I have a confession: I’m 23 years old, I have a college degree and a full-time job, and yes, I live at my parents’ house.
Is it my favorite thing to tell people? Well, no. But it helps knowing I’m not alone. In 2023, a Harris Poll for Bloomberg found that 45 percent of people ages 18-29 live with their parents, the highest rate since the 1940s. In other words, there’s a pretty solid chance that if you have a kid in their 20s, they’re living with you.
I don’t know how you parents feel about this situation, but I can speak for the kids here, and tell you they’re probably not overjoyed.
It’s not to say we don’t love our parents, or don’t appreciate the opportunity to gain our financial footing. The prospect of moving back home can just be, well, humiliating, especially if you went away to college and had a taste of living independently. Going from my New York apartment to my childhood bedroom made me feel like a melodramatic teenager again, and I feared losing my independence.
Between student loans, friends now hours away, and rent so high I cannot quite imagine ever being able to move out, the year-plus it took me to find a full-time job (if you don’t have to deal with the current job market, consider yourself lucky), post-grad life has been anything but glamorous. But in the year and a half I’ve lived at home so far, as much as I dreaded it, my parents have made my experience a rather positive one. In fact, I spent the first few months bracing myself for a misery that, somewhat miraculously, has yet to materialize. And it’s largely thanks to my parents.
My parents know they can’t fix my life, and I’m not asking them to. They largely treat me like an adult, one who feels grateful to be in her current situation but is very eager to escape it.
On behalf of my fellow 20-something adults living at home, I’m reaching out to you parents, to consider taking a page out of my parents’ book. There are certain things they do that make this phase of our lives better than I thought it would be. Here are a few:
They have empathy for my situation.
I know, I know. I’ve got it easy. I don’t pay rent. I don’t pay for much, really, aside from my student loans. Because I live at home, my life is not materially difficult right now, and I’m grateful for that.
That said, it does kind of suck to go from the excitement of college and city living to rooming with your parents and high school-aged brother and sister in the kind of small town where even McDonald’s closes at 9.
My parents let me complain, and they’ve never belittled the emotional difficulties that came with this choice. It can be hard for some parents to accept that the warm, comforting home their kid grew up in isn’t their ideal adult living scenario, but I think being able to acknowledge that without taking it too personally is key.
My parents aren’t nosy.
I am a grown-up, and while I sometimes go to my parents for advice, I don’t need my life to be micromanaged (or even regular managed) by them.
My parents don’t have my location. I understand that parents have safety concerns, but tracking my location just feels like a lot of parental supervision to put on an adult. Give your adult kid some space to breathe, and kindly delete Life360, please and thank you.
I get the TV remote sometimes.
Every Tuesday and Wednesday night for the past two months, I have monopolized our one cable-connected television to watch Dancing with the Stars and The Golden Bachelorette. My family did not particularly enjoy this at first, but with a few seasons under his belt, my dad is now an avowed Bachelor franchise superfan.
It might not seem like a big deal, but TV is a simple way to remind your kid that they’re not just a guest in your home. Plus, it can encourage them to hang out with the whole family, for the meager price of one two-hour television episode about elderly people finding love (you might even end up enjoying it).
They don’t ask me about my dating life, ever.
My parents never bring up the topic of dating first. After all, if I have something I want to share, I’ll share it. I have friends whose parents constantly ask if they’ve met anyone, or if they’re in a relationship, pestering them about when their partner will come over for dinner. Parents, on behalf of your children, I’m begging you to stop. If your kid is single, it’s a difficult question to repeatedly answer no to, even and especially if they’re perfectly happy on their own. If they have a partner, they will share that part of their life with you on their own time, on their own terms. Asking about it frequently isn’t going to change their answer, and will only create tension. For the sake of everyone involved, just leave this subject alone.
I’m expected to help out.
When your kid lives at home, respect should go both ways. It might be an adjustment, but the best way to show your kid respect is to not treat them like a child. I take turns doing the dishes with my siblings and drive them around if they need a ride. And while my mom is much kinder than my college neighbors who threw my laundry on the floor any time I was five minutes late to grab it out of the dryer, she certainly is not doing it for me.
They don’t push me too hard to leave, but they don’t want me to stay.
My parents say they love having me around, and they tell me repeatedly that they want me to start off in the best financial situation possible But they also don’t make me feel guilty about wanting to leave. I know I’ll have their support when I do manage to make my way out on my own, and if I ever need it, I know I’ll have somewhere to return to.
