One of the hardest things for an empty nest mom to do is to let go of trying to create the perfect holiday gatherings.
I want to share a text conversation I had with my kids last week. Four out of our five kids live within an hour of our Central Illinois home. Three are married and live near their spouse’s extended family.
My text let everyone know that my mom, sister, and niece would be visiting for Easter so I would be hosting Easter dinner on Sunday at 2pm. I wanted to let everyone know and see who would be joining us.
At Thanksgiving and Christmas we try to figure out a plan for making sure everyone can gather–often choosing another time than Thanksgiving Day or Christmas Eve or Day to make it easier for everyone. Other holidays and opportunities are hit or miss.
You’ll notice that my daughter (Anne) responded that they would be there and she would bring a vegetable to share. My daughter-in-law (Larisa) indicated that they couldn’t join us.
I don’t know the exact reason why they can’t join us and I won’t be asking. There’s a variety of possible reasons—she might be hosting Easter for her family at their new home. She might be working that weekend (she’s a night-shift labor and delivery nurse). They might be going to her parents for Easter. Heck, they have three kids under the age of three (two they are fostering) and they are tired. Maybe they just need a quiet weekend at home.
I don’t know the reason and I don’t need to. They don’t “owe” us anything. We operate on an “invitation without guilt” principle.
We love spending time with all our kids. In fact we were at Larisa and Austin’s home all last weekend helping them with home projects.
As empty nesters we have to be careful about the expectations we put on our kids to make us happy. Or the obligation we impose to gather because it’s a holiday.
Am I disappointed they won’t be there? Sure. I am. Because I love seeing them and I love having my kids home and my family together. However, I have to work through that in my own heart. I value the health of the relationship more than a “perfect” holiday gathering.
I wanted to share this because I thought someone else might need the encouragement.
Invite…but don’t guilt.
P.S. If you’re an empty-nest or close-to-empty-nest mom, don’t go it alone! I have all kinds of resources for you over at www.EmptyNestBook.com!
Figuring it out for me and my heart has been hit or miss some years. I try to make sure my kids know that our door is always open. If I really don’t know if they are planning to be at our house during the holiday, I have before reached out with Dad and I are thinking about maybe traveling this year, but if anyone would like us to come to them or you are thinking of coming home let us know.
Usually this gets everyone talking and then we let them tell us what they are doing first
One year we travelled to our parents because our kids were with their families.
My heart feels better when I know they are happy and busy wherever that is.
Such wisdom. Thank you for sharing Christina.
Can you even believe you’re writing about this empty next stuff? Weren’t you just heavy with a surprise child? *Fingersnap*
YES!!!! I know this person who wrote “Don’t Miss Your Kids, They’ll Be Gone Before You Know It!” She was right!!! 😘
We have 5 children also and the oldest two are adults, so we are just beginning to navigate this. We don’t always plan around our kids and we’ve been very open letting them know a yay or nay is okay. But the question I have is, for big events like Christmas, we are happy to move the date around to January (or whenever) if we need to to get everyone there. They are all within 3 hours of us. But it’s getting harder and harder to plan a date everyone is available. For big events do you ask for open dates first, or just plan it and hope most (everyone) can come?
Robyn, yes we’ve found that asking for open dates first is usually helpful and then we plan from there.
Such wisdom here, Jill! I love “invitation without guilt”. I’ll bet your kids appreciate it so much.
I recently hosted a couple on my podcast who have done premarital counseling for almost a hundred couples and they said that this is one of the most common stressors they run into with counseling young couples – parents who don’t allow their married kids to “leave and cleave”.
As we talked out what this means in the Genesis 2 story, I realized that I hadn’t really put some of these truths into practice in my own marriage, and it was so helpful in thinking about how to set my own kids up for success.
Here’s the episode for “How to Leave and Cleave and What Happens When You Don’t” in case anyone is interested: https://www.shannonpopkin.com/leave-cleave-bruce-sue-osterink/
Oh that sounds like a really good conversation to tap into! Thank you for sharing Shannon!
We have lived in guilt for 30 years. We are from divorced families who expect us to do what they set. We’ve run our heads off place to place since our children (now in their twenties) we’re born. Before that. It’s so exhausting we go through dread every year starting in October when my mom starts asking who will be there. She says she won’t move it because “most people have it and whoever shows, shows” but it’s not left at that, guilt follows. My mother in law wouldn’t move Christmas eve one year until a step grand daughter had a program that night and asked to move it for her. In the past when we asked to move it she got mad and didn’t put out her tree! We are now grandparents. Everyone, also in central Illinois, lives approx 1-1 & 1/2 hours from each other.
At what point do WE do what is best for us? How do we approach it with our parents? We love them and don’t want to disappoint them. We try to do guilt free with our kids. We even offer another weekend so we can have quality time. We’d rather spend a day in comfy clothes watching movies, snacking and relaxing than 2 hours in a hurry “because that’s when we do it”
Traci, you ask some good questions and the answer is that this year could be the year you can do what is best for you. I would suggest that you seek out some counseling or coaching to help you move from pleasing others to becoming a secure connector who is okay saying “no” even if it disappoints someone. This is the type of coaching I often do with women. I highly recommend the book How We Love by Milan and Kay Yerkovich to help you better understand the dynamics that are playing out.