to be as exciting as he thought they would be. He was also struggling to figure out his classes and how everything was going to fit into his schedule.
He's also planning to rush a fraternity and realizing it takes up a lot of time and energy and stamina that may not be completely in line with the other goals he has for himself at school. So throughout the conversation, I could actively watch my mind wanting to problem-solve for him. I could feel myself wanting to make suggestions, wanting to help him figure it out, wanting to somehow point him in the right direction.
And the whole time, I kept reminding myself, this is his journey. Of course, some of this is going to be challenging. And I already knew that there were going to be parts of this experience that he'd have to work through.
Nothing's perfect in life. But then, how amazing that toward the end of the call, my son told me, I am so grateful to be here. It was such a beautiful reminder to me that both things can be true.
An experience can be hard. It can be challenging and disappointing. And it can also be everything you ever wanted.
And if that isn't a metaphor for motherhood, I do not know what is. Because motherhood can be everything we ever wanted. It can be one of the most meaningful, and beautiful, and important parts of our lives.
And it can also come with so much stress, and anxiety, and frustration, and responsibility, and so much disappointment and hurt, especially at this stage of motherhood. And I hear mom say to me all the time, I don't know why my mind always goes to the negative. Why can't I just be more grateful? Why can't I notice that maybe things aren't as bad as I think they are? And what I want to say to you today is, of course your mind goes there.
It actually makes so much sense. Because your brain is doing exactly what it's designed to do. It's looking for the problem.
And then, it's trying to solve it. And truly, just think about how often your mind is actively problem solving. You're thinking about what you have to get done today.
Or what you didn't get done yesterday. Or what you need to repair today. You're planning for next week and next year.
You're also watching your kids and looking for the areas of their lives where you might need to step in or guide them a little more. Point them in the right direction. And all the while, you're trying to be the best version of yourself.
And a large part of that involves noticing the places where you haven't quite lived up to your own expectations. We do this with our kids too. We have so many hopes for how they'll live and conduct their lives.
We want them to be safe and happy. We want them to be moving in a forward direction. And, by the way, we want a relationship with them.
And if any of those really important areas aren't meeting our hopes and expectations, our minds immediately start working on the solution. We beat ourselves up for having negative thoughts or catastrophizing. And yes, that is part of what's happening.
But I also think it's worth recognizing the benefit of focusing on the parts of our lives that aren't working. Because if there's a problem, of course your brain wants to solve it. If there's something dangerous in your future, why wouldn't you try to avoid that danger? I mean, even intellectually, that makes sense.
Why would you ever see danger ahead and just say, well, let's see how it goes? Of course you would try to avert that danger. And if your kid isn't happy, that can feel dangerous in its own way. And if there were something that you could do about it, why wouldn't you want to do something? Why wouldn't you want to point them in the right direction if they were struggling, not knowing where to go? And, by the way, this has been your job description for most of your life as a mom.
We point our kids in the direction of safety and happiness and success. And in the process, we've experienced this beautiful, unique, almost intoxicating connection that comes from having such profound responsibility for another human being. And very often, especially when our kids were little, we got to experience the satisfaction of actually being pretty good at it.
They had a problem, and we were able to help. They needed something, and we knew what to do. They were struggling, and we could often make it better.
So now, when they're older, and we still feel this enormous sense of responsibility and love for them, but we can't necessarily solve what they're going through, we wonder why this feels so hard. But of course it feels hard. Our brains are still actively problem-solving.
They're still scanning for what might need our attention. The difference is that now so many of the problems we notice aren't actually ours to solve. And I think this is important to recognize, because the fact that your brain is looking for problems is not necessarily the problem.
What often hurts is the meaning we attach to what we find. Maybe your kid is struggling, and your brain immediately goes to, this shouldn't be happening. Or they're not going to be able to find their way out of this.
Or maybe you can't fix something for your kid, and you start thinking, I'm not doing a good job. I'm failing here. Or your relationship has changed, and your mind offers, I must have done something wrong.
Sometimes we even turn on ourselves for having the negative thought in the first place, thinking, why am I like this? Why can't I stop worrying? So now we don't just have the circumstances we're facing, we have this whole extra layer of meaning and pain sitting on top of it. The fact that my brain goes to the negative means there must be something wrong with me. The fact that this problem exists at all, and I can't solve it means I'm failing.
The fact that my kid is struggling means something has gone terribly wrong. And this is where I want to invite you to look at your own mind with so much love and compassion. Because just notice how often it does this.
And I see my brain doing exactly the same thing. During my conversation with my son, as he was describing the challenges he's navigating right now, I could observe myself listening for the doubt in his voice. I was also listening for some little clue that would tell me whether or not he was going to be okay.
And we don't just do this with our kids. I constantly see my mind problem solving around what I need to get done. Worried about places I've messed up or dropped the ball.
Thinking ahead to goals or challenges in front of me and trying to figure out how to approach them. And there are so many unknowns in my life right now as well. And I can see how much my mind is craving certainty.
I feel this urge to check in with my husband and ask, are we okay? Is everything okay? Are you okay? It's like I want something I can hold on to to get a little relief. And without that, it's like our mind doesn't want to let go of the worry. Our mind's tendency to constantly be at work problem solving can feel really uncomfortable.
In fact, it often manifests itself as anxiety and pressure. Maybe self-judgment or even frustration. So much of the work I do with my clients is helping them separate the actual circumstances of their lives from all of the thoughts and beliefs they have layered on top of them.
Very often, once we slow things down, we start to see recurring patterns. Belief systems we've carried for years. Like I should be able to fix this.
Or my child should be happier. Or if they're struggling, I've done something wrong. When we're willing to look at those beliefs and question them, we can start to loosen our grip on ideas that may have shaped us for years but don't actually serve us anymore in this stage of parenting.
Just consider this one. My child should be happier. Well, how exactly do you force another human being to be happy? As much as you want that for your kids, it's not actually in your power to create.
And so questioning these beliefs is so powerful. And this process can actually give you so much freedom from unnecessary pain that you may not even realize you're holding on to. But I also want to acknowledge that even though I've gotten so much better at recognizing and letting go of self-judgment and regret and guilt, and some of these thought patterns that seem to go hand in hand with being a mom, that doesn't mean I walk around in some Buddha-like state of peace all the time.
There are certain thought patterns I see come up for me again and again. With my boys, my mind is always scanning to see if they're okay. If they're happy and making good choices.
But even more, I think there's always been a belief in my mind that says it's my job to fix this. And so when I think something's wrong and also that it's my job to fix it, it's no wonder I feel anxious. Because I care so much about their safety and happiness and success.
And there is often a voice in my head telling me it's my job to make that happen. But I also recognize how often that's not possible. I also struggle with the feeling of overwhelm.
My brain often looks at everything I'm doing and says there's too much. I'm never going to get it all done. But at the same time, I can recognize that I'm choosing all of this.
I don't have to work this hard. I don't have to be doing all the things that I'm doing. But I'm also incredibly passionate about this work.
I love coming to you week after week and sharing what I've learned about how to take power back over your emotional well-being. And I love working with my clients and helping them see their own minds more clearly. It is so incredibly powerful to watch what happens when they begin to understand what's creating so much of their emotional pain.
And then that moment when they realize that they have more agency in their life than they thought. This work is so incredibly meaningful to me. So as long as I'm living a full life and caring about what happens with my boys, my brain is going to keep finding things to solve.
And sometimes for me, that's going to come with anxiety and overwhelm. It actually reminds me of a conversation I had with a client recently. She was talking about her son who had worked really hard to earn his master's degree.
Then he got an internship and she thought they'd finally gotten him to a place where he was going to be OK. But then that internship didn't immediately turn into a full-time job. And so she said to me, I thought the finish line was here and now it's moved.
And I said to her with so much love, who moved it? Because of course she wants him to get a job. She wants her son to be successful and happy. But we even joke that once he does get the job, she's probably going to be worried about that then too.
Is it the right job? Does he like it? Is he happy? Is he making enough money? And I think this is such an important thing to recognize because maybe there just isn't a finish line. Because life keeps evolving. There isn't some magical point where everything just gets settled and everything and everyone we love is completely OK.
In fact, there's never a time when all the uncertainty goes away and we just get to stay there forever. Our kids move into new stages of their lives and face new challenges. We move into new stages of our life.
And we're constantly trying to figure out how to be the mom our kids need when they're in middle school, then high school, then college, then after college, then in their first serious relationship, and then they get married, then they're having children of their own. And we are constantly trying to figure out how to navigate that. And at the same time, we're figuring out how to be the woman we want to be in our own lives.
Our relationships change. Our friendships change. Our parents get older and suddenly we're navigating really complicated questions about how to support them.
Life just keeps changing. Which means there will always be some problem for our brains to keep working on. And if we keep telling ourselves that we'll finally feel peaceful once everything is figured out, we may spend an awful lot of our lives waiting for a moment that will never actually come.
And I think this is where gratitude becomes incredibly valuable. And not gratitude in the way that we sometimes use it against ourselves. I'm not telling you that you should be more grateful.
And I don't think there's much benefit in just telling yourself while other people have it worse. I'm also not telling you that you need to pretend that something painful isn't painful or disappointing. What I'm really talking about is a willingness to notice the rest of the truth of your life.
Because if we want to find pain in our lives, we will find it. There is always something to worry about or something more to do. There's always something you can find that didn't go the way that you hoped.
Or something that's unresolved or something uncertain. There's always something that your brain can try to find to solve or fix. And again, that isn't actually a flaw.
It's just what our brains do. But if we put all of our attention on what needs fixing, we can miss what is already beautiful in our lives. We can miss the fact that both things can be true.
Your child can be struggling and there can still be so much that is going right or is at least okay right now. And your relationship with your kid can be changing and they can still love you even if they're not showing it in the same way. You can be incredibly sad about what's changing in your life and also incredibly grateful for what you got to experience.
You can feel uncertain about what comes next and be in awe that in some ways this transition to life without kids at home means that you did it. You launched your big kids. You actually got everything that you ever wanted.
Life is rarely one thing, my friend. There is pain and beauty. There is success and disappointment.
There is love and hurt. This is what my son reflected back to me in that conversation. He wasn't pretending the hard parts weren't hard.
In fact, he just spent 20 minutes telling me all about them. He just made space to step out of the problem solving for one moment and see something else that was equally true. I'm here.
I've wanted this my entire life. I worked really hard for this and I am so grateful. I think this is such a powerful practice for all of us.
It's recognizing that the default setting of your brain is to try to make the hard thing go away but just notice what else might be available for you. What are you so focused on fixing that you're forgetting to notice? Because yes, there is pain and uncertainty and there may be things you genuinely wish were different and there is also so much beauty in your life that is available to you right now without any of those things needing to be different first. And I want to say something here to the mom who is really struggling.
Maybe you're listening to this and thinking, I don't have it in me right now to look on the bright side and I get it. And that is not what I'm asking you to do. I'm not asking you to talk yourself out of your pain or to find a silver lining in something that feels devastating.
Sometimes the most honest thing you can do is admit this is really hard. But what I want to invite you to see is that pain does not have to be the only truth your mind is allowed to see. You can let yourself be sad and scared and disappointed and angry and heartbroken.
Whatever is real for you. And then, maybe not immediately, but at some point you can ask yourself whether anything else is also true. Not better, just also true.
Maybe your child is struggling and you love them fiercely and you're showing up to support them every single day in the best way you can. Can you see the beauty in that? Maybe your relationship with your big kid is painful right now, but you're not giving up on them and you're holding on to hope that it will get better one day. Or it could be what you've been through is incredibly hard and you have taken it step by step, day by day.
Can you recognize your own strength and resilience even if it doesn't feel powerful? This isn't replacing pain with gratitude. It's really about making room for both. You don't have to convince yourself it doesn't hurt.
What if you could refuse to let that hurt be the whole story? When I think about my own life right now, there is so much uncertainty. I don't know how my son is going to navigate this first year at his new school. And I don't know what comes next for my older son as he finishes college.
And there is so much about my own life that is up in the air right now. Things that I'm struggling with. Goals that I've set that aren't easy.
Places in my life where I'm honestly letting myself down. All of that is true for me right now. But it is also true that my son is at the school he dreamed about attending.
My oldest is actively trying to figure out what comes next. And I get to do work that matters so much to me. And I feel so proud of myself that I keep showing up to the challenges of my life.
And I'm not giving up. None of the pain or uncertainty of my life has to go away for me to recognize all of that. I don't have to wait for everyone to be okay or every problem to be solved before I allow myself to experience the beautiful parts of my life I have right now.
And neither do you. If you're listening to this and realizing that so much of your life is being consumed by worrying about your child, trying to figure out what you should do, second-guessing yourself, or wondering how to feel okay when they aren't okay, this is exactly the work we do inside of Mom 2.0. In this coaching program, you learn how to love your big kid without caring responsibility for every choice or every mood or every outcome. You'll learn how to trust yourself to know what is yours to do and what is theirs.
You'll learn how to stay connected when they're pulling away or pushing back and even how to be okay even when they're struggling. So if you're ready to feel calmer and more confident, more at peace, and more connected to yourself and your child, I would love to have you join me in Mom 2.0. You can learn more through the link in the show notes. My friend, there will always be something your brain can find to worry about.
Something unfinished. Something uncertain. Something you wish were different.
One more problem your brain wants to solve, but that is not the whole story of your life. There is also love and beauty. There are things you once dreamed would be true in your life that are a part of your life.
In fact, there are moments that you will miss someday that are happening for you right now. Your beautiful mind has the capacity to hold so much, both the joy and the pain. And my invitation to you is to make a conscious choice to give beauty some airtime.
You do not have to wait until everything is fixed to let yourself feel the goodness of your life. And you don't need to solve it before you're allowed to be here for it. Both things can be true.
This life is hard, and it is beautiful.
Until next time.
If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love for you to check out my next free Masterclass. There's a link in the show notes. You have more power than you think, my friend.
