All through the week, I sang “Baby Mine” (remember Disney’s Dumbo?) quietly to myself. We spend a lifetime pulling our children in, protecting, loving, and then, letting them go. It was a beautiful fantasy setting in Costa Rica on a black sand beach where she said her vows. She has spent the better part of her life showing me she how much she loves. Details count to Lauren. It’s the little things she does that make everything special. She doesn’t just sign a Mother’s Day card. She makes it from scratch. She doesn’t just love when it’s convenient. She pours herself out like a drink offering.

This past week, I watched her love her new stepson with a grace that made an indelible print on me. I watched as she became wife and mother in one clean sweep. She asked us both to “give her away.” It was a gift to me to stand beside her at such a moment. As the ceremony started, a three-legged dog hobbled through the gathering. I thought how poignant it was to have a reminder of our imperfections, our incompleteness as we joined two imperfect lives, but two people in love who seek that wholeness. I thought about my job as a mother and prayed I could let go. I thought about the ups and downs that marriage inevitably brings. I thought about their joy this day, and I prayed it would be doubled with each year that passes. As the ceremony ended, two macaws flew over and landed in a nearby tree, as if on cue. The same thing happened at Lindsay’s wedding. At the end of the ceremony, two egrets flew over. Both times the witnesses gasped. Surely God is in this place. And this mom watched and knew God was helping me release them into His more than capable Hands. Blessed life together, Lauren, Mike and Liam. I love you more than words can convey.

Good morning. The armchair psychologist with you today, and since I have had several chats with new blog friends on the good and bad of being empty nesters, I thought I might share a few reasons why I think it works.

I remember panicking the year my youngest was a senior in high school, realizing my only defining job was “mom.” I jumped into classes at the junior college and was embarking on an ambitious career as a psychologist when I realized about halfway through the semester there wasn’t anything I couldn’t do in that department with the degree that I wasn’t doing already. I also realized I would have to work about ten years with the hours I wanted just to pay for the degree. Over the years, I have counseled many women (never being short on opinion) and worked with battered women as an abuse counselor with nothing but reading a lot of professional material on the subject and on-the-job training. Downright scary, isn’t it! Except that I believe that God gave me a ministry to women so He equips me for every good work. It takes different forms at times, but my favorite part is connecting with women and in so doing, pointing to God as Light and Wisdom. So, that said, here’s my little bit of advice for living happily together as empty nesters.

Mike and I have spent the better part of our twenty-seven years raising children—almost twenty-six of those years have been either anticipating or in the throes of full childhood bedlam. Mike is an excellent dad and so he went through almost the same identity crisis as I did when they all moved out. We both were a little lost as to what was next. What we’ve learned after four years of having grown children is this:

1. Your kids still need you, only in different ways.
2. A good night’s sleep is an actual possibility again. This goes back to the theory “Out of sight. Out of mind.” You don’t know what time they got in, so you don’t worry (as much.)
3. Your husband becomes someone you enjoy spending time with again, instead of just someone to help share the load. This is the best part and one we still don’t take full advantage of.
4. There are plenty of good things that define each day and give it meaning besides the chaos of carpools, calendars, cars, colleges, and crazy moods of teenagers.
5. To grow, the marriage needs redefining and refining at certain life stage changes, whether it is having a baby, a move, a child leaving home, or retirement.

Back to point # 3, though. Mike and I were just discussing how we had defined most of our lives around what all we did with the kids, including most of our friendships and time spent together having fun. The worst thing that can happen is you both drift apart, and loneliness sets in, not having shared experience. Michael Rierra, in his book, Uncommon Sense for Parents with Teenagers, speaks of shared experiences as the number one risk for teenagers acting out. Rierra states,

“ To understand why certain risky behaviors are worthwhile for adolescents takes a little digging on the part of parents. The main consequence of saying ‘no’ to negative peer pressure is not just withstanding the ‘heat of the moment’ as most adults think. Rather, it is coping with a sense of exclusion as others engage in the behavior and leave the adolescent increasingly alone. It is the loss of shared experience. Further, the sense of exclusion remains whenever the group later recounts what happened. This loneliness then becomes pervasive…”

Though Rierra is talking about risky behavior in teens, I think it applies to marriages. The value of shared experience should not be underestimated. We need time together having fun. It rarely happens automatically. Mike and I have decided to do two new things together this year—small steps, but ones, we hope, with big payoff. We are going to learn how to play bridge with another couple that we don’t know very well yet, and we are going to go to a Bible study together. Just two little things, but with our busy and ever-increasingly distant lives, we need to orchestrate some “together” time, and enjoy a little shared experience again.

So what’s a girl to do? Twenty-seven years with the same man. How can you be creative and give a nice anniversary present and still have some significance to it? If I reverse it, it is plenty for me to go out to eat and have some meaningful conversation and remember the good times. I like simplicity. But my sweet husband always likes to add all the bells and whistles. That is his love language, so I have to think like he would. I think I’ll write a little note to him—sorry you can’t see that one, but I will finish this blog post with a tribute to my hero, my knight in shining armor.
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Often the brunt of the joke on TV now, men have become the “I Love Lucy” doofuses that can’t seem to figure out what is going on in the household to save their tiny pea brains. The savvy wife winks and smiles into the camera and tells him, “Honey, you’ve had your head in a cubicle all day, so let me tell you how life really works.” I am tired of this humor at the expense of men and their dignity. I am tired of men not being men or our perception of them being portrayed in this negative light. Being from Texas, there’s a stereotype of men here, too, that isn’t all that flattering about macho guys who wouldn’t shed a tear if they lost their best horse on roundup day. Neither of these images begin to convey the importance of men in families or give them any credit for all they do.
Yesterday, a friend and I spent a lot of time in the Sprint store trying to get a plan for a zillion minutes and negotiate the best deal with a family plan that serves five cell phones and two broadbands. Don’t ask. They love me. However, that is not where I was headed with this. Israel, our patient assistant, spent literally a couple of hours with us, I later realized, after the store was closed. They were supposed to close at seven, and that is about the time I got there. He never complained. However, his phone rang about three times while we were there, and I was pretty sure it was his wife wondering what day he might return to their abode. He just smiled, and said no problem. I couldn’t help but remember the times I had been upset with Mike when he couldn’t manage to get his tail in the door before 7 or 8 when quitting time was 5:30. And you can be sure, I let him know I wasn’t a happy mama. I don’t think I had any idea how his day had gone that would have caused him to be so late. I wished I could take those times back now, but I’ll let this post serve as a heads up to anyone who reads this and can relate.
My man gets up at the crack of dawn, drives in the Houston gridlock two hours, and tries to solve multi-million dollar problems for a company each day. He deals with all kinds of people and few are out for anything other than themselves. Work is after all, work. He’s the one who, when we were first married and weren’t making it financially each month, took a Saturday job just to pay the bills. He’s the one who took the risks, bore the worry, and stepped up to the responsibility and provided for this family. My girls are going to have a hard time finding husbands because he set the bar so high. One of the things I tried to keep in mind when I was feeling selfish and frankly, lonely, as he worked so hard over the years, was reminding myself what a good father and husband he was. No matter how tired he was, he had time for us. No matter if he felt like doing a project for the kids, or winning Science Fair single-handedly, he was there. I grew up with a teacher mom who taught me to tell the kids “School is your job. Taking care of you is my job.” So I rarely offered extra help with those crazy school projects. But not Mike. He made plaster of paris statues, completely functioning, authentic replicas of volcanoes, and followed the scientific method on neon poster board to the nth degree. He made lunches for the kids when I couldn’t look at bologna at 6 a.m., and he was the one that made the 11 o’clock runs to Walgreen’s to get a folder cover for the reports. He has always been the one to count on, the one who, when mom said no, that you could probably convince otherwise. He’s the back scratcher, the rub-your-back when you feel bad go-to guy, the good-looking Marlborough guy in the commercial in his boots rounding up the cattle in his “spare” time. He’s a dad. The best kind. And he’s a husband. The best I know.
Men are not appreciated enough today. Don’t think they don’t notice. At some point, some say why bother? Others keep at it despite the lack of gratitude. Maybe this post is only for me to remember and appreciate, but in case I’ve struck a nerve, make a point today to tell the man in your life whether it’s your dad, your brother, your son, your boyfriend, or your husband, that you notice what he does and he makes a difference in your life. I’ve got to go pick out something for our anniversary, but it’s my guess that the letter with words of affirmation will be his favorite gift, but I’m probably not thinking like a man.

In a couple of days, Mike and I will celebrate 27 years of marriage. He’s my best friend and I am privileged to call him mine. Two years ago, a friend asked me to write a letter to a bride-to-be for a book she was giving her guest of honor (great shower idea, by the way.) Below is that letter, with some of my musings of a great marriage. Not perfect by any means, but we’re here and we’re still trying, so that qualifies me to write a little about what I think might have made it work so far…Happy, happy Anniversary, Mike. I love you forever.