Just dropped off DS and it hurts so bad
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Anonymous
+2 |
Anonymous
| For those of you who don’t know yet- if you think doing this with your first kid is hard, wait til it’s your youngest! |
Anonymous
| Hugs to you, OP. I was in your shoes last year. I let myself be sad, but also tried hard to remind myself how very lucky I was/am to be at this point. And the days will go by quickly. Best of luck to you and your child. |
Anonymous
+1 I prefer to think of it as the next part of the wonderful adventure called life. This is what you want them to do---fly, make choices and advance to the next part of life. Be happy they are thriving and exploring the world (a bit farther from home than the first 18 years) |
Anonymous
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I had the same experience. Sat in my DD's bedroom after she left, looked at all the stuff from her childhood, all the memories and broke down.
That was a few years ago and now she is in grad school. And I'm loving being an empty nester. |
Anonymous
Me this weekend! Gulp. |
Anonymous
If we have one child we do know it already. |
Anonymous
It’s not sadness, is it? It’s happiness and loss mixed together. |
Anonymous
| Same. Happy and sad at same time. |
Anonymous
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My turn was earlier this week. He is SO excited. I know about roots and wings and I know he will be home sometimes. Yet I still feel a sense of loss that more time with my younger DC and hobbies and friends cannot fill.
I appreciate those saying, “You did your job.” And Rob Lowe’s piece is lovely. Good luck to all of us. |
Anonymous
+1 I do not get this thread at all. I was so excited for my kids when I dropped them off. I just got home from dropping off my youngest, and we had such a happy time at drop off. This is so freaking exciting! Not sad. And heck, we are pretty exciting about our empty nest time too! Besides, they'll probably be back before we know it, lol. |
Anonymous
| Yes, we felt sad when our kids went to college...but eventually we got used to it because they were so happy in college. Our home is their permanent base. My kids started their first jobs in DMV and they stayed at home to save on room, board and utilities for a few years. |
Anonymous
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Same boat op.
I guess my tears are from knowing things arent really ever going to be the same anymore - the daily dynamics, comings& goings, routine, spontaneous reputoire, etc. I liked our status quo. |
Anonymous
Same. I am not at all “sad” that DS is successfully launching and happy. I feel _loss_ at his absence and the end of an era that I really really really liked. I acknowledge that there is no correct way to feel here, but I have to say that I do not get at all the people who are SO excited that their children are gone from their day to day lives. (“So thrilled to be empty nesters now!”). (“Really enjoying this empty nest time!”) It’s not as if they couldn’t read a book in peace or take an adults only weekend or dinner or tango class when the kid was, say, a 16 year old junior. So it really does sound like these “Yassss! I’m alone!” people are genuinely thrilled not to be seeing the teens on the regular. Which is foreign to me - not right or wrong |
Anonymous
My wife dropped our one and only last September at Berkeley (we are n Alexandria) and I was bedridden with Covid. I actually cried for the first time in 20 something years. I felt like a huge part of me died. I did go out a month later and spent three days annoying him, but I get it. He goes back tomorrow and I feel like I barely saw him the entire summer. I'd love to say it gets better but it really doesn't. The hurt just gets less. |