Who said an empty nest is so bad?
The old empty nest might not be such a bad thing. A professor from the University of Missouri recently conducted a study to examine parent-child relationships and found that there were positive changes in the way parents interacted with their newly independent children. Also, there were very few differences between the way mothers and fathers interacted with their adult children, rebuffing the idea that mothers fall apart and experience a depressing empty-nest syndrome.
The study interviewed 142 sets of parents and their first-born sons and daughters. Some things that do change once the kids fly the coop, as reported by the parents, were that parents were able to relate more like peers to their kids and acted as mentors giving advice rather than authority figures making demands. Hardly any parents reported any type of change in the emotional support they offered their children. And of course, financial assistance continued for the majority of young adult children. So it seems, the more things change…the more they stay the same, kinda.
and the longer the children are out of the nest, the more peer-like the relationship should become. That issue is a source of discussion on my blog about parenting adult children. The blog is at grownchildren.typepad.com
Comment by grownchildren.typepad.com — March 31, 2008 @ 1:35 pm
I am a soon to be father (5 wks). I don’t know what it is like yet to have children for several years in your home, and then all of a sudden have an empty home. I can understand were all of a sudden there is a lot of extra time. I can also understand were it could end up being lonely. I wonder in these satiations why people don’t take a few minutes to become involved and share their experiences with new and soon to be parents? It seems like not only a great way to add something else to your life but to somebody else’s as well.
My wife and I are apart of a number of online communities which to some extent encourage this type of interaction. Our favorite right now is OurBabySteps.com. We just have a lot of questions about what to expect, and how to handle it. For us, with no experience, its great to have people to learn from. It also seems to me like a great way share, remember, and fill extra time.
Comment by Father to Be — April 4, 2008 @ 8:52 am