Living with your parents can be a drag. But having experienced either an emotional blow or feeling trapped in a low paying job, you now don’t feel comfortable living on your own. You feel forced to live with your parents.
Hate living with your parents; start making plans. Determine why you’re staying and examine any emotional baggage. Put yourself on a six-month exit strategy. Develop a budget or an emotional escape hatch. If this isn’t possible, be up front with your parents to explain and work on your dissatisfaction.
Living with parents can make you feel trapped and with no way out. But there are things you can do to break free. We’ll discuss the economic and emotional ties that keep you in the family home and how to make a plan to move out.
Determine Why You are Living with Your Parents
Figuring out why you’re living with your parents isn’t always a simple task. The reason might be in your heart, your mind, or your wallet. It’s time to grab your phone, PC, or good old pen and paper to develop two lists.
The first list should be the reasons you moved into your parents’ home in the first place. Has anything changed?
Have you emotionally moved on from that sudden break up with someone you were close to? Has the job loss you went through opened new and exciting opportunities? Have you finally paid down your overwhelming student loan? Evaluate the emotional trauma that led you to your parents. Something caused you to move in. You need to honestly evaluate if the reason still exists.
Why do You Stay
The second should be a list of the reasons why you stay with your parents. This list is not the obvious one. Everyone knows why they moved in. But despite the misfortune, not everyone understands why they stay.
If the reasons for moving in are gone and you hate living with them, then why are you still there. Even if the reasons still exist, there may be alternatives out there, but you are too comfortable to explore them.
Reaffirm what reasons still exist and begin working on eliminating them. This is easier said then done. I have a few suggestions. But you need to commit to leaving and be willing to make sacrifices as part of the exit plan.
Emotional Ties that Bind You to Your Parents Need Severed
Most of us have an emotional anchor called parents. We tend to go back to them when things go wrong or even if things go right.
Some good or bad changes might include:
- Divorce
- Job loss
- Emotional break down
- New job
- New marriage
Regardless of the situation we usually want mom and dad to either be happy for us or, protect and comfort us.
Come to Grip with Life’s Turmoil
Come to grips with the emotional need that sent you to your parents and evaluate it. Having spent time in the safety of your parents’ home are you now stronger? If not, forgo those dinners out and that periodic concert. Instead, look for a counselor or psychologist who can help you regain your strength. It costs time and money, but it will save you from depending so much on your parents.
The fear of fear makes many people feel like they’re trapped. Establish an emotional escape hatch. You don’t need to be afraid that, deep down, you really are too afraid to live on your own again. Or if you have never lived on your own, you don’t need to fear that you lack the emotional strength. If you fear that you’ll be lonely, delve deep into why you feel this way.
A counselor will help you create that emotional escape hatch. If you live with your parents, it should be because you want to, not because of a misguided feeling that you must. So, if you want to continue to live with your parents, but still hate it, you need to determine why.
Fix the Financial Reasons You Live with Your Parents
You might be in debt or you might just have a low paying job. There are ways to work around it. Fixing your financial woes is not as impossible as it seems. But it does take some planning and sacrifice.
Learn to Use Excel or a Paper Chart and Examine Your Finances
This is the nitty gritty part; taking a hard look at what you have and don’t have.
I suggest using excel because it adjusts easily, and it displays numbers that stare you right in the face. Have someone set it up for you if you aren’t familiar with it. If you can’t use excel, then make a chart. It will be static, but it’s better than nothing and you’ll still be able to organize your information.
Once you have your sheet is set up, list all your recurring and mandatory expenses. These may be:
- Car payment
- Insurance
- Student loans
- Cell phone
- Etc.
Then list your “want” or “luxury” expenses. Some of these could include:
- Clothes
- Dinners or coffee out
- Vacations
- Subscription Services
- Etc.
Be honest with yourself. All mandatory expenses must be listed and, probably most importantly, all realistic “want” and “luxury” items need to be listed.
Finally list your income. The excel sheet will let you know where you stand budget wise. Hopefully, you have some left over for a savings account. If there’s nothing left over or you’re at a deficit, don’t be depressed. Do something about it. You need to make some decisions and start slashing expenses.
The 70-30 Rule Will Help You Turn Your Finances Around
Look at your income and divide it up into 3 silos. These include:
- Mandatory expenses
- Luxury or want expenses
- Savings
Take 50 percent of your income and apply it to mandatory expenses. Then designate 20 percent of income to go toward your luxury expenses. Finally, put the rest or 30 percent away for your savings. Adjust these percentages based on your income, but overall stick with this plan.
When it comes to your savings; guard it with your life. Put it in a separate bank account and forget about it until you make a deposit. The best-case scenario is to open an account in a separate bank then your debit card. It will help you resist temptation.
This is the beginning of your 6-month exit plan and it will help you finance it.
My Parents are Seniors and Need My Help
Do your parents need your help? Determine what they need help with. If it’s meals and just someone to look in on them once in a while, consider Meals on Wheels.
Is assisted living or home healthcare an option? Explore these possibilities. And if your parent or grandparent has just experienced the death of a spouse, they might be depressed. Contact the Geriatric Mental Health Foundation for help.
In other words, do your research. There are always other options. Don’t abandon your parent or grandparent, but don’t risk losing your life to do this. Get help for them and for yourself.
Talk to Your Parents as an Adult
When you leave the house, does your parent ask you where you’re going and when you’ll be back? You may not tell them how you feel, but it burns you.
Keep in mind, that living with them brings back memories of your teenage years. They haven’t made the paradigm shift into thinking of you as an adult. Don’t yell, or be a smart aleck about it, but explain to them that they should consider you as a fellow adult. Discuss ways that would work.
But understand it’s a two-way street. Act like an adult. Clean up after yourself, do your laundry, be grownup in how you talk to them. You’ll find things aren’t so bad and you won’t hate living with them so much.
Pull Yourself Out of the Comfort Zone
Go to the zoo. Check out the animals in their cages. They’re comfortable and they’re not at risk of being eaten or starved. But keep in mind that they’re also confined.
Are you comfortable? If you have a nice meal every night and your laundry is done for you weekly, you might be a little on the comfy cozy side. You hate living with your parents; but you may easily fall into the trap of taking advantage of the situation. This comes at a price.
Evaluate your reasons and motives in staying with your parents. If you hate living with them, commit to a six-month exit strategy. If you’re not willing or can’t do that, it’s time to put your grown-up pants on and have a frank discussion with your parents.
