June 15, 2025 • 30 mins
In this episode of Christian Book Blurb, host Matt McChlery speaks with author Kate Battistelli about her book, 'The After Party of the Empty Nest.' They explore the emotional journey of empty nesting, the different types of mothers experiencing this transition, and the importance of planning for the future. Kate shares her personal experiences, lessons learned, and practical advice for coping with the challenges of an empty nest. The conversation emphasizes the significance of community support, spiritual growth, and finding new purpose in life after children leave home.
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With thanks to this episode's sponsors 'God Whispers are Life Changers' by Michael and Delane Salkheld
Takeaways
- The empty nest is a time of reflection and identity change.
- Mothers experience the empty nest differently, often categorized into three types: Swallow, Morning Dove, and Robin.
- Planning for the empty nest should start early, even while children are still at home.
- It's important to find new activities and community involvement after children leave.
- Prayer and seeking God's guidance are crucial during the transition.
- The loneliness of an empty nest can be mitigated by volunteering and connecting with others.
- Women should focus on their identity beyond motherhood.
- God has a specific purpose for each individual after their children grow up.
- The importance of gratitude in every season of life.
- The book includes discussion questions and prayers to help readers process their experiences.
Sound Bites
"It's a celebration, not a party." "What do I do now?" "I felt like a Mack truck had hit me." "Get out and do something." "Start planning now for then." "He wants to be our friend."
Chapters
00:00 Introduction to the Empty Nest Journey 02:51 Understanding the Empty Nest Phenomenon 05:53 Personal Experiences of Empty Nesting 09:07 Lessons Learned During the Transition 12:05 Coping Strategies for Empty Nest Parents 14:57 Planning for the Future 18:08 The Role of Community and Support 21:13 Exploring the Author's Background 24:01 Fun and Hobbies 26:48 The Importance of Spiritual Growth 29:54 Conclusion and Resources
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
This is Christian Book Blurb brought to you by author and songwriter Matt McChlery Get abehind the scenes glimpse into the lives of some of your favourite Christian authors, hear
about their books and faith.
Also, why not check out my website, mattmcleary.com?
This episode of Christian Book Blurb is sponsored by the book God Whispers Our LifeChanges by Michael and Delane Sulkeld.
(00:26):
Available now from godwhispersforlife.com.
Well, hello and welcome to this episode of the Christian Book Blurb podcast, where we liketo encourage you in your discipleship, one book at a time, as we meet some amazing
Christian authors and learn about their books, their lives and their faith.
I'm Matt McChlery.
(00:47):
Thank you so much for joining me today.
And on today's show, I am going to be speaking with Kate Battistelli all about her newbook called The Afterparty.
of the empty nest.
Well, let's first of all start off by welcoming Kate to the podcast.
Hi Kate.
I'm Matt.
(01:07):
Thank you so much for having me today.
It's my pleasure.
It's great to have you joining us here on The Christian Book Blob.
Now you have recently published your new book called The After Party of the Empty Nest.
Now that is an intriguing title.
Why did you choose this title and how does it help to explain what the book is all about?
(01:29):
Well, I come out of the theater world, the Broadway theater world, and after you'reclosing, you the show is done, you always have an after party, and it's a celebration of
that main event.
It's more relaxed, more intimate, time for some good conversations, time to really thinkthrough everything about that production.
(01:49):
So it's a celebration, not a party where you're dancing and all of that, but it is a timeto just look back and be proud of what you did.
So how, I was going to say, how does that relate to the emptiness?
So just for some of our listeners who may not have heard the expression, the empty nestbefore, could you just explain what that is and kind of what stage of life that is talking
(02:16):
about?
Yes.
The empty nest is that time when your final child has moved on to college or marriage orwhatever, and you're suddenly by yourself.
You know, we, I like to think of our children as birds because we've always called it theempty nest here in the U S I don't know what y'all call it in England, but it's just that
(02:36):
time when you're just looking at this nest and it's empty.
The kids are gone.
And for moms, a lot of times our identity gets so wrapped up in that.
that it's hard to figure out, what do I do now?
And I haven't reached that stage yet.
I've got three young children of my own.
ah The day will come though.
(02:58):
So um it's been useful reading your book and getting some sort of insights ahead of time,which is always a useful thing to do.
Staying with the nest imagery, you also describe three different types of mother, becauseyou've primarily written this book for mums, haven't you?
Primarily I do have a little bit in there about dads because they also go through thedifficulty of the emptiness when their kids are gone I mean it it hits them to just I
(03:24):
think a little bit differently than mothers But yes, I talk about the three differenttypes of mama birds and the first one is the swallow and she's the mom who She's kind of
looking forward to this time.
She already has a plan.
She's looking forward to the freedom.
So she's
probably the least common because for most women it can be pretty tough.
(03:47):
And then the next one is the morning dove.
You know, we hear those beautiful coos in the morning of our birds out on the lawn orwherever, and we do associate them with morning.
And that's the mom that kind of gets stuck in that place where she says, I just don't knowwhat my identity is anymore.
I don't know how to move forward.
And it can be a real time of grief for her.
(04:09):
And then there's the Robin mom.
who is the combo of the two.
And in the U.S., there are 310 million Robins.
It's the most prevalent bird.
I mean, most of them are on my front porch, it feels like most days.
And that's the mom that's, you know, she can see the future, but she's still a little bitstuck in what do I do now?
(04:29):
So I like to see, I like to think about those three different birds because all those momsare gonna approach their empty nest a little bit differently.
Mm, really good.
And when you moved into this empty nesting stage of your life, what did it look and feellike for you personally?
(04:53):
I felt like a Mack truck had hit me.
It was very difficult because I didn't plan for it.
And one of the whole themes of the book is start planning now for then.
But I'd never thought about it.
Our daughter is in the Christian music world and we were working very hard to kind of gether help her navigate all of that as she was getting older and, you know, late teens,
(05:13):
early twenties.
And we were so focused on that.
I didn't think about the time when she wouldn't be home.
And all of a sudden she's gone, moved to Nashville.
We're in Florida.
And I'm just thinking, well, that was fun.
spend all those years raising your child and we only have one, we have one daughter and,it was difficult.
(05:33):
I always say there were no backup siblings to kind of, you know, ease the pain a littlebit.
We were very, it was very lonely and my husband has always worked at home.
But for these couple of years, he was out of the house working.
there I was with nobody and it was tough.
And I, like I said, I hadn't planned, so I had no.
future in mind other than you know one of the grocery store the next day it was it was atough time because i really did get stuck there for a while i think i was a good combo of
(06:03):
the melancholy mom and robin mom i tended to stick into that melancholy for a little whilebecause you do kind of lose your identity you're just thinking well who am i now that's
all i've known myself as well i mean since we got married and have children because we
We met the Lord, I was 29 when I met the Lord.
(06:23):
So we came out of that theater world, met the Lord, God asked us to lay it down, and thenjust moved into motherhood and homeschooling and all that, and that was my full identity.
So when that was gone, I really did not know what was next.
uh And having gone through that season, um what has God taught you during that season?
(06:50):
oh
he's taught me a lot.
mean, one of the biggest lessons I think is just learning to be patient for his next step.
I think for all Christians, it's just hard to wait, you know, to thank God, have youforgotten me?
What is going on?
So it was learning to, be patient.
Cause we know the Lord is never in a hurry.
(07:12):
He's going to do what he's going to do when he wants to do it.
And we don't get to tell him all we can do is be available.
So I think that was.
Probably one of the biggest lessons for me to learn and I've learned it in other ways tooas I've matured in the Lord's I've known the Lord 40 years So I've walked with him a long
time, but there's some lessons that are just harder to learn than others
(07:36):
And how did the book come about?
Well, back in, gosh, I guess it was around 2012.
Once I had moved out of it, I'd written my first book.
was seeing, okay, God, are, you have something for me that came out of the blue.
mean, I never thought I want to write a book someday.
It was completely what I call a God there.
(07:57):
He just dared me to do something way out of my comfort zone.
And I did it.
And, um, well, I was thinking about that season for, for women, cause I saw so many womenthat got stuck in that.
And I came up with this blog post and I just called it motherhood, the after party.
Cause to me, I was seeing how good it can be when we take that time to wait, figure outwhat that thing is that God is calling us to do and then jump fearlessly into it.
(08:24):
You know, it, it, just struck me that cause I just saw so many women not handling it well.
So I wrote this blog post and it's marinated in me for a number of years.
And I thought I've got to write a book about this because I think it's
It's a subject that's not talked about much, but women really can have a tough time withit, with figuring out what's next, with figuring out what their new identity is.
(08:47):
What's that?
I like to say, what's your mom and I'm a mom and I can say I'm a mom and an author, or I'ma mom and a nurse or whatever that is.
What's that next thing?
Because if you think about it, we've probably got a good 40 years after our kids are gone.
That's a lot of time.
(09:07):
to figure out what the Lord has us on this planet for.
And if you think about it, God saved us till this era in history.
We could have been born anytime.
We would have been born in the 1850s or the 1200s.
God said, no, I'm saving you till now for a specific purpose.
We see how crazy this world is.
(09:28):
It's getting worse and worse.
I don't know how it is in England, but boy in America, being a parent of young childrentoday, I would
really have a tough time with that.
think about where we are.
What is our part in building the kingdom?
And that's what I want women to focus on.
What did God call you specifically to do?
(09:49):
Because he chose it for you before the foundation of the world.
So we don't want to miss that.
And that's for me, that's just a, don't know, it just sort of powers me through and givesme encouragement to really encourage women that, Hey, there's something you're supposed to
do.
You can't sit in
misery for the next few decades.
(10:09):
mean, I've met women that, I've been dealing with this for three years.
I'm like, get out and do something.
You know, there's God has so much more than we ever could imagine.
If we're willing to step out with him, if we're willing to, to get out of our comfort zoneand sometimes do a scary thing, you know, got for me, it wasn't so much frightening, but
(10:29):
it was scary to think I've got to do this and put myself out there and hope anybody even
listens to what I'm saying, even wants to read what I'm writing.
Does that make sense?
Hmm.
Yeah, does.
Yeah.
I think all authors kind of battle with that a bit.
It's a very, it can be quite a lonely thing because you're on your own and you've got allthese sorts of ideas, of course, for you, they are important.
(10:58):
And, but then you think, well, will there be important to anyone else?
And you're not, you don't really face an audience, do you, as an author?
You have just tucked away in a corner somewhere and then your book
kind of goes onto a shelf and then someone chooses to pick it up or not.
So there's that degree of separation.
So yes, I fully get what you're talking about there.
(11:18):
Now one of the chapters in your book, The After Party of the Empty Nest is called SeasonsSeason Us.
Can you just explain um how you see the different seasons we go through from thisperspective that you wrote about?
Well, there are so many, and I think like we already spoke about learning to wait andfigure out, you know, there are just so many things that can change in our lives.
(11:46):
So we've just with as being a parent, you're seeing that those seasons in your kids beingthankful.
That's that's one that I think we can tend to forget to be grateful for wherever seasonGod has us be thankful for that.
See the blessing in it, even the hard times, even the tough things that you've gonethrough.
Maybe you're not thankful for them, but you can be thankful in them.
(12:09):
Because I've dealt with a lot of different things where the Lord, you know, you're justgoing, why Lord, why is this happening to me?
But it's taught me to be thankful in it because then I'm able to minister to other women.
For example, I went through infertility for a tough time with that, but it helps me to beable to relate to a mom that's going through that.
(12:29):
So there is such blessing in those hard times.
You know, it seems like this is never gonna end.
This is just awful.
God doesn't care about me, but he is preparing you for that next season.
You've got another chapter in the book, which is called Three Truths to Help You Cope withYour Empty Nest.
(12:51):
Could you summarize for our listeners who might be experiencing an empty nest at themoment, some advice that you gave here?
Yeah.
Well, it's worrisome.
We're wondering about our kids.
know, kids leave the nest and some of them fall away.
They move into crazy lifestyles.
So I think for parents, we can so worry about our kids forgetting that God is moreconcerned about them even than we are, especially kids that have walked away and become
(13:20):
prodigals.
I tell moms, listen, Jesus left the 99 to go for the one, right?
So he sees your kids.
He is more
involve more concern, trust and pray.
You've to pray and intercede like crazy, but God has them.
And another one is like for me, it just so quiet, you know, and then the loneliness, noone can really fully explain that until you're in it.
(13:45):
You know, we can read all the books about the emptiness, but until you're in it, you'renot going to fully understand that.
But getting out of it, volunteering, that's one of my big things to say, get out and dosomething when our daughter moved out.
I started volunteering at a single mom's ministry and it was great.
We were able to do really great, helpful things for the moms, but also I made friends, Imade connections.
(14:08):
And sometimes in that volunteering, you may very well find out what that next thing is.
So all these things, you know, being worrisome and quiet and lonely, you can battle that,you can fight them and you can get past them, but they are going to hit you.
So if you know that in advance, you can begin planning now for then.
(14:31):
And you also mentioning sort of planning now for then, um, you've got another chapterwhere you talk exactly about that.
Um, loads of several different ways that we can start to prepare now for the day when weexperienced that, that emptiness time.
Um, can you give us a couple of things that we can do now to help us be prepared for then?
(14:57):
Well, if you have an idea where you're going, you can start to prepare.
Even if you've got other kids at home, there are, I tell moms, look for those margins inyour life.
Where are those areas, those couple hours where you can be working on something.
Say you think, man, when my kids are gone, I'm going back to college.
Well, you can take college classes now.
You can spend a couple hours a day doing something.
(15:20):
You can volunteer, say, I want to be a politician.
Well, go.
work, you know, go volunteer for a politician.
Think about how you can do things now.
There are a million YouTubes.
There are a million Facebook groups for anything that you might be interested or think theLord may be calling you to.
But for those that don't know where they're going, like I had no clue, pray.
(15:43):
I mean, the only thing really we can do is pray.
Get some other people to pray with you.
I'm a big proponent of having a prayer circle, having those.
Mature Christians around you that they can begin to pray that God will show you he willshow you if you ask him and if you're willing to step out if you're not afraid of the next
(16:05):
Season in your life.
He's going to show you but again We have to choose to be chosen if God is Asking us to dosomething.
It's up to us to say yes We can say no and lots of people do but I want to encourage themalways to step out
If it's not the Lord and it's not right, he will show you.
(16:26):
You're going to know pretty quickly that, okay, I think I missed the boat on this, but youjust keep praying and asking and moving into whatever that thing is that you believe he's
calling you into.
At end of each chapter you include some discussion questions, you've also got somescriptures there, uh and also a prayer that you've written and that relates to whatever
(16:50):
topic you've looked at in that chapter.
Why did you include these extra elements in the book?
Well, I wanted women to think about these things as they finished a chapter.
Okay.
It kind of a little recap.
How did you respond to this?
What did you think about that?
What's that stirring up in you?
Also, you could use it as a Bible study.
(17:12):
There could be a group of women that could use it that way.
And then the scriptures, whatever applied because scripture, the word is going to make allthe difference.
If we're learning it, memorizing it, just marinating in that.
And then the prayer, I just thought to myself,
What would I be thinking?
What would I be asking the Lord for?
And I think it's similar for a lot of women.
(17:34):
You know, it's just what do they need in that moment?
What do they need from the Lord?
What are they worried about or scared about or excited about?
What is that thing?
And I try to narrow it down to whatever that chapter was talking about.
That's really useful.
Thank you for that.
Now we're going to be coming back in a little while where we're going to be digging alittle bit deeper into um Kate Battistelli's life.
(18:02):
So do stay tuned and join us straight after these.
God Whispers Our Life Changes, a book by Michael and Delaine Sulkeld, is an incredibletrue-life story of Michael and Delaine, an ordinary couple who listened as God led them
from joblessness to starting and growing a business, then into ministries that have takenthem from underprivileged neighbourhoods in the United States to rural villages and orphan
(18:31):
care in sub-Saharan Africa.
It is a story of life lessons by example.
of the elation and frustration in starting and growing a business interwoven withheartwarming and heartbreaking stories of serving in their community and abroad and how
God led the way in it all.
(18:53):
God Whispers are Life Changes by Michael and Delaine Sulkeld is described as a must-readfor anyone looking for God's direction in serving others.
It is available now
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(19:14):
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(19:36):
to keep supporting Christian books and authors.
Hello, welcome back to The Christian Book Blurb.
I've been chatting with author Kate Battistelli all about her book, The After Party of theEmpty Nest.
And we've been given some loads of great advice and some insights into your life as well,Kate, but some great advice about how to cope as parents when we experience this emptiness
(20:03):
when our kids have left home.
And so if you're interested in discovering or digging into that topic a little bit more,
do go and check out a copy of Kate Battistelli's book, The Afterparty of the Empty Nest.
Now at this point in the podcast, Kate, we'd like to get to know the author a little bitbetter.
(20:25):
My listeners can't see all the interesting artwork that you have behind you as we havethis chat over like a Zoom call.
What can you tell us about your life?
You've got some very interesting things behind you there.
Signed Beatles posters and all sorts of...
Not a real Beatles poster.
(20:45):
mean, not really signed.
That would be worth a lot of money.
We'd probably sell that.
My husband and I come out of the Broadway theater world, as I said.
um When I was a young woman, about 25 years old, living in New York, I ended up being castas the understudy to the leading lady of The King and I with Yul Brynner.
(21:06):
For those of you listeners who remember him.
I thought, wow, this is awesome.
I'm going to go do this.
It was a big national tour.
Well, I ended up taking over the role, which was just crazy.
I the whole story is crazy, which I won't tell you now, but you know, God just, and Ididn't know the Lord yet, but I see it as a very prophetic picture of how God reaches down
(21:27):
and pulls us out of obscurity into dancing with him.
If you remember the end of the show, towards the end, they do the big shall we dance, theKing and Mrs.
Anna and they're dancing.
it's, I just see it as a.
prophetic picture for my life because I didn't know him and yet he pulled me up.
So we come out of that.
My husband joined as the associate conductor.
(21:49):
That's where we met, fell in love across the footlights.
He was a conductor and a professional trumpet player.
And then we had our one daughter, raised her for those of your audience that might knowher music, Francesca Battistelli, who's done very well.
mean, the way the Lord has used her blows my mind.
(22:09):
because I wanted fame and fortune.
I wanted to win a Tony.
You I wanted everybody to know my name.
And I think God just said, I can't really use that because you want it for yourself, but Ican use your daughter because she wants it for me.
She wants to worship me, glorify my name.
And I've seen her do that.
And some of the stories that I hear from people who, where her music has touched them,it's remarkable.
(22:32):
And it's so gratifying as a parent to see your child.
do that, just take off into the world.
We never expected that.
You know, I didn't see it, see that happening, but that's what the Lord did.
And it, it's just amazing.
This, my life is so quirky.
It's the, it's in turns the Lord has done with us.
It's, we were saved just so you know, we, had a born again Jewish woman that brought us tothe Lord in an all black church in Jamaica, Queens.
(22:59):
So that story alone is crazy.
Interesting.
Really good.
Now, because you've been through this process of going through sort of experiencing theempty nest and kind of rediscovering yourself as it were, what do you do for fun these
days?
gosh.
Well, I love to cook.
(23:20):
My husband and I both he's Italian.
So I do love to cook.
have a big life group that gets together every Tuesday night and I cook and we have funand I love to garden and stuff like that.
I love to walk.
have, we're, we're in a really pretty neighborhood.
So just walking every day is wonderful.
Going to the gym, stuff like that.
So those are some of the things I do for fun.
(23:42):
That's great.
And of course you were mentioning these different types of birds in your book and we werechatting about them earlier on.
So does your interest in birds go beyond sort of using them as a writing device in yourbook?
Are you a bird watcher or is it not really?
Not a bird watcher, but where we are, have lots of trees.
(24:04):
So there are lots of birds and we see pretty little birds.
I've never really tried to figure out what they are.
But speaking of Robbins from the beginning, we have the way our porches, there are theseeaves that they like to nest in.
And we have one nest where I call it the Robin condo because one will leave and anotherwill come back.
It's great.
(24:24):
cannot get rid of these birds, but it's delightful having them and seeing the littlebabies come out.
So.
That's great.
that's great.
So you love food and I'm guessing it's Italian food mostly.
Yeah, I love all kinds of food, but my husband's a good cook and he makes these meatballsfrom his mother's recipe.
He still has this old beaten up recipe card that really are unlike any I've ever had.
(24:50):
So I have to say probably if I was gonna lean toward one cuisine, it would be Italian.
Tea or coffee, what do you prefer?
coffee, coffee with cream, sometimes butter, which sounds weird, but yeah, it's what dothey call it?
Bulletproof coffee and a little salt.
I know it's crazy, but yeah, probably wouldn't go over well in the UK.
(25:13):
Well, you never know.
mean, they could market, they could market pretty much anything these days.
I haven't had an iced coffee before.
did try one the other day and I was pleasantly surprised because usually when my coffeegets cold, have to stick it back in the microwave to, to warm it up again.
But it was just so hot that day.
thought I'll, I'll try the one where they've shoved a whole load of ice in it.
(25:36):
And I thought, Oh, I'm not too sure.
I don't know.
Um, but actually it tastes quite good.
Um, but there you go.
Um, yeah.
So they could, they, who knows, there might be someone who is in the coffee industrylistening to them and you never know next, next, next season, all of a sudden they might
(25:56):
be selling something with butter.
You never know.
It's popular in the US, but...
Okay, and chocolate or sweets or cake even.
and
Dark, okay, alright, percentage do you tend to go for?
(26:20):
not those 90 % because then it just that it's too bitter, but 60%.
Sometimes milk chocolate I like with almonds or nuts or something like that.
But yeah, chocolate, gotta be chocolate.
And if it's cake, then chocolate cake.
The best of both.
Yeah, yeah, that's wonderful.
(26:41):
What is the Holy Spirit doing in your life or what has he put on your heart?
Mmm.
I think the Holy Spirit is always nudging me forward to not be afraid to do those thingsto be able to speak out to I Don't know to just encourage others That there's so much more
(27:05):
of him.
We think well, you know, I go to church I read my Bible occasionally and that's good.
There is so much more and if people could just grasp that
to really know Jesus, to become friends with Him.
He wants to be our friend, but He's only gonna come where He's wanted.
And if we want Him, if we show Him, spend time in His presence, spend time in the Word,then He'll speak to us.
(27:29):
Then we're gonna hear where He wants to take us, you know, what our next step is.
uh for me, that's the biggest thing, to hear the Holy Spirit better, more clearly.
Because this is a crazy time, like I said before.
We don't know what's coming in this world.
It could be something really ugly.
It could be wonderful, but whatever it is, we need to be prepared.
(27:51):
And the only way to be prepared is to really have a strong relationship with the HolySpirit.
And that's going to come through reading the word, praying, all those things.
Thanks Kate, that's great.
Now where can we find you on social media?
Have you got a website?
And also where can listeners get copies of your book from?
(28:15):
Well, you can find me, KateBattistelli.com, simple.
And on all the social media, I'm just KateBattistelli, so that's pretty easy.
And then Amazon, wherever books are sold, you can find The After Party, The Empty Nest.
wonderful.
I was going to say the name of the book again for you so listeners could remember but welldone, very good, very good.
(28:36):
So thank you Kate, it's been great chatting with you on the show today and I'm sure manypeople who are living this season of The Empty Nest or maybe are just about to enter it um
will be really blessed by your book.
So thank you for joining us today.
Thank you so much, Matt.
This was great.
(28:58):
I just want to give a really big thank you to the sponsors of today's episode.
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Do go and check it out.
And thank you as well for listening to this episode of The Christian Book Blurb, where welike to encourage you and your discipleship one book at a time.
(29:21):
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(29:46):
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This episode of Christian Book Blurb is sponsored by the book God Whispers Our LifeChanges by Michael and Delane Sulkeld.
(00:26):
Available now from godwhispersforlife.com.
Well, hello and welcome to this episode of the Christian Book Blurb podcast, where we liketo encourage you in your discipleship, one book at a time, as we meet some amazing
Christian authors and learn about their books, their lives and their faith.
I'm Matt McChlery.
(00:47):
Thank you so much for joining me today.
And on today's show, I am going to be speaking with Kate Battistelli all about her newbook called The Afterparty.
of the empty nest.
Well, let's first of all start off by welcoming Kate to the podcast.
Hi Kate.
I'm Matt.
(01:07):
Thank you so much for having me today.
It's my pleasure.
It's great to have you joining us here on The Christian Book Blob.
Now you have recently published your new book called The After Party of the Empty Nest.
Now that is an intriguing title.
Why did you choose this title and how does it help to explain what the book is all about?
(01:29):
Well, I come out of the theater world, the Broadway theater world, and after you'reclosing, you the show is done, you always have an after party, and it's a celebration of
that main event.
It's more relaxed, more intimate, time for some good conversations, time to really thinkthrough everything about that production.
(01:49):
So it's a celebration, not a party where you're dancing and all of that, but it is a timeto just look back and be proud of what you did.
So how, I was going to say, how does that relate to the emptiness?
So just for some of our listeners who may not have heard the expression, the empty nestbefore, could you just explain what that is and kind of what stage of life that is talking
(02:16):
about?
Yes.
The empty nest is that time when your final child has moved on to college or marriage orwhatever, and you're suddenly by yourself.
You know, we, I like to think of our children as birds because we've always called it theempty nest here in the U S I don't know what y'all call it in England, but it's just that
(02:36):
time when you're just looking at this nest and it's empty.
The kids are gone.
And for moms, a lot of times our identity gets so wrapped up in that.
that it's hard to figure out, what do I do now?
And I haven't reached that stage yet.
I've got three young children of my own.
ah The day will come though.
(02:58):
So um it's been useful reading your book and getting some sort of insights ahead of time,which is always a useful thing to do.
Staying with the nest imagery, you also describe three different types of mother, becauseyou've primarily written this book for mums, haven't you?
Primarily I do have a little bit in there about dads because they also go through thedifficulty of the emptiness when their kids are gone I mean it it hits them to just I
(03:24):
think a little bit differently than mothers But yes, I talk about the three differenttypes of mama birds and the first one is the swallow and she's the mom who She's kind of
looking forward to this time.
She already has a plan.
She's looking forward to the freedom.
So she's
probably the least common because for most women it can be pretty tough.
(03:47):
And then the next one is the morning dove.
You know, we hear those beautiful coos in the morning of our birds out on the lawn orwherever, and we do associate them with morning.
And that's the mom that kind of gets stuck in that place where she says, I just don't knowwhat my identity is anymore.
I don't know how to move forward.
And it can be a real time of grief for her.
(04:09):
And then there's the Robin mom.
who is the combo of the two.
And in the U.S., there are 310 million Robins.
It's the most prevalent bird.
I mean, most of them are on my front porch, it feels like most days.
And that's the mom that's, you know, she can see the future, but she's still a little bitstuck in what do I do now?
(04:29):
So I like to see, I like to think about those three different birds because all those momsare gonna approach their empty nest a little bit differently.
Mm, really good.
And when you moved into this empty nesting stage of your life, what did it look and feellike for you personally?
(04:53):
I felt like a Mack truck had hit me.
It was very difficult because I didn't plan for it.
And one of the whole themes of the book is start planning now for then.
But I'd never thought about it.
Our daughter is in the Christian music world and we were working very hard to kind of gether help her navigate all of that as she was getting older and, you know, late teens,
(05:13):
early twenties.
And we were so focused on that.
I didn't think about the time when she wouldn't be home.
And all of a sudden she's gone, moved to Nashville.
We're in Florida.
And I'm just thinking, well, that was fun.
spend all those years raising your child and we only have one, we have one daughter and,it was difficult.
(05:33):
I always say there were no backup siblings to kind of, you know, ease the pain a littlebit.
We were very, it was very lonely and my husband has always worked at home.
But for these couple of years, he was out of the house working.
there I was with nobody and it was tough.
And I, like I said, I hadn't planned, so I had no.
future in mind other than you know one of the grocery store the next day it was it was atough time because i really did get stuck there for a while i think i was a good combo of
(06:03):
the melancholy mom and robin mom i tended to stick into that melancholy for a little whilebecause you do kind of lose your identity you're just thinking well who am i now that's
all i've known myself as well i mean since we got married and have children because we
We met the Lord, I was 29 when I met the Lord.
(06:23):
So we came out of that theater world, met the Lord, God asked us to lay it down, and thenjust moved into motherhood and homeschooling and all that, and that was my full identity.
So when that was gone, I really did not know what was next.
uh And having gone through that season, um what has God taught you during that season?
(06:50):
oh
he's taught me a lot.
mean, one of the biggest lessons I think is just learning to be patient for his next step.
I think for all Christians, it's just hard to wait, you know, to thank God, have youforgotten me?
What is going on?
So it was learning to, be patient.
Cause we know the Lord is never in a hurry.
(07:12):
He's going to do what he's going to do when he wants to do it.
And we don't get to tell him all we can do is be available.
So I think that was.
Probably one of the biggest lessons for me to learn and I've learned it in other ways tooas I've matured in the Lord's I've known the Lord 40 years So I've walked with him a long
time, but there's some lessons that are just harder to learn than others
(07:36):
And how did the book come about?
Well, back in, gosh, I guess it was around 2012.
Once I had moved out of it, I'd written my first book.
was seeing, okay, God, are, you have something for me that came out of the blue.
mean, I never thought I want to write a book someday.
It was completely what I call a God there.
(07:57):
He just dared me to do something way out of my comfort zone.
And I did it.
And, um, well, I was thinking about that season for, for women, cause I saw so many womenthat got stuck in that.
And I came up with this blog post and I just called it motherhood, the after party.
Cause to me, I was seeing how good it can be when we take that time to wait, figure outwhat that thing is that God is calling us to do and then jump fearlessly into it.
(08:24):
You know, it, it, just struck me that cause I just saw so many women not handling it well.
So I wrote this blog post and it's marinated in me for a number of years.
And I thought I've got to write a book about this because I think it's
It's a subject that's not talked about much, but women really can have a tough time withit, with figuring out what's next, with figuring out what their new identity is.
(08:47):
What's that?
I like to say, what's your mom and I'm a mom and I can say I'm a mom and an author, or I'ma mom and a nurse or whatever that is.
What's that next thing?
Because if you think about it, we've probably got a good 40 years after our kids are gone.
That's a lot of time.
(09:07):
to figure out what the Lord has us on this planet for.
And if you think about it, God saved us till this era in history.
We could have been born anytime.
We would have been born in the 1850s or the 1200s.
God said, no, I'm saving you till now for a specific purpose.
We see how crazy this world is.
(09:28):
It's getting worse and worse.
I don't know how it is in England, but boy in America, being a parent of young childrentoday, I would
really have a tough time with that.
think about where we are.
What is our part in building the kingdom?
And that's what I want women to focus on.
What did God call you specifically to do?
(09:49):
Because he chose it for you before the foundation of the world.
So we don't want to miss that.
And that's for me, that's just a, don't know, it just sort of powers me through and givesme encouragement to really encourage women that, Hey, there's something you're supposed to
do.
You can't sit in
misery for the next few decades.
(10:09):
mean, I've met women that, I've been dealing with this for three years.
I'm like, get out and do something.
You know, there's God has so much more than we ever could imagine.
If we're willing to step out with him, if we're willing to, to get out of our comfort zoneand sometimes do a scary thing, you know, got for me, it wasn't so much frightening, but
(10:29):
it was scary to think I've got to do this and put myself out there and hope anybody even
listens to what I'm saying, even wants to read what I'm writing.
Does that make sense?
Hmm.
Yeah, does.
Yeah.
I think all authors kind of battle with that a bit.
It's a very, it can be quite a lonely thing because you're on your own and you've got allthese sorts of ideas, of course, for you, they are important.
(10:58):
And, but then you think, well, will there be important to anyone else?
And you're not, you don't really face an audience, do you, as an author?
You have just tucked away in a corner somewhere and then your book
kind of goes onto a shelf and then someone chooses to pick it up or not.
So there's that degree of separation.
So yes, I fully get what you're talking about there.
(11:18):
Now one of the chapters in your book, The After Party of the Empty Nest is called SeasonsSeason Us.
Can you just explain um how you see the different seasons we go through from thisperspective that you wrote about?
Well, there are so many, and I think like we already spoke about learning to wait andfigure out, you know, there are just so many things that can change in our lives.
(11:46):
So we've just with as being a parent, you're seeing that those seasons in your kids beingthankful.
That's that's one that I think we can tend to forget to be grateful for wherever seasonGod has us be thankful for that.
See the blessing in it, even the hard times, even the tough things that you've gonethrough.
Maybe you're not thankful for them, but you can be thankful in them.
(12:09):
Because I've dealt with a lot of different things where the Lord, you know, you're justgoing, why Lord, why is this happening to me?
But it's taught me to be thankful in it because then I'm able to minister to other women.
For example, I went through infertility for a tough time with that, but it helps me to beable to relate to a mom that's going through that.
(12:29):
So there is such blessing in those hard times.
You know, it seems like this is never gonna end.
This is just awful.
God doesn't care about me, but he is preparing you for that next season.
You've got another chapter in the book, which is called Three Truths to Help You Cope withYour Empty Nest.
(12:51):
Could you summarize for our listeners who might be experiencing an empty nest at themoment, some advice that you gave here?
Yeah.
Well, it's worrisome.
We're wondering about our kids.
know, kids leave the nest and some of them fall away.
They move into crazy lifestyles.
So I think for parents, we can so worry about our kids forgetting that God is moreconcerned about them even than we are, especially kids that have walked away and become
(13:20):
prodigals.
I tell moms, listen, Jesus left the 99 to go for the one, right?
So he sees your kids.
He is more
involve more concern, trust and pray.
You've to pray and intercede like crazy, but God has them.
And another one is like for me, it just so quiet, you know, and then the loneliness, noone can really fully explain that until you're in it.
(13:45):
You know, we can read all the books about the emptiness, but until you're in it, you'renot going to fully understand that.
But getting out of it, volunteering, that's one of my big things to say, get out and dosomething when our daughter moved out.
I started volunteering at a single mom's ministry and it was great.
We were able to do really great, helpful things for the moms, but also I made friends, Imade connections.
(14:08):
And sometimes in that volunteering, you may very well find out what that next thing is.
So all these things, you know, being worrisome and quiet and lonely, you can battle that,you can fight them and you can get past them, but they are going to hit you.
So if you know that in advance, you can begin planning now for then.
(14:31):
And you also mentioning sort of planning now for then, um, you've got another chapterwhere you talk exactly about that.
Um, loads of several different ways that we can start to prepare now for the day when weexperienced that, that emptiness time.
Um, can you give us a couple of things that we can do now to help us be prepared for then?
(14:57):
Well, if you have an idea where you're going, you can start to prepare.
Even if you've got other kids at home, there are, I tell moms, look for those margins inyour life.
Where are those areas, those couple hours where you can be working on something.
Say you think, man, when my kids are gone, I'm going back to college.
Well, you can take college classes now.
You can spend a couple hours a day doing something.
(15:20):
You can volunteer, say, I want to be a politician.
Well, go.
work, you know, go volunteer for a politician.
Think about how you can do things now.
There are a million YouTubes.
There are a million Facebook groups for anything that you might be interested or think theLord may be calling you to.
But for those that don't know where they're going, like I had no clue, pray.
(15:43):
I mean, the only thing really we can do is pray.
Get some other people to pray with you.
I'm a big proponent of having a prayer circle, having those.
Mature Christians around you that they can begin to pray that God will show you he willshow you if you ask him and if you're willing to step out if you're not afraid of the next
(16:05):
Season in your life.
He's going to show you but again We have to choose to be chosen if God is Asking us to dosomething.
It's up to us to say yes We can say no and lots of people do but I want to encourage themalways to step out
If it's not the Lord and it's not right, he will show you.
(16:26):
You're going to know pretty quickly that, okay, I think I missed the boat on this, but youjust keep praying and asking and moving into whatever that thing is that you believe he's
calling you into.
At end of each chapter you include some discussion questions, you've also got somescriptures there, uh and also a prayer that you've written and that relates to whatever
(16:50):
topic you've looked at in that chapter.
Why did you include these extra elements in the book?
Well, I wanted women to think about these things as they finished a chapter.
Okay.
It kind of a little recap.
How did you respond to this?
What did you think about that?
What's that stirring up in you?
Also, you could use it as a Bible study.
(17:12):
There could be a group of women that could use it that way.
And then the scriptures, whatever applied because scripture, the word is going to make allthe difference.
If we're learning it, memorizing it, just marinating in that.
And then the prayer, I just thought to myself,
What would I be thinking?
What would I be asking the Lord for?
And I think it's similar for a lot of women.
(17:34):
You know, it's just what do they need in that moment?
What do they need from the Lord?
What are they worried about or scared about or excited about?
What is that thing?
And I try to narrow it down to whatever that chapter was talking about.
That's really useful.
Thank you for that.
Now we're going to be coming back in a little while where we're going to be digging alittle bit deeper into um Kate Battistelli's life.
(18:02):
So do stay tuned and join us straight after these.
God Whispers Our Life Changes, a book by Michael and Delaine Sulkeld, is an incredibletrue-life story of Michael and Delaine, an ordinary couple who listened as God led them
from joblessness to starting and growing a business, then into ministries that have takenthem from underprivileged neighbourhoods in the United States to rural villages and orphan
(18:31):
care in sub-Saharan Africa.
It is a story of life lessons by example.
of the elation and frustration in starting and growing a business interwoven withheartwarming and heartbreaking stories of serving in their community and abroad and how
God led the way in it all.
(18:53):
God Whispers are Life Changes by Michael and Delaine Sulkeld is described as a must-readfor anyone looking for God's direction in serving others.
It is available now
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(19:14):
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(19:36):
to keep supporting Christian books and authors.
Hello, welcome back to The Christian Book Blurb.
I've been chatting with author Kate Battistelli all about her book, The After Party of theEmpty Nest.
And we've been given some loads of great advice and some insights into your life as well,Kate, but some great advice about how to cope as parents when we experience this emptiness
(20:03):
when our kids have left home.
And so if you're interested in discovering or digging into that topic a little bit more,
do go and check out a copy of Kate Battistelli's book, The Afterparty of the Empty Nest.
Now at this point in the podcast, Kate, we'd like to get to know the author a little bitbetter.
(20:25):
My listeners can't see all the interesting artwork that you have behind you as we havethis chat over like a Zoom call.
What can you tell us about your life?
You've got some very interesting things behind you there.
Signed Beatles posters and all sorts of...
Not a real Beatles poster.
(20:45):
mean, not really signed.
That would be worth a lot of money.
We'd probably sell that.
My husband and I come out of the Broadway theater world, as I said.
um When I was a young woman, about 25 years old, living in New York, I ended up being castas the understudy to the leading lady of The King and I with Yul Brynner.
(21:06):
For those of you listeners who remember him.
I thought, wow, this is awesome.
I'm going to go do this.
It was a big national tour.
Well, I ended up taking over the role, which was just crazy.
I the whole story is crazy, which I won't tell you now, but you know, God just, and Ididn't know the Lord yet, but I see it as a very prophetic picture of how God reaches down
(21:27):
and pulls us out of obscurity into dancing with him.
If you remember the end of the show, towards the end, they do the big shall we dance, theKing and Mrs.
Anna and they're dancing.
it's, I just see it as a.
prophetic picture for my life because I didn't know him and yet he pulled me up.
So we come out of that.
My husband joined as the associate conductor.
(21:49):
That's where we met, fell in love across the footlights.
He was a conductor and a professional trumpet player.
And then we had our one daughter, raised her for those of your audience that might knowher music, Francesca Battistelli, who's done very well.
mean, the way the Lord has used her blows my mind.
(22:09):
because I wanted fame and fortune.
I wanted to win a Tony.
You I wanted everybody to know my name.
And I think God just said, I can't really use that because you want it for yourself, but Ican use your daughter because she wants it for me.
She wants to worship me, glorify my name.
And I've seen her do that.
And some of the stories that I hear from people who, where her music has touched them,it's remarkable.
(22:32):
And it's so gratifying as a parent to see your child.
do that, just take off into the world.
We never expected that.
You know, I didn't see it, see that happening, but that's what the Lord did.
And it, it's just amazing.
This, my life is so quirky.
It's the, it's in turns the Lord has done with us.
It's, we were saved just so you know, we, had a born again Jewish woman that brought us tothe Lord in an all black church in Jamaica, Queens.
(22:59):
So that story alone is crazy.
Interesting.
Really good.
Now, because you've been through this process of going through sort of experiencing theempty nest and kind of rediscovering yourself as it were, what do you do for fun these
days?
gosh.
Well, I love to cook.
(23:20):
My husband and I both he's Italian.
So I do love to cook.
have a big life group that gets together every Tuesday night and I cook and we have funand I love to garden and stuff like that.
I love to walk.
have, we're, we're in a really pretty neighborhood.
So just walking every day is wonderful.
Going to the gym, stuff like that.
So those are some of the things I do for fun.
(23:42):
That's great.
And of course you were mentioning these different types of birds in your book and we werechatting about them earlier on.
So does your interest in birds go beyond sort of using them as a writing device in yourbook?
Are you a bird watcher or is it not really?
Not a bird watcher, but where we are, have lots of trees.
(24:04):
So there are lots of birds and we see pretty little birds.
I've never really tried to figure out what they are.
But speaking of Robbins from the beginning, we have the way our porches, there are theseeaves that they like to nest in.
And we have one nest where I call it the Robin condo because one will leave and anotherwill come back.
It's great.
(24:24):
cannot get rid of these birds, but it's delightful having them and seeing the littlebabies come out.
So.
That's great.
that's great.
So you love food and I'm guessing it's Italian food mostly.
Yeah, I love all kinds of food, but my husband's a good cook and he makes these meatballsfrom his mother's recipe.
He still has this old beaten up recipe card that really are unlike any I've ever had.
(24:50):
So I have to say probably if I was gonna lean toward one cuisine, it would be Italian.
Tea or coffee, what do you prefer?
coffee, coffee with cream, sometimes butter, which sounds weird, but yeah, it's what dothey call it?
Bulletproof coffee and a little salt.
I know it's crazy, but yeah, probably wouldn't go over well in the UK.
(25:13):
Well, you never know.
mean, they could market, they could market pretty much anything these days.
I haven't had an iced coffee before.
did try one the other day and I was pleasantly surprised because usually when my coffeegets cold, have to stick it back in the microwave to, to warm it up again.
But it was just so hot that day.
thought I'll, I'll try the one where they've shoved a whole load of ice in it.
(25:36):
And I thought, Oh, I'm not too sure.
I don't know.
Um, but actually it tastes quite good.
Um, but there you go.
Um, yeah.
So they could, they, who knows, there might be someone who is in the coffee industrylistening to them and you never know next, next, next season, all of a sudden they might
(25:56):
be selling something with butter.
You never know.
It's popular in the US, but...
Okay, and chocolate or sweets or cake even.
and
Dark, okay, alright, percentage do you tend to go for?
(26:20):
not those 90 % because then it just that it's too bitter, but 60%.
Sometimes milk chocolate I like with almonds or nuts or something like that.
But yeah, chocolate, gotta be chocolate.
And if it's cake, then chocolate cake.
The best of both.
Yeah, yeah, that's wonderful.
(26:41):
What is the Holy Spirit doing in your life or what has he put on your heart?
Mmm.
I think the Holy Spirit is always nudging me forward to not be afraid to do those thingsto be able to speak out to I Don't know to just encourage others That there's so much more
(27:05):
of him.
We think well, you know, I go to church I read my Bible occasionally and that's good.
There is so much more and if people could just grasp that
to really know Jesus, to become friends with Him.
He wants to be our friend, but He's only gonna come where He's wanted.
And if we want Him, if we show Him, spend time in His presence, spend time in the Word,then He'll speak to us.
(27:29):
Then we're gonna hear where He wants to take us, you know, what our next step is.
uh for me, that's the biggest thing, to hear the Holy Spirit better, more clearly.
Because this is a crazy time, like I said before.
We don't know what's coming in this world.
It could be something really ugly.
It could be wonderful, but whatever it is, we need to be prepared.
(27:51):
And the only way to be prepared is to really have a strong relationship with the HolySpirit.
And that's going to come through reading the word, praying, all those things.
Thanks Kate, that's great.
Now where can we find you on social media?
Have you got a website?
And also where can listeners get copies of your book from?
(28:15):
Well, you can find me, KateBattistelli.com, simple.
And on all the social media, I'm just KateBattistelli, so that's pretty easy.
And then Amazon, wherever books are sold, you can find The After Party, The Empty Nest.
wonderful.
I was going to say the name of the book again for you so listeners could remember but welldone, very good, very good.
(28:36):
So thank you Kate, it's been great chatting with you on the show today and I'm sure manypeople who are living this season of The Empty Nest or maybe are just about to enter it um
will be really blessed by your book.
So thank you for joining us today.
Thank you so much, Matt.
This was great.
(28:58):
I just want to give a really big thank you to the sponsors of today's episode.
This is the book, God Whispers Our Life Changes by Michael and Delaine Silkeld.
That book is available now from their website, GodWhispersForLife.com.
Do go and check it out.
And thank you as well for listening to this episode of The Christian Book Blurb, where welike to encourage you and your discipleship one book at a time.
(29:21):
Now do join me again really soon because in just a couple of weeks time, I'll be back.
speaking to another Christian author all about their books and their life and their faithbecause an episode of the Christian Book Blurb podcast lands in your inbox or your iPlayer
or whatever it is that you use to listen to the show from on the first and the 15th ofevery month.
(29:46):
So I look forward to having the pleasure of your company again really soon.
Thank you very much and goodbye.
Thanks for listening to Christian Book Blurb.
with your host Matt McChlery.
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