Most of my life I’d done all the “right” things, worked hard and handled my business.

I was always mature for my age as a child, finished second in my high school class, and went on to attend Harvard. I spent two years as a Peace Corps volunteer after graduation. I wasn’t perfect, but things flowed smoothly for me for the most part.

I went on to follow the normal life path of being a wife and mother, divorcing, and remarrying. And I built a successful career over the years, climbing the leadership ladder of the companies where I worked.

But after many years of sailing along…….it hit me one day that I would soon be an empty nester.

I was excited for my youngest to be leaving for college, but as the time got closer, I started feeling way out of sorts, and was asking myself:

“How did this get here so quickly, and why am I not happy about it?”

I had always been the rock at home and at work, the eternal optimist. I was the person others came to for advice and solutions when they had problems.

I was the parent who knew that my job was to raise my kids to leave the nest and become their own people. I always encouraged them to do that.

I should have been happy because I had done my parenting job well, and also because I’d have time to do all the things I’d been putting off while raising children!

But instead, this was hitting me hard. I felt:

✦ Sad and Lost – I asked myself, “What am I gonna do with no kids around to look after? How will I spend my time every day that used to be filled with swim meets, basketball, and football games, being the taxi driver, and making family meals?”

✦ I felt like the mom part of me no longer had a purpose….like a big part of my identity was being put out to pasture to die because my kids wouldn’t need me anymore.

✦ I also felt like I was broken and something was wrong with me for feeling this way. I’d sent kids off to college before. I had shed some tears, but I didn’t feel THIS way. Why was this time so different? I knew this day would come so why was I no longer the rock I had been?

On top of all of this, I was afraid for my marriage:

✦ Over the years of raising children and working, we’d had bumps in the road like most couples.

✦ We’d focused more on our shared parenting responsibilities and our careers than we had focused on making sure the bumps were smoothed out and continuing to grow our relationship.

✦ I was afraid that without kids to rally around and to drive our social calendar, we would spend our time sitting in silence, staring at each other with nothing in common, and nothing to talk about.

✦ Or worse, I was afraid that without the focus on the kids as a distraction from our issues, our marriage would crumble altogether.

✦ I didn’t like either of those options.

As I tried to figure out how to fix things and feel better, I knew I couldn’t change the fact that my son was leaving for college, and I didn’t want to. I’d just have to sit with my feelings about that for a while.

But I could try to change the direction my marriage was heading.

I decided to reach out to a woman offering coaching for women who wanted to ‘revive’ their marriages.

✦ It was the best decision ever because it started me on the path to becoming an Energy Healer!

✦ I learned quickly that focusing on my marriage didn’t mean planning date nights or doing trust exercises.

✦ It wasn’t about getting my husband to understand what I needed or wanted from him.

✦ It certainly wasn’t about looking to him to make me happy.

✦ And it wasn’t about me trying to make him happy either.

It was all about ME making me happy by rediscovering myself outside of the roles I had been playing to fill everyone else’s needs (wife, mother, daughter, sister, boss, friend, co-worker). It didn’t mean abandoning those roles, but it meant filling my cup first so I could show up better for others.

I came to the realization that I was running on autopilot. I had lost myself in the shuffle of doing for everybody else and had left myself behind.

I had to learn to recognize and fill my own needs in the same way I had been doing for others. That took the form of:

✦ Dating myself – spending time alone in a coffee shop, eating out, or traveling solo.

✦ Doing things that brought me joy… gardening, painting, and spending time in nature. These are the things that had fallen by the wayside with all of my other responsibilities.

✦ Revisiting my spirituality and immersing myself in books and classes to rediscover myself on a deeper level.

✦ Working with my coaches and mentors to understand the emotions I was feeling and discovering who I truly am.

So what did this all teach me?

I learned:

✦ It’s normal to feel the way I did about my son leaving. We (men and women) process empty nesting as a loss/death, and we grieve accordingly.

✦ There are many others who have experienced this same sense of loss and fear I did whether it was related to empty nesting or any other circumstance. There’s no shame in reaching out for help.

✦ To move past feeling like I was being put out to pasture I had to discover who I am at a soul level and stop defining myself only in terms of the different roles I play for others.

✦ The quickest way to self-love and discovery was to be purposeful about investing time and effort in myself. And as we invest time in ourselves, we are often surprised at how those around us grow as well.

Who am I now?

As a result of doing all of this:

✦ I have healthy relationships with my children, and my role of mom has evolved into a role of a friend, sometimes advisor and confidante, and always proud cheerleader. And when I nervously “came out of the closet” to my kids as an energy healer, thinking they might call me crazy, they laughed and said, ”do you think we didn’t already know that about you?”

✦ My husband has grown and evolved alongside me, and our marriage is a place of refuge and mutual support where we each grow along our unique paths. We still have bumps in the road, but we are much better equipped to navigate them.

✦ I found a love for myself that has given me the confidence to handle any changes or challenges in my life, as well as the emotions that come with them.

✦ I am clear on who I am, my purpose, and my direction. I now know my intuitive gifts have been with me all my life, but by diving deep I connected the dots on how they showed up in the past and learned how to use them in the present to help myself and others in a powerful way.

I am a living testament to the transformative power of looking inward and making yourself a priority. I’m proud to be helping others heal from difficult life situations from a position of grace and love. As an energy healer and intuitive coach, I would be humbled to share the lessons I've learned and use my gifts to help you on your own personal journey of growth and healing.