All I want for Christmas is for my (very grown up) CHILDREN TO LEAVE HOME
They have degrees, jobs, partners - but still can’t be prised from their childhood bedrooms. A flustered SARAH LONG says ...
When our children were born, I never thought they would still be living with us in their 20s. I could just about imagine them starting school, then turning into surly teenagers before reaching the age of reason and waving goodbye for ever on their 18th birthdays. Yet here we are.
Like many parents in their 50s, we find our nest is still full. Fuller than ever, because the grown-up birds take up more space than before.
They haven’t been here all the time. Three times we packed the car, leaving just enough space for one of them to squeeze between the mini fridge and the portable clothes rail. You unpack them into a bleak student room and cry all the way home because you know things will never be the same — your baby is all grown up.
There have been post-uni absences — a year in South America, a stint at the european Parliament in Brussels, periods of flat-sharing with friends.
Tom, 28, studied economics at LSe, where he also took a Masters in european Government and Politics. he is now an innovation consultant. Ben, 26, is an artist and graduate of the University of the Arts London. Rosie, 22, read natural Sciences at Durham and is now a maths teacher in a secondary school.
But a parent with a spare room within walking distance of a train or Tube station is a sitting duck. If you were young, would you spend half your salary on renting a pokey room in a flat with an empty fridge if there was a comfy alternative with a stocked freezer? Thought not.
I’m not the only midlife parent still with cuckoos in the nest: 3.4 million young men and women live with mum and dad, the highest figure since records began, according to the Office for national Statistics.
higher house prices, people spending longer in education and many waiting to have children are all factors.
NeARLY a third of men aged 20 to 34 still live with their parents, compared with a fifth of women. It’s hardly surprising in view of the cost of housing, which has created this boomerang phenomenon and the rather cruel expression ‘failure to launch’.
‘This is the best restaurant in town,’ said my son recently to a couple of friends who had dropped by and who stayed for supper. And the cheapest, I thought, as they nodded their agreement.
now our eldest is nudging 30, our dining habits have moved on, of course. We no longer all sit down together as we did when they were biddable kids. You never know who will be in, and when, and who they might bring with them.
It’s more like a student house, but where nobody has ‘their’ shelf in the fridge or writes their name on their milk carton. There’s no need when the fridge magically replenishes itself and there is a moveable feast of dishes. And did I mention the wine?
That’s not to say I’m the only cook. I am often treated to my kidults’ offerings, usually involving pasta or fajitas. But their undisputed speciality is the full english breakfast, served at all hours.
We are territorial animals. The kitchen and living areas are open to all, while the boys’ basement is subject to its own hygiene rules and not to be entered by those of a sensitive disposition.
For historical reasons, because she is the youngest, our daughter’s room is above stairs, adjacent to ours.
her clothes and belongings stray on to the landing, perhaps suggesting her wish to push back the boundaries and reclaim the entire floor. She even barges into our bedroom unannounced to inspect herself in our full-length mirror before heading out.
Luckily, we have our own ensuite bathroom, but this can be ransacked for toothpaste and essentials that are too boring for them to buy for themselves. Occasionally, an adult child’s room may be requisitioned for our own overnight guests, provoking a martyred look as a sleeping bag is put on the sofa. The territories collapse if we go away for a weekend, which we do as often as possible.
The upside of having a house full of adults is you do not need to put security measures in place. no burglar would dare. The downside is word may get around that there is a ‘free house’.
This term came to my attention during the teenage years when a gathering would be planned according to whose parents were
vacating their premises. The risks were greater then; you were likely to come home to broken door handles, carpet stains and tales of neighbours seeing young people sitting on your roof. It makes my blood run cold to think of it.
These days, they are more sedate; the worst you find is the radio tuned to an unfamiliar station and the odd broken cup or depleted bottle of vodka.
But there was once blonde hair on my pillow and an unfamiliar book open on the bedside table, which made me feel like growling, Three Bears style: ‘Who’s been sleeping in my bed?’
The overnight-guest issue cannot be ignored. They are adults, it is their home and they may invite whomever they like.
I learned this lesson one morning when prowling into my son’s darkened room to get his dirty laundry (I know, but the primeval nurturing urge is not to be denied.) While fishing out his shirts and boxers, I noticed a pair of stilettos on the floor and four bare feet sticking out of the bed. Mortified, I crept out unnoticed. He now does his own washing.
As well as the intimate friends, there are the more casual ones. During a phase when we were one child down, my son invited a friend to stay ‘for a couple of nights’. When I raised an eyebrow, he said he couldn’t see the problem, as we had a spare room. The ‘friend’ turned out to be a German girl (perfectly pleasant) he’d met in Spain, who arrived with a large suitcase and her boyfriend and stayed for two weeks.
After this, I hit on the idea of taking paying guests — students at an English language school who were grateful and, crucially, out all day. No more spare room, no more passing traffic.
Now we are a full house so the students are consigned to history. I’m not too disappointed. While feedback was overwhelmingly positive, one 40-year-old Hungarian felt moved to point out that some ‘shared areas’ were messy.
Tidiness is not my strong suit, so I can’t point the finger of blame. No doubt it’s my fault for failing to indoctrinate a philosophy of ‘everything in its place’.
Where it used to be tripping over Playmobil figures and Lego, it’s now 20 pairs of shoes cluttering up the hall, headphones tangled up with newspapers on the sofa, the table groaning beneath laptops and files, walls covered in Post-it revision notes, an overspilling ironing basket and everyone helping themselves to everyone else’s chargers.
You look at the scuffed walls, water stains and gradual decline of the decor and think: ‘There’s no point in doing anything now, might as well wait until they’ve left. When we’re 80’.
Are we to blame? I sometimes panic that we’ve made them too comfortable. We belong to that liberal generation who pretend they are their children’s friends, imposing none of the restrictions we were subjected to at their age. This may backfire — supposing they never leave!
Friends in a similar predicament have told me of interesting solutions. One couple waited until their kidults were travelling, then sold the house and moved into a hotel, transferring all possessions into storage.
Another friend has opted to abandon her full nest by taking a job in New York, but it strikes me as a risky tactic. What’s to stop them changing the locks?
THE truth is, I secretly love it. Who wants to be a dreary nuclear couple sinking into quiet middle age when you can be surrounded by young people? Adult children bring friends home, creating the illusion of a busy household that lets you push back growing old.
I like nothing more than cooking giant casseroles of food. What is the point of a familysized kitchen if you don’t have a family to fill it? There’s no way I’ll make a cake just for me and my husband — two middle-aged people trying to be careful — but a house full of hungry young people who need the calories is the perfect excuse.
For the time being, I’m enjoying being the old sofa they flop back on to. But I hope they move out before they’re, say, 40. Get their own places and settle down. Then we can go and live with them.
I want to be a nightmare mother-in-law in the granny annexe — there’s something to look forward to.
Invisible Women by sarah long is out now (Zaffre, £7.99).