Step1
Organize a family meeting to hammer out the details of your new living arrangement as soon as you move home. Even better, do it before you move home. Will you be paying rent? Who buys the toilet paper? How will your parents feel if you bring a date home? How will you feel if your single parent brings a date home? Are you expected to move out in a certain amount of time or can you stay indefinitely? Get clear on these issues before unspoken expectations become resentments that become knockdown, drag-out battles.
Step2
Be prepared to make some major compromises. After all, you are living under their roof once again. This is a give-and-take situation. Your parents have already given you a place to live, so you'd better make sure that what you give back matches their gesture. Your "giving" can range from biting your tongue during an argument to emptying the garbage every night.
Step3
Acknowledge your parents' sacrifice. Even if they love having you around, even if they begged you to move home, your parents are sacrificing a part of their lives to do what's best for you. Even if you aren't sure what that sacrifice is, even if they insist that there is no sacrifice, you ought to acknowledge it anyway. A simple statement like, "You're making some sacrifices for me to move home and I want you to know that I really appreciate it," will go a long way in letting your parents know that you've been thinking about their needs as well as your own.
Step4
Be good company. You may feel cranky, depressed, confused, but don’t take these feelings out on your folks. Be pleasant. Be a fun roommate. Be a source of uplifting energy around the house.
Step5
Do not embody the deadbeat cliché. Sitting in your bedroom surfing the Internet in your underwear, while doing research for your startup business is one thing. Sitting in your bedroom surfing the Internet in your underwear, while doing research on Jessica Alba's abs is quite another. If your parents are working hard while you're slacking off; it's fair to say that you've officially entered Loserville. Hurry up and grow up!
Step6
Do not label yourself as a deadbeat. Chances are that even if you are working diligently, even if you are relieved to be home, even if your parents are thrilled to be giving you this time to figure out your next steps; you are bound to feel like a failure occasionally. Our society tells us that we are supposed to move out at age 18, go to college, get an incredible job, buy a penthouse downtown, build our stock portfolio, and pay off our parent’s house as a surprise birthday present. This isn’t always realistic, especially today when college debts loom bigger than ever and our career paths rarely take straight lines. Remember that in many other cultures it is common--even encouraged--for children to stay with their parents long into adulthood. If you aren’t a deadbeat; don’t label yourself a deadbeat. And don’t allow others to label you this way either.
Step7
Redecorate your bedroom. You won’t feel inspired living in a space that looks exactly as it did when you were in high school. Clean out, paint walls, rearrange furniture, buy new sheets, create a space for yourself that reflects your current tastes.
Step8
Savor this time. Isn’t it wonderful that your family is willing to help out in this way? You are fortunate. Your parents are fortunate. Many families don’t get the opportunity to live together after the children are grown. This is a rare opportunity to get to know your parents in new ways and bond on a deeper level, before venturing out on your own once again.
Comments
MichaelJMotta said
on 12/21/2007 Nice article Amanda.
I boomeranged a couple of times in my 20s. I think much of the cultural bias to which you refer in Step Six is the result of capitalism's need to continually increase consumption in a society that "has everything" materially. Sharing living quarters and only having certain people earning income just doesn't feed the insatiable beast, so it's derided as if it's bad in itself.
One thing I've found fascinating about our culture is that working for money, which for much of history and in many cultures was looked upon as lowly, is now viewed as if it's the definition of success. Where it was noble to be a man of leisure (understood as being culturally and politically active), now this has been placed beneath generating revenue. Part of the "slave revolt in morals" (as Nietzsche calls it) perhaps - the inversion of virtue/vice, noble/ignoble, high/low.
grouch said
on 12/21/2007 Ouch. I think that if my children moved back in it would have to be in a basement apartment to allow all the amount of personal time and space they needed.