To ban son from moving back in?

[Boxset67]

I'm married with three sons 24, 21 and 18. All three have left home (youngest to uni last month) and I have to say we are enjoying life as a married couple despite the nest being empty! The eldest has lived away from home since he started uni, and has this week decided he is going to apply for a job close to us, and move back in to save money! I should add he hasn't asked, he's just decided he will be better off financially, and is expecting us to welcome him with open arms! Quite honestly, I'm horrified at the prospect. I don't want to go back to doing his laundry or taking another person into account when deciding what to cook for dinner. On top of that we do clash quite a lot (get on better since he moved out!) and he's very untidy. I can see it working, and I don't think for one minute he will save money, just spend more on going out and going on holiday! AIBU?

"men" like this are the reason for half of the threads on the relationships board and there are people saying OP should fall in with it.

My 11 year old does his own washing most of the time and cooks the occasional meal. Trying to "enforce" this with another adult sounds exhausting.

I tell DS (who has a fear of being homeless) that he will always have a home if he needs it. That won't include sponging off me when I'm in my 60's because he wants to spend more money on himself and if he ever thought it was reasonable to decide that without even discuss it with me I can't decide whether I would be more disappointed in his attitude or my parenting.

All of you who keep saying "I would always be welcome home" - are you planning to let your parents pay for everything, do everything and get into arguments when they try to chivvy you into doing what you initally agreed? Shame on you if thats what you've planned.

Pure lolz over here that some randomer on the internet can somehow know there is 'more to it' than the OP who actually is the mother to her son.

My children will always be my children and if there is a need I would have them back. Mine are all under ten though so who knows what might happen in the future.

YANBU OP.

Why on earth should OP, change her working hours and lifestyle rich is working absolutely fine in order for her DS to take her contribution to her household seriously?

What am I missing here? OP presumably has put in a whole load more hours working during her lifetime than her son has to date.

If her son lacks respect for her life choices then he can you know live independently.

If OP thinks her DS won’t do his own cooking and cleaning both OP & her DH should charge DS rent including cooking, cleaning and food shop contributions.

This is a healthy grown man of 24, with no dependants, a job and a flat who is making a decision to go and sponge off his parents so he can have more spending money for himself. He’s not saving for a house deposit or anything, he wants to indefinitely move back in with his parents because his lifestyle choices are beyond his current means.

Perhaps you need to get a full time job so he takes your work seriously and no longer sees you as the Mum figure looking after everyone.

That's the daftest comment I've ever read. Suggesting the OP works FT just to prove a point to her son? Because PT work isn't taken seriously?! Because it's up to her to make him responsible for his own household chores?
OP could spend everyday on a sun lounger painting her toe nails and still not be responsible for another adult's housework.

maybe because he unwittingly feels comfortable to do so? isn't that a nice thing?

No, it is not a nice thing to announce you are going to move into someone elses home without asking or being asked to.

I do wonder how many of these martyrs to the parenting cause would move back in with their parents today as the rent was cheaper. hmm

Now? No chance sadly they are passed away, but if they were here, at over 40 no, def not. if they needed to move in with me though ( dp ) absolutely they could.
At 24, life was very up and down though.

It is extrememly hard when one decides to come back having been away for a period of time.

I have experienced this, I would look up prices of the going rate for renting then tell them this is the amount you will pay for living here that will include me doing your washing, cooking your meals if i am cooking for myself and DH. This will not include me doing your ironing or being a slave to you. If we plan to be out you will have to get yourself sorted and I expect the rooms you use to be left clean and tidy this includes the bathroom and kitchen. If you cannot adhere to what is expected you will be told to find somewhere else to live.

The money he gives me i would use for weekends away with DH.

It is entirely up to him then.

It is entirely up to him then

No it isn't. It's up to OP, it's her house and she hasn't even been asked.

this is a board where we come on knowing or wanting opinions.do we have to start getting mean because of differences of opinions.

My MIL has let BIL back to live with her more times than was good for anyone.
He, however, is a feckless sponger, who works until he falls out with people, refuses to ever have a permanent job, preferring short term contracts, and who drinks too much. He becomes verbally abusive and aggressive when drunk, sometimes leading to physical aggression too.

He came back to live with her when we moved to Australia. There was a massive fight between him and DH - we left that night to come to our unfinished house. We had an AVO out on him (same as a restraining order). But he lived with his mother - up until the situation became so untenable that she was pretty much begging the neighbours to call the police on him (she felt she couldn't) to get him arrested and out of her house. She lost weight, she aged, she looked ill while he lived with her - but she didn't feel able to tell him to get lost.

He went away for a while - but then he came back. Almost immediately she started to become unwell, but then he broke his good behaviour bond and ended up in actual jail. She won't have him back again now.

However, she STILL makes excuses for him and blames me for "breaking up her family" because I won't have the sorry excuse for a human in my home (He called me a lot of fucking names in front of my then 3yo and only left when I pulled my phone out and threatened to call the police). He's in jail again at the moment - another break of AVO/good behaviour bond.

This is an EXTREME example - I know that - but my MIL put herself into this situation by not standing up for her own rights to a peaceful life, and allowing this sponging manipulative "manchild" back into her home, rather than turn him away.
DH would love to be a manchild - but I don't let him, as far as I'm able. He still tries it on though.

and for people coming on and sayig really harshly how dare other ask if ther is something more to it and that the op knows her and parents know their kids best.well yes.but no sometimes it is those closest who miss some big things and can take a good friend or doc orother to just trigger in is something we haven't automatically seen in our dcs because we are that close.

I don't think any of us 'randomers' are saying we know there is more to it. Just perhaps that it is something to think about.

Young men suffer disproportionately with their mental health and often fail to disclose that they are struggling until it is too late.

Young men also frequently get in a mess with gambling and the like. Or get mixed up in something dodgy and want a fresh start.

If the OP is happy nothing untoward applies here then great. But he's been away 6 years. I'd be asking questions. It could be something as simple as a spiralling credit card bill or a cut in hours at work.

The OP knows her son and how he thinks better than you or I or any other poster on here, kateandme. FACT.

I know that lying but sometimes we miss things and can be helped,reminded or seen new thing through talking to others.i ave never once said op doesn't no her child best infact I think I said she is closest to dc.

Well considering that he hasn't even asked his parents if he can come home, Tinkly then if your scenario is correct and he isn't managing, it's high time he learned. He's a healthy, functioning adult OP has said. IF he is in trouble then he needs to communicate and I'm sure his parents will welcome him but on the proviso that he sorts himself out with a view to moving out again in future. Not staying a perpetually helpless, useless man-child.

I couldn't agree more Tinkly.

Lying perhaps op does its just sadly I know of too many DP who actually are totally removed from their dc and have no clue about them at all. This is because they are entrenched in this view of them from when they were younger and they do not have the ability to see them as they are.

Dh is married, has two dc, is an amazing DF, DC doing extremely well at school, has reasonable job had for over ten years now and is doing OK.
Pils still see him as a stroppy Kevin style teenager, its hard to witness and be around. They dont engage with him, they talk down to him, they never ask me or him questions...they wont change their view point. DH wouldn't go there if he had a choice to ask or be homeless, homeless every time over going back there. but they do not know him and I would say never have actually.

You're clearly massively projecting, Bornfree.

I would certainly be digging to see if there were any mental health difficulties- however even if there were, indefinitely 'coming home' is not always a good solution to this, where this has happened of the adults I know, their world and their coping mechanisms haven't got better at all, if anything they went home, coped less well as they didn't have to necessarily push themselves by coping out in the world, got part time or didn't work as less need for jobs and so on. Even if they had a mental health problem, I wouldn't just say- come and live with me indefinitely because I don't think that's necessarily healthy for the adult child or the parents, and they may be better off supporting them to continue an independent life (if possible), pay for therapy, help and support but from a distance, not live a possibly quite enmeshed and enabling life- I know someone whose 40 year old daughter still lives at home and refuses to go to therapy despite profound problems, and this is essentially enabled by the quite nice lifestyle but emotional dependence that has ensued. I would however of course offer a place to stay in a crisis, and for a few months to get stable. Long-term I'd encourage them to be living independently in the world, mental health difficulties or not- for my own sanity as much as anything.

Whilst my home will always be open to my children, if as an adult they decided they wanted to come home to have more disposable income, I’d make sure they knew rent and money towards the bills would be expected even if I secretly put this money aside to give back to them when they wanted to move out (deposit etc)
I’d also be very clear that as an adult they should be helping round the house.....
I don’t blame you for having reservations! Good luck

Do you know many young men Lying? Asking for help and reaching out isn't necessarily what they are good at.

DS1's best mate was in over his head massively on payday loans through gambling before he reached out. DS was genuinely concerned he was going to do something stupid and was on the brink of telling his lovely, but totally oblivious, parents himself. Friend is now back home and getting help with his problem. And I'm sure his parents thought they knew him really well.

men" like this are the reason for half of the threads on the relationships board and there are people saying OP should fall in with it.

Preach.

And I know if I started a thread saying

I'm a 24 year old woman, I've been living away from my parents for a few years now. I've recently realised I could be saving loads if i moved back in with my parents, so I'v started preparing to do that. I let my mum know today when I'd be moving back in - and she freaked out! She said I had to ask her to live in my own home! And that she'd been enjoying middle aged alone with my dad.

AIBU to think she's a massive tight arse and a bit of a bitch ?

The arsehole I would be ripped would be of black hole proportions.

Have you or DH talked to DS about this yet?

My parents would always welcome me home in times of need (illness etc).

If I'd approached them with a plan and requested to stay for a fixed amount of time to save a deposit they would probably have considered it.

If I'd pitched up expecting free board so I could spend more on beer, shoes and holidays they would have tactfully told me 'not happening' and encouraged me to stand on my own two feet.

I think that's reasonable.

All the best OP and ignore all the people who are exclaiming that you clearly don't love your child, obviously you do!

I should have told my parents they weren't allowed to downsize into that apartment last year, as; I as a 29 year old, should have an unfettered ability to shirk my responsibilities as a grown adult and decide any day in the future that I'd rather not pay a mortgage anymore and move back in with them so that I had more flash money available to spend on myself, well according to some on this forum, that would be normal it seems.

I don't even have kids yet, but I know for a fact, none of them will be turning up after they've moved out, and deciding unilaterally that they're moving back in because they want to save money for themselves. Save money for a house deposit or falling on hard times is different, and pretty much everyone in here has already agreed that.

I can't help feeling that what TheGruffalo says is all too true. Young men are cossetted, young women are expected to (and DO) manage or at least communicate. Young men must be pandered to and have information carefully extracted from them so as not to upset their delicate little fragile selves... urgh.

Enormous projecting abounds in this thread. I'm taking the OP at face value, she has the facts. I don't doubt she and her husband will have a conversation with their son.