For nearly two decades I was a full-time working mother. Then, I lost my job and 2 of my 3 kids moved away.

• Balancing work and motherhood was a constant juggling act, but I did it well for many years.
• Then, I lost my job before sending my two oldest kids off to college.
• With no deadlines to meet and my kids not needing me as much, I’m reevaluating my future.

For nearly two decades, I functioned as both a full-time mother and a full-time magazine editor.

Then last year, I was laid off from the job from the job I had held for nearly 11 years, only a few months before my two oldest children left for college and my youngest started middle school. Overnight, my calendar cleared and my phone stopped buzzing. No more daily deadlines, no more commutes, no more mental checklists of who needed to be where and when.

At first, I felt relief. I was burnt out and in need of a break, and the timing could not have been better. It was the end of June, which meant I could enjoy all that summer had to offer while still being available for anything my kids needed as they prepared to leave the nest.

Life was busy, but manageable

While I was working, my two identities ran in tandem — sometimes seamlessly, more often in a constant juggling act. I’d spend my mornings in editorial meetings and my evenings shuttling kids to soccer games or dance classes. I’d squeeze in emails during school pickup, edit pages after bedtime, and answer late-night Teams pings from the glow at my dining room table.

Like many working mothers, my life was defined by the overlapping demands of deadlines, doctors’ appointments, and parent-teacher conferences.

Then came the pandemic, and the lines blurred even further. I wrote cover lines and edited features while supervising remote learning. I led departmental calls while simultaneously prepping lunch and tossing clothes in the dryer. I was indispensable everywhere, always needed. As work returned to a hybrid model and the kids became slightly more independent, the chaos eased somewhat, but the balance was still elusive.

I’ve lost jobs before, but this felt different

One Friday, as I began my morning routine, I received that dreaded calendar invite to a meeting with my manager and a rep from HR. The company was restructuring, and my position was being eliminated — and in just a few minutes, my life changed drastically.

The last time I lost a job, I had a 15-month-old at home and two in elementary school. Sure, I had no work to do, but a toddler climbing the walls, nightly homework sessions, and consistently responding to “Mommy!” kept me busy. There wasn’t much time for self-reflection.

This time was different. For the first time since 2005, no one at home needed me urgently either. That dual shift — professional and personal — has left me in a strange in-between space. I’m no longer a full-time working mother. The identity I wore like a second skin for decades feels suddenly ill-fitting, and I’m trying to figure out what comes next.

A surprising shift took place

I didn’t realize how much of myself I had wrapped up in being busy. My worth often felt measured in output: a polished article, an edited package, a perfectly executed family logistics plan. Now, the quiet stretches of my days feel both luxurious and unsettling.

I can sleep in because I don’t have to wake kids for school — but it feels like wasting the day. I don’t have to run home to start dinner, but without that structure, it’s shockingly easy to let hours slip by doing nothing. I can linger over coffee, walk the dog without rushing, even stream an episode — or five — of “Love is Blind” in the middle of the afternoon. And yet, I fidget, restless, wondering what exactly I’m supposed to be doing.

For years I imagined how easy life would be if I could spend my days in a quiet home, no longer glued to my phone to catch every urgent email, no last-minute Target runs, no frantic calls from the nurse’s office to come pick up a strep-laden child. But no one tells you that the “easier” stage comes with its own ache: the loss of being needed by anyone or everyone in the same way.

I’m learning to reframe this moment. Maybe it isn’t about who I am or who I was, but who I can still become. I have the professional skills honed over decades — storytelling, editing, managing teams — that I can bring to new kinds of work. I have the personal experience of raising kids while keeping a career alive, which gives me perspective and resilience I didn’t fully appreciate before. And I finally have time — time to think, to reset, to imagine what the next version of me could look like.

Maybe identity isn’t fixed; it’s rewritten. Right now, mine is a draft. That’s uncomfortable for someone used to tidy headlines and firm deadlines. But maybe this is where the story gets interesting: not in the perfect balance, but in the messy middle, where reinvention begins.

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