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Empty Nest Syndrome: Do More than Just Cope

April 26, 2012 by Joi 3 Comments

Red Tail Hawk

If you’re looking for a new hobby, nothing – absolutely nothing – beats birdwatching.

This is interesting. At least it’s interesting to me. Women tend to prepare and brace themselves for Empty Nest Syndrome years before the last bird has left the nest. I can’t tell you how many times I’ll be two or three “back and forths” into an e-mail relationship when it turns out that the very sad mom I’m talking to still has at least one child at home.  The last time it happened, I tried to wrap myself around the fact and I think the explanation is simple: The relationship between mothers and their children is a very intimate one. You can’t spend the majority of your life nurturing, protecting, and caring for a cherished little person without developing a bond that’s stronger than any single member of the justice league.

Because of this bond, a mother knows the pain and sadness that she will experience when “the day” comes.  That’s what most of us call it, isn’t it? The DAY.   Boom-Boom-BOOM- BOOM (accompanying doomsday music).

It’s sort of like bracing yourself for a flu shot.  You focus so much thought and energy on the needle that, before you know it, that thing is 3 feet long.  You grimace and tighten your arm because a 3 foot needle is going to hurt like the dickens of all dickens.  The problem is, bracing for it makes the pain that much worse.

I’m sure you see where this one’s heading. I’m about as subtle as a 3 foot needle.

When we focus all of our thoughts on “emptiness,” it won’t be long before our room, home, car, or even the very world we live in seem as vacant, quiet, and deserted as a school’s playground in July.

Focus, instead, on what IS – not what ISN’T, and certainly not what you fear will be missing down the road.  Remember the 3 foot needle. If you still have children in your home, begin to fill your life, home, and yard with so much that the thought of “emptiness” never crosses your mind. If your nest is already empty (or in the process of emptying!), you haven’t any time to waste, begin filling it immediately.

Even when my husband’s at work and all the beloved young people we love so much aren’t in the house, I never, ever feel alone.

For example, right now I’m the only human in the house.  But alone? Far from it.  I have two cats sleeping by the back door, one in a chair basking in the sun, and one lying on the desk right in front of me (I have to move her tail out of my way like a billion times a minute… a billion and one).   My front yard is filled with birds, oblivious to the chubby sleeping cat two feet away. I put bird seed on the windowsill by my desk, so I have the constant companionship of doves, goldfinches, sparrows, and cardinals.

A squirrel was at his corn station for about an hour and has now ascended to the top of his favorite tree.

Lonely? Far from it!

The only things I’m thinking about at the moment are:

  • Watching the NFL Draft later today.
  • Baking a cake.
  • Getting more birdseed at the store (doves eat more than any teenage boy ever thought about eating)
  • Updating 3 more websites.
  • Swamp People is on tonight! Choooot!

Someone who read about how I used to walk every day with a few of my daughters asked me if we still went for our walks and talks. I told her that it had dwindled to a few days a week when we could all walk together. She asked what in the world I did without daily “walks and talks.”  I told her, “Silly goose, I still walk and I still talk every day.  The only difference is now I’m always right!”

Chaos vs Calm

I think a lot of people (men and women) have trouble rolling with the flow of life. In my opinion, there are different stages of life and to truly enjoy each one, you have to embrace it.   Not just accept it, not just hug it… you have to wrap your arms around it and squeeze it like it’s a long lost pet.

When our children are little – even teenagers – we’re at an age and place in life where we “fit” the situation.  We’re up to the task! As years go by, we enter the years when we have the luxury of being able to slow down a little. Make no mistake about it, these years don’t mark old age.  40s, 50s, and 60s are far from old age – especially these days. Today they’re like 30s, 40s, and 50s.  What a wonderful age in which we live.

To try to illustrate my point, I’ll use a popular (and outstanding) tv series: Parenthood.  My youngest daughter Stephany and her boyfriend got me seasons of Parenthood for Christmas. Every now and then, on my lunch break, I’ll pop an episode in and my cat and I laugh, cry, and thoroughly enjoy ourselves.

Zeek and Camille Braverman, played by eternal hotties Crag T. Nelson and Bonnie Bedelia (Ha!  My spell-check wants hotties to either be “potties” or “hogties.” To heck with it I’m sticking with hotties. Bonnie Bedelia is not an eternal potty, nor is Craig T. Nelson a hogtie  no matter what my software says.).  Zeek and Camille have grown children who have children of their own.  During just about every episode I’m struck by the stark contrasts between chaos and calm.  You’ll have a scene of one of the adult kids rushing to work while dropping off a small child at school… all while battling the dramas of each.  Then it’ll cut to a scene of  Camille cutting flowers in her garden.

Chaos…. Calm.

You’ll watch as a tense scene unfolds between one of the grown children and her teenage children (cue that doomsday music again!). Drugs, boys, girls, parties… Then it’ll cut to a scene of Zeek in his kitchen drinking a cup of coffee.

Chaos…. Calm.

I happen to be at a place in my life (even if the 40s of today are yesterday’s 30s) when the calm looks infinitely more attractive to me. Infinitely.  Is there a word that means infinitely x 2,000? If there is, insert it here.

If you are currently circumnavigating an empty nest or your children are approaching the age where you see it on the horizon, I’m here to tell you that your world will only be as empty as you allow it to become.  Fill your time with hobbies, pets, trips, passions, interests, and pastimes.  DO NOT focus on what’s missing, focus on what’s there right in front of you.  Remember, calm isn’t such a bad thing and quiet is probably the most underrated word in the entire dictionary.

Find things that make you excited to get out of bed in the morning. If you can’t think of anything that has that effect on you at the moment, it’s simply because you haven’t found it yet. Keep looking! One of the secrets to being happy is surrounding yourself with things that make you smile.

Now if you’ll excuse me. That cake isn’t going to make itself and God knows the birds aren’t going to feed themselves.

Filed Under: How to Be Happy, Positive Thought, Problem Solving Tagged With: be happy, coping with empty nest syndrome, empty nest syndrome, overcome empty nest syndrome

Ways to Improve Your Mood and Keep From Getting the Blues in the First Place!

April 11, 2009 by Joi 3 Comments

Rusty and Em Thumbs Up

Moods are funny things, aren’t they? At any given time, they can determine if you’re on top of the world or if it’s on top of you. Even though our circumstances usually don’t change from one day to the next, the way we look at them often does. Monday we can feel so happy that we’d have to fake a smile, but when Tuesday comes around, we seem to have forgotten how to smile.

There are several things that can cause us to be down in the dumps, mopey, grumpy, and just “out of sorts.” Obviously, if something that isn’t to our liking has happened, we’re going to react with a mood that’s less than our best. But, very often the mood can be attributed to something much more shady – something that we didn’t expect to turn on us!

  • Getting too much sleep can alter our moods for the worse. If you sleep 7 hours Friday night, then turn around and put in a 3 hour nap on Saturday afternoon…  by Sunday, you may be lethargic and edgy.   One reason is that you won’t sleep well Saturday night (after your nap marathon).  When our sleep schedules are altered, we don’t often respond with the best of moods.
  • However, not getting enough sleep is even worse! Lack of sleep affects people differently.  Some get cranky and irritable, snapping at people, biting heads off that’d rather stay intact.  Others feel depressed, as though there isn’t much to even smile about.
  • Beware of taking too much allergy medicine! I have noticed (as have many people I’ve talked to) that taking just about any antihistamine can lead to a case of the droops.  One young girl e-mailed me last year (it was actually around this time of year because I remember telling her Happy Easter).  She said that for a few weeks she just felt like there were tears “behind her eyes” most of the day.  She said that things were bothering her that never seemed to bother her before – little things.  After a few e-mails back and forth, I asked her how she felt, otherwise.  When she said, “As long as I keep sucking down ******** (an allergy medicine), I’m okay.”   Light bulb!  I explained to her that she was probably having a reaction to the allergy pills as a lot of us do. Fortunately, her biggest allergic reaction to the trees involved her eyes, so I gave her the name of some outstanding allergy eye drops.  I also told her to place something cold on her eyes when they itch:  Wet cloth, cold spoon, etc.  One week later, she e-mailed and said she felt like her old self again. She took my advice about the cold object on her eyes and keeps a spoon in her purse.  She said she got peculiar looks, but she just laughs. (THAT’S the whole idea!)
  • Spending too much time in the past can dampen your present. I’ve talked a lot about this one – on this site as well as Out of Bounds.  There’s nothing wrong with looking in the past from time to time, but if you find yourself doing it too often, you’re headed for trouble.  This seems to be something that a lot of mothers do when their children get older.  They keep looking at old pictures and wishing they were little again.  The way I look at it is this:  When my girls were little, I held them in my lap and read to them.  Today, we sit across the table from one  another and each talk about things we’ve read.  The same love is involved, the same closeness is experienced.  You can hold your children in your heart just as closely as you did in your arms.
  • Be sure you get enough sunlight and fresh air. Too little of either can dampen your mood considerably.

Focus on the Positive

When you’re feeling down, for whatever reasons, don’t think about the negatives.  Instead, focus on what you love about your life.  Think about your family. They may be lunatics, but they’re your lunatics!

Do you love your bird-filled yard, your cats, your big ole kitchen.  Do you love living within 5 minutes of a Starbucks? Do you love watching movies, then going to IMDB to read about the stars?   These are just a few things that I’m in love with in my own life.  I also love feeding rabbits, raccoons and possums on my patio and in my yard each night.  I sit the food out and watch in absolute delight as they enjoy their supper and the raccoons bathe in the bowl of water.  You haven’t seen cute until you’ve seen a raccoon with a bunch of grapes.  Last night, after the raccoon washed his gorgeous face, a small possum walked over and licked her right on the face.  Very unusual.  I reached for the door, thinking I was going to have to protect an overly friendly (or thirsty) little possum, but the raccoon didn’t seem to mind.

The point is, get your enjoyment from life where you want it.

If you enjoy watching tv each evening, watch away.   It doesn’t matter if others make fun of your shows – they don’t have to watch!  If you enjoy surfing the web, surf away.  If others say you’re wasting your time, remind them that it’s yours!  Plus, if you’re relaxing and enjoying yourself, you aren’t wasting your time, you’re choosing to spend it the way you choose to spend it.  After all, it’s yours, right?

Side thought, why do people always want to tell other people how to spend their time, what they should or shouldn’t enjoy, etc.

Like my own examples, the things that make you the happiest may not seem like much to someone else.  But that doesn’t matter in the least.  If it makes you smile and makes you glad to be alive, it’s your’s and your’s alone.  Others may not understand what I get from feeding every bird and animal in the county, but I know how happy it makes me.  So, you’ll find me buying bird food in bulk.  And smiling.

Exercise the Blues Away

Countless studies prove that regular exercise can improve your mood.  Not only does it help with the blues, exercise actually helps with people who are suffering mild to moderate depression.  What’s more, it’s beginning to play a supporting role in treating severe depression.  Experts are actually finding that exercise can replace some antidepressants.  Studies show that the effects of exercise last longer than antidepressants, work as well, and don’t have the negative side effects. The “side effects” of exercise are all positive!  Now that’s exciting.

Studies show that walking briskly for 35 minutes, 5 times a week OR for 1 hour, 3 times a week can do a world of good for your mood.

The thing about exercise is that it takes effect immediately.   You can be feeling down one minute, then engage in activity and find your spirits lifted immediately.

How does exercise relieve depression and lift bad moods?  Exercise enhances the action of endorphinsy. Endorphins improve natural immunity and reduce the perception of pain. They also  improve your mood.

The “side effects” of regular exercise offer a host of wonderful health benefits:  Lowered blood pressure, protection against heart disease,  lowered risk of many types of cancers, weight loss and/or management, improved circulation, improved respiratory function, and so on.

The next time you’re feeling out of sorts, a walk may be just what you need.

Filed Under: General, Positive Thought, Self Help Tagged With: be happy, improve your mood, overcome the blues

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Overcoming Empty Nest Syndrome

One of the questions I hear the most from my readers is, "How can I cope with empty nest syndrome?" I'll try to deal with this sensitive subject as often as possible. If you have any suggestions, I hope you'll contribute to the conversations!

  • Coping With Empty Nest Syndrome
  • Don't Just Cope in an Empty Nest, Thrive!
  • How to Be Happy in an Empty Nest
  • Overcoming Empty Nest Syndrome
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