THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, July 4, 1995 TAG: 9507010028
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH SIMPSON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 181 lines
Mini is mad.
She's gone to her room and shut the door. Her mother knocks, asks if she'll come out. Mini won't. Mother shrugs her shoulders, waves a hand in the air as if to say, ``Kids.''
This could be your typical mother-daughter standoff. Except that Mini Singh Durrance isn't a teenager. She's 31. And her parents aren't getting on her about cleaning her room, but getting her life together.
It is not a happy scene. But it's one that, in various forms, is probably becoming more common throughout the country.
Over the past couple of decades, offspring have returned to their parents' nests in rising numbers. In the United States, more than 5 million sons and daughters ages 25 to 34 lived at home with parents in 1993, compared with 2 million in 1970.
Several trends are at work: People are marrying later. Or divorcing sooner. People are competing for jobs in an economy where a high school diploma doesn't count for much any more. Or are trying to buy homes and invest in dreams in a market where price outstrips paycheck.
``In our society, you're expected to leave your parents' home and create your own,'' says Fredrick Weston, director of clinical services at Family Services of Tidewater. ``That gets harder and harder as houses get more expensive.''
An increase in single parenting also figures into the picture. In some cases, single parents need the support of their own moms and dads to help care for children. Or they've lost custody of their kids but gained child-support obligations that soak up paychecks.
And sometimes grown children flat-out yearn for the comforts of home.
``Parents have accustomed them to a standard of living most can't afford for years,'' says Phyllis Stegall, a Seattle psychologist who co-authored ``Boomerang Kids: How to Live With Adult Children Who Return Home'' (Pocket Books, 1989). ``Some of them think life is going to be perfect. And they find out a college education didn't buy them much.''
Durrance stands in the middle of a bedroom she's had since she was a little girl. In the closet are her old prom dresses, on the dresser a worn childhood copy of ``Little Red Riding Hood.''
She used to share this room with her sister; soon she'll share it with her baby. A changing table is in a corner, trimmed with pastel coverlets.
Durrance returned to her parent's home two months ago after a failed marriage. She had tried living with a friend in Richmond but soon realized she needed to move home for the sake of the baby, which is due to arrive in August.
``It became obvious delivering a child in a healthy environment would be impossible,'' she says, resting her hands on her stomach. ``I'm not financially able to support myself or an infant at this point.''
Who, she asks, would hire someone eight months pregnant? It didn't matter that she had a college degree. So she returned to her parents' suburban Chesapeake home.
``I felt a great sense of peace,'' she says, thinking back to the first step back into their carpeted living room. ``I could close the door and, no matter what happened outside the door, I was safe.''
But that didn't mean it was all smooth water inside.
Durrance's mother, Jagdish Singh, is not quite as pleased with the arrangement.
She and her husband, Amarjit, had been empty-nesters for two years after having raised five daughters. ``We were very happy,'' she says. ``We liked the freedom.''
When her daughter moved back in, the tension level rose. Durrance was under stress from a failed marriage, having a child on her own and wondering what she was going to do with her life. She's been looking for help through Social Services and other agencies but has come up with nothing.
``We are trying to help her, but she keeps screaming at us,'' Singh says. ``It's like I'm a hostage in my own home.''
She explains the situation in a detached, general manner: ``When children get older, they get their own life, their own personality. Then after a long time they move back, and parents are accustomed to their own lifestyle. There is going to be a clash.''
She wishes she and her husband had set ground rules in the beginning. They didn't, and Singh cites their nationality for that: ``In Indian families, you give and you give and you give.''
The Singhs and their daughter are now trying to backtrack to agree on some basic rules of conduct: Respect each other other's privacy. Talk; don't yell. Establish a game plan for after the baby arrives and Durrance gets back on her feet financially.
Ground rules are key in any successful blending of families.
``You need to talk right at the outset what the coming home is about,'' author Stegall says. ``What does he or she need? How long will they be there? Establish a contract with one another.''
Such an agreement could include the rent the adult child will pay, the chores for which he'll be responsible and the household rules he'll observe.
``You need to replicate the real world,'' Stegall says. ``Parents do too much too soon for a lot of kids.''
Family Services' Weston suggests agreeing on such mundane things as who's going to pick up clothes, do laundry, buy groceries. ``Those are things that seem like an abstraction initially but become important as time goes on,'' she says.
Relationships can break down when the grown child expects to be waited on, or the parent treats the returning child as though he's still a teenager.
``All the old roles come out,'' Weston says. The child returning home shouldn't relax back into being dependent. Parents also need to acknowledge their child is an adult. Weston remembers one family who used to argue over the adult child's bedtime. ``If you're on your own, that would never be an issue,'' Weston says.
Also, if the adult child is returning with children of his own, the lines of authority need to be drawn. Who gets the last word, Mom or Grandma, Dad or Granddad?
While children of all economic levels return home, gender appears to make a difference. Sons are more likely to return than daughters. According to the Census Bureau, 3.3 million men between 25 and 34 were living at home in 1993 compared with 1.8 million women.
Stegall speculates that this could be because women are more likely than men to be taught basic housekeeping skills, making it easier for them to live on their own.
For Wayne Kent, 25, of Chesapeake, it was more a matter of money.
It wouldn't have been so bad if Kent had moved back to the bedroom he'd had as a kid, which was the biggest in the house.
Instead he landed in the smallest bedroom in the house. That would be his little sister's old room. The one with the purple walls.
Just one of the little indignities of moving back home.
When Kent returned in December 1992 after graduating from Virginia Tech with a degree in hotel and restaurant management, he figured he'd be home a couple of months.
Just enough time to land a job.
That was a 2 1/2 years ago.
``It's extremely frustrating,'' Kent says. ``The whole purpose of going to college is to make it on your own.''
Since he's moved back home, Kent has worked as a waiter. Now he has a job tying up ships. Neither position has paid enough for him to live on his own, he says.
But he feels growing pressure - not from his mother but himself - to move out. ``When I'm at home,'' he says, ``I live in my own little room. I don't fix dinner. I don't bring friends over. I eat out so I don't feel like I'm totally sponging off my mom.''
And dates? Forget it. He avoids bringing them home. ``It can be really embarrassing when they ask where you live,'' Kent says. ``That's what gets me the most, saying, `I live with my Mom.' ''
That and the purple bedroom.
Derrick Johnson moved back into his parents' Portsmouth apartment for a different reason: His marriage broke up, leaving him with a $325-a-month child-support payment for his son.
The payment wiped out his paycheck from his job at Smithfield Packing Co. ``By the time I paid that, I didn't have anything to live off of,'' he says.
Although his mother, Carolyn Owens, didn't have any problem with Derrick moving home, she does wonder about his long-term plans. ``When they get older and no closer to moving out, you worry about them,'' she says. ``But I think he was lucky to have a place to come home to.''
Although an adult child often moves back home after a setback - divorce, job loss, unplanned pregnancy - sometimes the return can signal something more positive.
Susan Willis, 25, moved back into her parents' Norfolk home in April because she wanted to go back to school to get her master's degree in business administration.
``There were a lot of things I wanted to accomplish and I was spending so much on expenses,'' she says. Willis graduated from American University in Washington four years ago, then lived in Washington and Fredricksburg for 3 1/2 years. She dreams of owning a business - an African restaurant - and believes more education, and more money, are key to that.
But there was another reason she wanted to come home: her parents. ``I wanted to have some quality time with my family before I have my own family,'' she says.
Stegall says such a return home can be healthy for a family. ``It can be a time to go back and talk about things and heal old wounds,'' he says. ``Also, it's useful for young people to know who their parents are as adults, that they have fears and hopes like anyone else.''
Willis doesn't shirk at telling people she's living with her parents after eight years on her own. After all, she's had nothing but good responses from her friends and relatives. ``They say, `Great, you finally came home,' '' she says. ILLUSTRATION: Color staff photo by Beth Bergman
Jobless and with a failed marriage and a baby on the way, Mini Singh
Durrance, 31, moved back into her old room in her parents' home in
Chesapeake.
Color staff photo by Joseph John Kotlowski
Derrick Johnson is back with his parents. With him are his sister.
Jolynn Owens; mom, Carolyn Owens; and son, Derrick Jr., 2.
KEYWORDS: EMPTY NEST ADULT CHILDREN by CNB