The Buddha said all life is suffering. There’s a reason for this, and regardless of your position in life, no one escapes it, because life is loss. No privilege exempts you. And the older we get the greater weight of loss we carry. Parents encounter a particular type of grief; our children change from requiring our every second as babies, to wanting us for a second as teenagers. Our existence is important to them, but not necessarily our presence.
The bow and the arrow
We fall from grace, as where they once adored us they now have to denigrate us, to separate and fly. As Kahlil Gibran wrote, we are the bow and our children the arrow. We have to let go, for their own development but also our own. We had our time. Do the bows become firewood or discarded in the porch, or might some late use be found?
As the children jump our nest, we can only listen as they strike the branches on their way to the ground of their own life; just as our parents winced and faced their own fears when we left home and didn’t look back. Our forbearers no longer sit with us, yet are forever within us.
A state of grieving
It’s the demise of purpose, company and focus; we can’t even observe as we once did. They have to put distance between us, which leaves us lost. This is time to reorient ourselves, and to understand that we are in a state of grieving. Few things hit parents harder than children doing what they must do. Our hands are empty where once they were full, our houses fallen silent of giggles and innocence. Let go of those luminescent days of throwing toddlers around like sacks of flour onto beds, sofas and trampolines. It’s done. Catch up with the reality. Let go.
We were never told that parents must be prepared to be destroyed, and to relinquish the child as an idealised product and extension of themselves. However, it also means our growth isn’t over, but we need to accept we are not what we once were. We are leaving the club different people to those we were when we entered. What we gave up for our children we must now reclaim with older wiser hands.
Acceptance as the new challenge
We are elders, no longer with the deluded comfort of ‘endless’ time and the omnipotent belief of youth. We can no longer fool ourselves that we are limitless. In some ways that’s liberating. If we bungee jump now we’ll sever at our ankles. Acceptance is our new challenge. ‘One day I’d like to live in a big house.’ The ‘one day’ is now yesterday and that’s okay. There’s peace to be made with the things we failed to do and now never will.
It’s time to place our goals within reach, not in the tomorrow, but at arms’ length. All those dramas and dreams that never happened? Well, at least we had them, but like holding a torch in the daylight, we need to adjust. Things are not the same; while we weren’t paying attention everything changed. It’s little wonder we’re confused, disoriented and sad. And now we understand what our own parents weren’t warned about either. We now understand that being a parent doesn’t make you superhuman, it brings you closer to grief.
Questions parents ask
Is it normal to grieve when my children leave home, even though nothing bad has happened?
Yes. Grief isn’t reserved for death. It attends any significant loss, and the end of daily parenting is a real one. You are mourning a role, a rhythm and a version of yourself. That the change is healthy and expected doesn’t make it hurt less. The sadness is a sign of how much the relationship mattered, not a sign that something has gone wrong.
Why does my child seem to push me away just when I want to stay close?
Some distance is necessary for them to separate and build a life of their own. Sometimes that separation looks like coldness, irritation or even a need to criticise you. It rarely means what it feels like it means. Adoration turning to friction is often how a young person gives themselves permission to leave. It’s painful to be on the receiving end, but it’s usually a sign the work of growing up is happening.
How do I rebuild a sense of purpose once the house is quiet?
Slowly, and without rushing to fill the silence. The empty hands are uncomfortable, but they’re also space. This is a time to return to the parts of yourself you set aside while raising children, and to allow those parts to have changed. Purpose after parenting rarely arrives as a single grand plan. It tends to return through small, real things that are within reach now, rather than the big ‘one day’ that kept getting postponed.
When is this grief something to seek help for?
Grief that softens over time, comes in waves and sits alongside ordinary life is part of the adjustment. If the low mood becomes constant, if you lose interest in almost everything, if you can’t sleep or function, or if the sense of loss tips into feeling that life has no meaning, that’s worth talking to someone about. Therapy can help you make sense of what this transition has stirred up, including older losses it may be echoing.
I respectfully understand that those who are not able to be, or choose not to be, parents have their own challenges of living. We all do. And what a trip it is.
