This morning I woke up to a familiar sound. The thud, thud, thud as my oldest son thunders down the stairs to get his breakfast. I’ve been hearing this sound for years. It’s part of the routine.
I used to love hearing it. When he was younger, I would lie in bed and know that all was right in the world when I heard him in the house. But I don’t have that feeling anymore now that he is 29. What I feel now is bitter resentment.
On the eve of his thirtieth birthday, I had assumed he would be long gone, creating his own life, seeing his own friends, making his own shit – and spending his own money. But no. Like many ‘children’, my eldest son still lives at home with me.
When I saw the latest Office for National Statistics report earlier this month showing that a whopping 33 percent of young men aged 20 to 34 – a full third – live at home with their parents, I breathed a sigh of recognition. The equivalent for women is 22 percent – still shockingly high in my view.
On the eve of his thirtieth birthday, I had assumed he would be long gone, creating his own life, seeing his own friends, making his own shit – and spending his own money. But no.
I don’t think parents have yet understood what this major societal shift means. Is the term ’empty nest’ outdated?
Personally, it means that the relationship I have with my son is souring. Instead of waves of unconditional love, I often swing between angry and sad.
I also question my parenting: is it my fault that he hasn’t left yet? Have I made him too dependent on me?
My parents were children during the war and encouraged my siblings and I to stand on our own two feet from an early age. As young teenagers we had newspaper rounds and took the bus to meet friends. I don’t remember my mother ever helping me with homework.
In contrast, my generation of over-50s were the first to “helicopter” their children, always hovering above them, taking them to clubs, finding lost gym equipment, and doing homework with them. I fear we have spoiled them so much that they never developed the thicker skin you need for the world outside the home.
It’s all too easy for them to stay curled up under our wings. I worry about it all the time.
By the time I was my son’s age, I was living in Bristol in a house I owned with my now ex-partner. In fact, I was pregnant with my son. How tempted I am to blurt out, “By the time I was your age…” . .’, but not me. I know it would hurt him.
The truth is that life with a grown man, who is also my son, is full of problems.
I also question my parenting: is it my fault that he hasn’t left yet? Have I made him too dependent on me?
It’s not just that he makes so much mess – he makes an inordinate amount of mess – it’s also the emotional burden of it all.
I find myself boiling with frustration when I get up after him in the morning and there are crumbs all over the kitchen and trash on the stairs (mostly socks and sneakers).
I don’t want to clean up while feeling mutinous and irritable at the same time. It makes me hate him and hate myself.
It wasn’t meant to be. At 19, he went to college after a year’s absence and I thought that would be it.
I assumed he would graduate and then make his way in the world. Maybe he would move to a city (we live quite rural) and share a flat with friends. I knew he might come home this summer, but it never occurred to me that he would want to live here, in the middle of nowhere. Wouldn’t he like to live in the beating heart of a city, full of career opportunities, nightlife and other young people?
But no. He seemed excited to get home, standing at 6 feet tall.
And at first I was of course very happy to see him, because I thought this was something temporary.
He returned with his student suitcase, which he unpacked in his childhood wardrobe, and promptly ate everything in the refrigerator.
I ask him a million times a day not to leave empty pizza packs in the kitchen, to clean his room. Yet this falls on deaf ears.
He ran a huge bath. Threw a large bag of laundry at me, which I did for him with great pleasure, even joy, because I am his mother and, as I said, no one at this time had said that his return would last forever.
But this seemed to set a precedent – and honestly, not much has changed in the seven years since.
He still eats large amounts of food. He complains when we run out of milk (of which he drinks gallons). He is constantly in the bath or using the washing machine. He also constantly turns on the dryer, which drives me crazy because it costs so much money to run. But that’s not the case – his money – and that’s a big part of the problem. If he paid the electric bill, I could pretty much guarantee he would stop endlessly drying his socks.
It’s not that he doesn’t have a job: he works for lawyers at a nearby law practice. It’s a good role and he’s promised he’ll move once he’s saved enough money, but he’s currently paid just over minimum wage, so it will take a while. And if I’m being completely honest, I don’t know if he’s trying very hard to save it.
We agreed that he would pay me rent – £300 a month – but that often doesn’t happen because he doesn’t seem to have the rent. I ask, but then I start to feel like a nag.
There’s a part of me that suspects this is all a bit manipulative. We know each other’s strengths, but also our weaknesses. He believes I will love him unconditionally no matter what he does, and that includes paying poorly on the rent.
I don’t think he sees it as a problem like I do. He says all his friends live at home – and I have no doubt about that – but it makes me desperate.
The problem is that it is an arrangement without clear rules. Sometimes, yes, I mother him, but other times we are more like roommates and just share the same space.
I don’t do laundry anymore – at least that has changed – but of course we do ‘share’ a fridge, so it often happens that when I get home from work and look forward to cooking dinner, I notice that ‘my ‘ food is gone.
When I question him about this, he looks offended. “It’s our food, right?” he says. Then he sneaks away. I have patiently tried many times to explain that we need some form of order in the house, but he still clearly believes that mine is his too.
When he was a teenager, I could just about cope with wet towels on the floor and dirty socks strewn across the landing – but now?
I ask him a million times a day not to leave empty pizza packs in the kitchen, to clean his room, to remember to buy toilet roll, to collect his towels, not to leave his friends in the shop all day nearby so I can get some sleep. Yet this falls on deaf ears.
We’re in a strange situation where he feels like he has the right to do whatever he wants because in some ways not much has changed for him.
But for me everything would change.
At 58, I looked forward to a time when I had more freedom. His father and I separated many years ago and since then I have been basically single and dedicate my life to raising him and working for him.
I’ve tried to give him the best possible start in life. But I thought eventually he would leave the house and I would be able to focus on myself and my life.
It’s not that I haven’t dated yet; it’s just that now I had to keep everyone at a distance while prioritizing my son and my income.
But now I would love a partner who I can spend some time with and actually be at home with. How can I bring a man home while my 29 year old son sleeps next to me? The thought of that makes me feel terribly self-conscious. And yet my son often brings friends home and I never complain. I just put in my earphones.
The truth is, I’m shocked that he seemingly has no desire to move on to the next stage of life.
I couldn’t wait to leave home: I went to Edinburgh University and never returned home after graduating. I got a job there, found a flat stock and started living my life: a wonderful, independent existence.
Of course, rents are so much higher these days, and young people can’t even think about getting into the housing market at age 20.
But what about if he got a room in a real flat that he shared with friends – he could afford that – or if he let it live for a while in a less desirable postcode, like we all did in our youth did? It may be harder to leave the house now, but it’s certainly not impossible.
I have friends who are in similar situations with their adult children, and I think it’s because we make life at home so comfortable. In my day I had a single bed and no privacy in my parents’ house. And my parents certainly had no interest in helping me financially or having “boys” stay over.
Our kids, on the other hand, have big rooms, king size beds and always friends. It looks too much like a hotel.
I also wonder if things would have been different if his father and I had stayed together.
In my darkest moments, I feel like my son hasn’t moved on, partly because of our failed relationship. Maybe he imagines that he is the man of the house and that it is his role to be here?
I torture myself because I must have coddled him after the divorce – and maybe still do. Maybe, despite everything he feels, he can’t leave me.
But then I reassure myself: many children living at home are not the product of single-parent families. They simply look at the exorbitant rental costs and wonder why anyone would ever give up their comfortable life in their childhood home.
Of course I love my son – that goes without saying – but when I see him using all my washing powder and eating all my food, I fear my love is turning into resentment. Sometimes I just want to yell at him.
And other times I love having him here. When I’m tired and just want to hang out with someone, he can be so easy to be company and so much fun.
But this situation is not good for either of us.
Every few weeks I promise myself that I will have a difficult conversation with him and give him a deadline to move out. It’s for his own good, I tell myself. And then I postpone it again – and grab his socks from the stairs.