An earlier version of this essay appeared in YourTeen Magazine.
I’m a death educator.
My job is helping people understand loss, grief, and the emotional curve that follows major life changes. So when my only child left for college, I assumed I’d handle the empty-nest transition with professional grace.
I was wrong.
I’m also a single dad with a flexible schedule—I’m a college professor—so I spent years deeply involved in the daily fatherhood routine. I knew the gig would eventually end when my son traded his bedroom for a dorm room.
The advantage of an expected loss is that you have time to prepare.
Parents spend years knowing that one day their kids will leave home. It’s not like a child suddenly announces, “I never want to leave and would like to live in the basement forever.”
My strategy for dealing with the looming empty nest was simple:
Stay busy.
I overcommitted professionally and personally. I filled my schedule and convinced myself that activity could outsmart grief.
For a while, it worked.
But I forgot about the mornings.
For eighteen years my son and I performed the same morning ritual—a three-step father-child dance.
Step one: the wake-up interrogation.
“Are you up yet? Really up? Actually out of bed?”
Step two: the nutritional lecture.
“You need to eat real food. Pop-Tarts don’t count.”
Step three: the exit inquisition.
“You have everything? Are you sure? Where’s your jacket?”
Then one morning the house was quiet.
No wake-up routine.
No breakfast lecture.
No jacket investigation.
Grief doesn’t need dramatic moments to appear. Sometimes all it takes is a quiet cup of coffee and the sudden realization that the routine is gone.
The silence crushed me.
Eventually I adjusted to the empty nest. And then the pandemic arrived.
Like many college students, my son suddenly returned home and moved back into the teen cave. At first it felt like bonus fatherhood time.
I even beat him at Mario Smash Bros.
But the novelty faded quickly.
Online classes, isolation, and pandemic life took a toll on him. I watched, in slow motion, how much young adults need friends, independence, and their own space.
The perks of living at home—free food and complimentary laundry—didn’t compensate for what he was missing.
And that’s when I realized something important.
I loved having my son home again.
But I also wanted him to go back.
Because parenting isn’t about keeping kids close.
It’s about preparing them to leave.
In other words, you can’t have the grown…
without the flown.
