Welcome to the Free Bird Club
It’s now been officially one year since my youngest graduated high school and we technically joined the Empty Nest Club. Let’s first talk terminology. We call it Free Birding, not being empty nesters— it sounds better to concentrate on what you’ve gained and not what you lost. But let’s be honest: you don’t really earn your membership card until they actually leave for college in August. Even then, they tend to boomerang back home pretty regularly at first—turns out, dorm living isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. They start appreciating little things, like flushing toilets that work and food that isn’t served out of a plastic tray.
And then, just when you’re starting to adjust to the quiet, they show up again—four weeks of winter break with suitcases full of laundry and mysterious cords—and deposit everything in the foyer or mudroom like they’re dropping off a donation. It sits there for a week until you finally crack and tell them it has to go, which is met with exaggerated sighs and a sluggish relocation to the dining room.
Now, I say all this with love—and maybe a little sarcasm—but it’s true. I miss my kids. I wasn’t sobbing into throw pillows or anything, but I definitely had my moments. Some of my friends had a really hard time with the transition. There are days when it sneaks up on you—the realization that Annie and Abbie aren’t just gone for the semester; they’re launched. It’s June, and the last time they were home was over the holidays. It does make me question whether we still need the big house in Fort Mill… or if we just need a smaller one with fewer places for laundry piles to form.
But here’s the thing: your kids are where they’re supposed to be. And that brings joy, even when it also brings a little ache. There’s a bit of an identity shift when your entire “career” was being the stay-at-home mom who knew the school calendar by heart and volunteered for everything. Suddenly, you’re not the family’s project manager anymore. You’ve been promoted—or demoted, depending on how you look at it—to the advisory board. You’re still valued, just not… required daily. They’ll call when they need advice—or when they need the insurance login.
It is strange to reinvent yourself. I get asked all the time, “Do you work?” Well, no, not in a corporate office with a break room and a performance review, but I do manage our family’s life. These days, I call myself an estate manager, which sounds much fancier than “keeper of appointments, paperwork, and random Amazon returns.” It fits. I’m flexible, I handle logistics, and I wear yoga pants for 80% of my workday.
Speaking of which—when the girls were preparing to leave for college, I decided to focus more on my health. I got back into yoga about six years ago, and last year I doubled down and became a certified yoga teacher. It’s been good for my body and even better for my mind. I traded in being a band mom for being a yogi, which honestly involves fewer spreadsheets and more candles. And the yoga studio has become a new kind of community—one where no one asks if you remembered to sign up for snack duty.
The trickiest part of this stage? Motivation. When your days used to be built around the needs of everyone else, it’s an adjustment to wake up and ask, “What do I want to do today?” And let’s be honest, it’s hard to answer that question when BritBox is just one remote click away and there’s a new British mystery waiting that definitely requires immediate binge-watching. (If you are looking for one, Agatha Raisin is quite fun.)
So to my friends who are newly Free Birding—welcome.
You get to reclaim your schedule. You can eat dinner at 5:30 just because you feel like it. You can travel without worrying about who’s feeding the hamster or finding someone to pick up from soccer.
You can leave for a trip on a Tuesday and come back on a Thursday—just because airfare was cheaper and you didn’t have to run it by anyone but the dog.
And yes, you can walk around your kitchen in your underwear.
Congratulations. The nest may be empty, but the freedom? Absolutely full.
