The time in our life when our children are making plans of moving out and moving on. The years we are left facing that we are now our own person. We are no longer a needed fixture in our children's lives. We may be menopausal women. We may be men going through that mid life crisis. We may just be parents facing empty nest syndrome. Either way it is a new chapter in our lives and a new road to travel and discover, "Who am I now?"
This is not an easy transition for me. I'm going through menopause, so I am already a roller coaster of emotions and new quips and quirks that could send me into a frenzy of uncontrollable laughter or a fit of homicidal rage, or even still a river of tears brought on by the Gods only know what, because I sure as hell don't. Facing the inevitable, I am a parent of adult children who are now off living their own lives. I have done my job. I like to think I have done it well.
I have the mixed emotions of being ready to have quiet and solitude or feeling needed by children and having them in my life daily. I think about being able to get up and walk to the kitchen in my birthday suit unfettered by the fact that there may be one of my children also heading to the kitchen. Heck even to make crazy spontaneous love to my husband in the middle of the living room floor without worry of recourse from expected interruptions of a child walking into the room. Then I think about waking up to an empty house, husband at work and children off leading their own lives. What do I do now? Who am I? What am I supposed to do now?
Yes, these are my formidable years. I am at the trail-head of this new life path and I have no clue where it is going to lead me. I feel like all I can do is hold on tight and enjoy this crazy ride.
