Reese Witherspoon gets candid about empty nest struggles: 'I cried in their rooms'

Reese Witherspoon has opened up about watching her children leave home as they grow.

The actress, who shares daughter Ava, 26, and son Deacon, 21 with ex-husband Ryan Phillipe, and son Tennessee, 12, with ex Jim Toth, shared her feelings after sending the oldest kids to college.

Speaking at The Interview podcast, Reese said, "I grieved their going to college and I cried in their rooms."

"One year, one of them didn't come home for Christmas and I sat in their bed and just cried," she added.

She went on to add, "It’s a loss because you do everything for them. You take the food out of your mouth, the coat off your back. You don't sleep."

"You don't sleep because you're either taking care of their physical needs when they're little. Or when they're older, you're just so worried all the time that they're gonna get in a car accident or they're gonna come home or there's gonna be drugs involved," The Morning Show actress said.

Adding, "You just have every worry the parents have, you know? And then one day, it's kind of like, if you've done your job, you did the right things, they go."

"It makes me teary right now. It's just really hard. But you know you did the right things," Reese noted.

Reese also went on to add that now her older kids are like friends to her, saying, "Ava will call me and just be like a great friend. Deacon calls me all the time we hang out in New York and he'll tell me about cool restaurants and I'll be like, ‘Great. Can you get a reservation?’ Because he can get better reservations than I can now."

However, Reese Witherspoon noted that she uses a different approach to parenting her youngest son, Tennessee. She said, "Whenever I lose my cool. I turn to my youngest and I go, ‘You got to call your brother and sister. They wore me out. I'm so tired. Like, eat the cookie. Go to bed late. Just do it, you know, but like, think about how it's going to make you feel.‘"

"And then like beyond that, I'm so tired. I've been parenting for 25 years," the actress added.