<p>This is the last night of my oldest daughter’s spring break. This will also be her last spring break because she only has one more semester after this one.
No Cancun vacation for her…she spent it home with her boring parents and little sister. The visit has been very nice , but the reality is setting in that next year this time, she will
( hopefully ) be gainfully employed in her field…on the opposite coast
Don’t get me wrong, I want her to spread her wings , but I am having that mother anxiety…she will not be home for summer this year.</p>
<p>It’s hard to adjust to them being gone almost all the time, even if they’re doing constructive things that they enjoy.</p>
<p>My son was a college senior last year. I didn’t even have the last spring break that I thought I would have with him – he spent it visiting graduate schools to which he had been accepted. Then, after his college graduation, he only came home for a week before leaving for the opposite coast, where he is now attending graduate school. </p>
<p>My daughter, who is a college sophomore, was just accepted into an internship that she will commute to from home, so at least I will have her here for one more summer, but this may be the last time. I suspect she will spend the following summer elsewhere. And she doesn’t always come home for breaks now, either.</p>
<p>People think that “empty nest” time comes when kids go away to college. They’re wrong. The real empty nest happens a few years later.</p>
<p>Yes, Marian… I don’t have an empty nest by common definition , but I feel that my first born is really gone now.</p>