Reaching the Most Overlooked Generation
Life When Couples Reach the Empty Nest Stage
by George Bullard
Several years ago, I ran into a casual friend, Jack, at a community event. He asked me what I was working on now. I told him I was focusing on the needs of the Church@50+. Particularly I was focusing on Empty Next households as the most overlooked generation.
Jack wanted a deeper explanation. I shared some details. As I did so, I remembered that Jack's relationship with his wife Sheila was the second marriage for both. However, I did not know the specifics or timing.
I jokingly shared with Jack the adage about married life beginning again when the last child leaves home, and the dog dies. I added that couples must figure out at that point why and how they still love one another.
Jack looked at me with deep concern and said, "Yeah, I know. My marriage fell apart the day the dog died. My wife and I had too long related to one another through our children and then through our beloved dog. Once we had to look each other in the face daily and relate directly, I realized I was no longer in love with her. I left her."
Empty Nest Stage
The Empty Nest stage is a new beginning for life. When married couples reach this stage, they renegotiate their relationship patterns and think about multiple issues in new ways. They have more health and wellness issues. There may be actual chronic or acute diseases they manage. They may be out of shape and overweight. They take maintenance drugs that go beyond an aspirin and vitamin.
They think about their career. Will they ever get to the vocational role they always believed they deserved to achieve? Or will they have to be satisfied with something less?
Do they want to stay with the same organization for the rest of their career? Or is this a time to make a switch before they get too old for people to consider them?
Financial security is an important question. Based on current financial projections and barring an economic disaster or pandemic, will they have enough money for retirement? At the same time, during this Empty Nest stage, they had always wanted to do some things when they did not have heavy obligations to their children. Of course, those educational debts and the cost of weddings still affect reserve and retirement funds.
These are just a few of the issues typical Empty Nest households face. It is not unusual for them to wake up one morning and realize they are in an emotional vise. They likely are part of the Club Sandwich Generation, a subset of the Empty Nest Stage.
The Club Sandwich Generation
The Club Sandwich Generation is when an Empty Nest couple discovers they must help manage three other generations of their family. One or more aging parents have various dependency needs. One or more adult children are not nearly as independent financially and emotionally as they hoped.
Grandchildren may be coming along. Empty Nesters have a robust and deep desire to focus on relating to their grandchildren and a concern about the value systems they are learning.
Their church believes they do not have the same family obligations they once had. They begin asking them to accept more leadership responsibilities. They are targeted to make more significant financial contributions. Expected is just as regular church attendance as when their children were at home.
They, however, want to go off in their camper more weekends or buy more weeks of their vacation timeshare--only to realize they must spend more weekends with an aging parent who lives several hundred miles away. They would love to spend more Sunday mornings sleeping in, reading, and sipping coffee in the den or on the deck.
Question: What are your looking for life when you become an Empty Nester? What are your looking for in a church when you reach the Empty Nest stage of life?