Prepare for Your Empty Nest

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Prepare for your empty nest to avoid anxiety and make the transition smoother.

As the season of motherhood shifts, it’s natural to feel both anticipation and uncertainty about the empty nest. These tips will give you hope!

But this transition can be a beautiful opportunity to rediscover who you are beyond your roles.

In this post, I share practical and grace-filled steps to prepare your heart and home for this next chapter. Whether you’re looking to rekindle old passions, explore new callings, or embrace the quiet space to deepen your relationship with Christ, these tips will help you approach this change with faith, hope, and purpose. Let’s walk this journey together, trusting God’s perfect plan!

Recently I shared with you how to embrace usefulness as an empty nester. If you’re in this stage of life, it’s better to find your new direction sooner than later.

Only one life,’ twill soon be past, Only what’s done for Christ will last. C.T. Studd

If you’re busy enjoying each moment of your children’s lives, you might suddenly wake up to an empty nest!

Whether you have teenagers and a few more years until they all move out and this new season is here to stay, it’s never too late to prepare for your life as an empty nester.

How to Prepare for Your Empty Nest

When my kids were little, the empty nest years seemed ions away. I could hardly see ahead as I was stuck in the moment changing diaper after diaper.

I homeschooled my kids for about twenty-five years. I was consumed with planning and teaching them day in and day out. It didn’t come without struggles and I felt like those days would go on forever.

To be honest, it wasn’t always easy yet I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

One thing is sure, it affected my marriage and we grew apart although always faithful to each other. Then while the kids were still living at home, I started doing my part to improve our less-than-blissful relationship.

Marriage isn’t easy and it takes work to rebuild lost connections.

I didn’t want a distant relationship during the empty nest years. If this is what you’re living right now, you will find solutions by reading this.

Practical Ways to Prepare

Preparing for an empty nest can be both exciting and challenging. It’s a season of change, but with intention and prayer, it can be a time of renewal and discovery.

Here are some practical and spiritual steps to prepare for this transition:

• Spend time in God’s Word!
• Don’t forget to pray!
• Date your husband!
• Renew extended family ties!
• Take up a hobby or two!
• Renew extended family ties!
• Volunteer at church or your community!
• Start exercising!
• Do not neglect your emotional well-being!
• Declutter!
• Redecorate!
• Join a Bible study!
• Take an online or in-person course!
• Plan meaningful visits with your kids!
• Find new ways to celebrate!
• And be sure to REST!

By preparing for this season with purpose and grace, you can enter it with joy and anticipation.

It’s not about “losing” your role as a mother but discovering the richness of what God has in store for you next!

Are you fearful about entering the empty nest years? Prepare by learning to live fearlessly!

An Empty Nest Looks Different

There are twelve years between our oldest and youngest child. When our oldest was 28 he moved halfway across the country.

In three-and-a-half short years, all the others had moved out.

At ages 19 and 20 my two youngest moved to Wisconsin. I can’t lie, it was not exactly expected, yet their reasons were good. When your children want to walk with the Lord, it’s best not to hold them back.

Prepare for Your Empty Nest

At one point I had a friend whose children had grown up. One was married and the other lived at home. The parents of these children tried to control their choices. In addition, my friend was depressed and revisited the past instead of taking joy in the present.

While our kids are little we are in an endless cycle of diapers and runny noses. When suddenly they are grown, we can feel lost and insecure by the changes and cling to them as if we can stop the clock.

But the clock keeps ticking as time keeps moving forward.

The transition to an empty nest is overnight without time to adjust to the finality of the time change.

If your child is moving out for college, their wedding, a new job in another town, or moving to an apartment, you can get caught up in preparations for their new life and forget your own dramatic change of events.

In retrospect, what I did worked well. Hindsight always works the best.

I started a blog two years before my youngest finished homeschooling!

It became my new passion and gave me something new to do with my life. I wasn’t even thinking about the years after homeschooling when my nest would empty.

It was accidental!

As it turned out, developing a new interest was the best way to prepare for my empty nest.

If you find a new (or old and neglected) interest to do when your last child moves out, it will make the transition to an empty nest easier.

Prepare for Your Happy Nest & Marriage

It is more and more common for a marriage to flounder and die during the years of raising kids. If this is you, I know it’s been a difficult journey.

Marriage isn’t easy. It has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Marriage is hard work.

It’s totally rewarding to be an empty nester with a thriving marriage.

Prepare by Building a Strong Marriage:

• Using Bible Verses that Make Your Marriage Knot Tighter
• How To Choose Gratitude When Your Marriage Hurts
• 5 Prayers When Your Marriage is on the Rocks

Prepare with Hobbies & Activities

Are you preparing to be an empty nester or are you already one?

I prefer being referred to as an ‘Empty Nester’ to saying, “I am ‘retired”. Retired sounds so worn out and tired.

I do NOT want to live without purpose as a couch potato with nothing better to do than watch TV or endlessly scrolling social media.

Without a doubt, I want to glorify the Lord with my whole life for whatever days are ahead.

Retirement is also NOT a ticket for an endless vacation. I want to live full and die empty because I was living for Jesus.

I often wonder what other empty-nester moms are doing with their day.

• What does your days look like?
• How do you see your life as an empty nester?

Stay Committed to Praying for Your Kids

Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my meditation.

Hearken unto the voice of my cry, my King, and my God: for unto thee will I pray.

My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up

Honestly, to be committed to praying for my kids is my favorite goal as an empty nester mom.

Several years before I entered these years, I thought about having a porch (which I have now) and sitting in a rocking chair praying for my kids.

It’s easy to derail from the desire to pray fervently as the evil one fears those who pray. I constantly have to say, “Lord, teach me to pray!”

It’s so important to prepare for life as an empty nester. You’ll transition smoothly from full-time mom to your new role with purpose.

Are you struggling to prepare for the years ahead as an empty nester?

Did you already land in your nest? Please let me know how I can encourage you!

Are you fearful about entering the empty nest years? Prepare by learning to live fearlessly!

Click the graphic below to learn more!