I’m almost 30 and I still live with my parents—here’s what I’ve learned
I have a confession to make: I am nearing 30 and I still live with my parents.
I haven’t lived with my parents forever. There were my four years in college, and that one year I lived with my best friend. But for the most part, I’ve lived in the same house for a decent percentage of my life.
Living at home has not been a choice for me. It started as a temporary fix that has now lasted way longer than it should have. But the cliché stands true: times are tough.
Privacy is hard
The walls in my house are paper-thin. A conversation in one part of the house can be heard from the other. Phone calls are non-existent. My friends have learned to never call me: I will never pick up. When I need to make a call, I have to alert my parents and beg them to stay away from the room I will be talking in. Sometimes I find the need to “POS” my G-chat conversations like a pre-teen.
You can’t really have a romantic relationship.
My therapist constantly tells me that at the rate I’m moving, I’ll never get married. When living with your parents, one truly cannot have a relationship. One, it’s embarrassing to admit to a future prospect that you live at home, two, it’s embarrassing to admit to a future prospect that you live at home.
I’ve surprisingly dated boys who also lived with their parents. There is no solace in in the situation, there’s simply nowhere to go. The best you can do is pick a house, sit watching TV in the living room until mom and dad wave goodnight, and then go at it as quietly as possible.
But I have had boys over. Most of them come post-midnight when my parents are sleeping. We sneak into my bedroom and get cozy on the twin mattress. The catch? They have to be out of the house by 6 a.m. That’s a tough task when getting only 3 or 2 or no hours rest. I’ve succeeded every time, except once. One boy came over, and to satiate my parents, I slept on the couch while he slept in my bed. Little did I know that he would get up and take a shower in the early morning. Little did I also know that he would get lost in my house post-shower and enter my parents’ bedroom. My mom was quite shocked.
You live in your past (or your sibling’s past).
Because my childhood bedroom is literally in my parents’ room, I sleep in my brother’s. The room is still full of his things from childhood and high school: papers on the desk, clothes in the closet and drawers, CDs and records laying about. The walls are covered in The Legend of Zelda and Mystery Science 3000 posters. Nothing in the room says my name except the clothes on the floor because there is no place to put them. From my years living on my own, I have amassed furniture, home décor, framed artwork, and you know where all of that is? In storage. My life lives in a facility about 30 minutes from my where I live. The only possessions in my parents’ house that are mine are my books, Birchboxes, and my nail polish, all of which live in the living room. The living room has become my space. My parents love it. (Not.)
Despite all that, you get to live with two people you love.
There are some perks to living with my parents. Of course, there is the whole life of luxury aspect: food, laundry. But there are real perks, too, like roommates who know your habits. I don’t like to talk when I get home from work, and the people I live with know and respect that. They also don’t judge me for watching TV in my pajamas on Friday nights and they never “accidentally” drink my green juice or Kombucha. In fact, my parents are quite lovely people.
Though the cons can outweigh the pros, living with mom and dad isn’t the end of the world. I have learned a lot from my parents that I couldn’t learn from other roommates like how to do taxes and how to deal with insurance agencies. In reality, it has become more common these days for adults to live with their parents, and for that, I breathe a sigh of relief: I’m not the only one.
But seriously, does anyone need a roommate? Hit me up.
(Image via Universal Pictures)
Related:
The number of young women living at home is greater than it was in WWII
