Motherhood in the Empty Nest – a Lack of Social Recognition?
family home. Regarding family policies, social context, and individual attitudes towards this stage and
reconfiguration of a mother’s social role of a mother – there is still a notable gap in the research on family issues.
Becoming a mother in an empty nest is an individual process following considerable life changes. Despite its
importance, it appears to be treated with less validity than the experiences of mothers who are navigating through
the early stages of motherhood. Therefore, I will present what happens in the lives of women whose role as
mothers is being transformed.
With the departure of children, time is released for mothers to pursue their individual and professional needs. While the mother’s role shifts from everyday mode to a latent or out-of-everyday mode – the caregiver role (which is part of the mother’s role) does not seem to have an end. Mothers of adult children remain trapped in the panini sandwich generation, which forces them to care for their parents, in-laws, and sometimes, even their partners themselves. It is not easy to predict the duration and intensity of the necessary assistance. A natural consequence of the physiological ageing process affects the continuation of entanglement in responsibilities. There are not just remote maternal duties (towards adult children), but also extra duties as daughters of ageing parents.
The presentation is based on empirical material collected between 2019 and 2021 within a 36-month longitudinal qualitative study of individuals
and couples in Poland whose adult children had left the family home.