Moving Back Home

I like to think of myself as a generally mentally stable person. A little kooky maybe, but medically and psychologically sane. Over the next few months, my sanity will be pushed further to the brink, perhaps never to return. The very serious matter of which I speak is something that most of us have had to go through, and from which many of us never recover: moving back in with your parents.

It doesn't matter whether you've been at university, been travelling or are suddenly hard up and need to live rent free for while, the effect is always the same; Crippling self loathing and an overwhelming desire to commit murder, ideally involving your parents/guardians and a freak poisonous blow-fish incident. Joke. [Just in case my parents do happen to die in a freak blow-fish incident, this should not be counted as lawful evidence against me.]

What do you mean I'm tasty with Wasabi?

Universally people hate moving back in with their parents and it can be for a number of reasons, and through flawless and thorough research, I have the top reasons (and their effects) below.

All The Questions
They seem harmless, but they're not. This is something that you should always bear in mind when answering a question put to you by either of your parents: there is always subtext. See some common examples below:

Where are you going? = Will you be drinking?
Who are you going with? = Will you be having sex afterwards?
What time will you be home? = How long can I walk around naked for?

Answering without thinking can have serious consequences: "Oh so you will be around to entertain your grandmother while we drink gin in the utility room!" And don't even think that they'll save any for you.

A recent survey, that was definitely not fabricated for the purpose of this article, revealed that the top worst question that a parent can ask a re-mover (one that has re-moved in) is...

Where were you last night?
Your brain goes into overdrive while you think of the right thing to say.

Last night you were dancing on the table at an office function before going to a karaoke bar where you sang your best rendition of 'When a Man Loves a Woman' and eventually wound up at a student flat somewhere in Shoreditch. You missed your last train and had to sleep on a random sofa with a questionable stain on the cushion before vomiting into the funnel you were chugging beer from at 4am.

You're the one in the baseball cap. What were you thinking??

Obviously you don't give the honest answer so you blurt out the perfect answer: "I worked late, went out for dinner with a millionaire potential husband and stayed a childhood friend's house." Or so you thought. [pause] "What childhood friend? Err..." This is the time where you get the "while you're under my roof" speech, usually lasting between 15 and 160 minutes.

Tip: Invent a person who lives close to the office and use them as your excuse for everything. Why are you late? Jim kept me back. Why do you smell of alcohol and it's only 7pm? Jim has a problem. Why did you email me a photocopy of your bottom? It's Jim's bottom. Jim emailed Dad instead of Dan. From my account.

Pay Rent or Pay Your Dues
So you've done the ironing - in prison terms, you've given the tough black guy 200 cigarettes - you can sit back, relax and watch TV, right? Wrong.

I hate to tell you this, but you get buggered a lot in this film.

Until you treat your parents like landlords, i.e. pay them an extortionate amount of money while you sit in a freezing cold room with a dripping tap, you are not entitled to homely comforts you had when you were a teenager. Big Bang Theory marathon on Sunday mornings? Forget it. Ordering pizza at 3am? Think again. There are a whole new set of rules now that you are an "adult" so cough up and move out or contribute around the house for a little slack.

Note: No matter how much cooking/cleaning/crying you manage, conjugal visits are off the table.

Darling, Stay Out Late Tonight
There is one thing that you never want to know about your parents, and that is that they still do it like teenagers as soon as they hear the front door close. So when they want you out the house for 'alone time' beginning the ever familiar sentence, "you're old enough now to know what goes on between a man and a woman when they're in love..." Tell them to shut the front door, grab essentials including paper bag for hyperventilation and vomiting, and - shut the front door.

Three hours should do it.

You're [insert age here] years old!
We've all heard it, from our parents, most often when we're doing something particularly immature like seeing how many digestive biscuits you can balance on the cat's head while he's sleeping. (I defy anyone to beat 6.) It can also hit us when we're doing something a little too mature than they're ready to deal with.

Tip: The perfect retort is: What were you doing when you were my age? The answer will indefinitely be worse than what you're doing at your age (have you seen what drugs they took in the 70s?) and will make them stop and think, for at least a minute.

One thing to remember is that as much as you want to move out/poison your parents, there isn't a day goes by (probably when you're balancing biscuits on the cat's head) that they don't look back on the day of your conception, sigh deeply, and think, "Should have used a condom."