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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To find it odd that adults with their own families and houses refer to their parents' house as "home"?

98 replies

RedskyAtnight · 18/12/2020 09:07

This is coming up a lot on threads recently and I'm finding some of them very confusing as a result.

I'm an adult who is married with 2 children. I haven't lived with my parents for over 20 years. The house I live in with my husband and my children is my "home". If I was visiting my parents, I would say I was going to my parents' house, not that I was going "home" because the house they live in is not my home!

So, finding it confusing when people are talking about going home for Christmas - meaning they are going to stay with their parents.

Particularly when they refer to "staying at home" and "going home" within the same thread. Does this mean they consider they have 2 homes?

I can understand if you are an adult living with your parents that you would refer to their house as your home (because it is) and also that students/other young people who spent a large part of the year living with their parents would call this home. But if you're an adult with your own family and your own house who hasn't lived with your parents for years... why would you still call your parents' house "home"?

OP posts:
Kissthepastrychef · 18/12/2020 10:15

Home is where mom is

So much truth in this. My mum is currently in rehab after a huge stroke and comes home on Monday. The house has been like a shell without her in it, doesn't feel like home at all. I'm really looking forward to the first day I open the door and mum is there.

ShirleyPhallus · 18/12/2020 10:27

It drives me bananas that a school friend says “let me know next time you’re home and we can meet up”.

I am not sure that she realises that after 20+ years of living somewhere else I very much consider “home” that I won’t be back

DougRossIsTheBoss · 18/12/2020 10:32

I still say 'going home' about going to my parents house.

It's where I grew up and it's a lovely place, much much nicer than my own house. I had a lovely childhood there and it's full of great memories for me. I get a warm fuzzy feeling any time I get to go there.

I have recently come to the realisation that where I live now will never be home to me and as soon as life circumstances allow I will be properly going 'home'

wigglerose · 18/12/2020 10:33

I refer to my parents house as 'my parents' to everyone else. I think if I referred to my parents house as that to my mum's face she would be really upset!

TigerDrawers · 18/12/2020 10:35

As an ex-military child we moved around a lot so in my mind "home" is always where I live. Even when I've moved house as an adult my new house becomes "home" the moment I step over the threshold.

Despite my parents now still living in the house I spent most years growing up in, I still refer to it as my parents' house and not home. It stopped being home the day I moved out.

My DP called his parents' house "home" for years and I also found it really weird. He mentioned it while chatting one day as he'd found it weird that I didn't call my parents' house home!

He does now call our house "home" though, which did weirdly take him a while!

user1471604848 · 18/12/2020 10:37

If you're Irish, some people refer to "home" (where you live now), and "home-home" (your childhood home).

My 91 year old mum still refers to her childhood house as home, even though she's lived in her marital home for 54 years. :)

Cacacoisfarraige · 18/12/2020 10:38

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DougRossIsTheBoss · 18/12/2020 10:39

Not only is my parents house the same one where I grew up in fact but also where my dad, my grandad and his dad grew up.

This place that I bought in the early noughties can't really compare with that heritage.

Topseyt · 18/12/2020 10:40

@Kissthepastrychef

My parents still live in the house they lived in in 1977. It's the house I grew up in and will always be Home. PIL moved several times since DH moved out so MILs home will never be Home for him as she no longer lives in their childhood home (FIL is sadly dead)

It's more about being where you grew up imho

Mine moved into theirs in 1970 and are still there. I was three at the time, just a few weeks from turning four. I still have memories of us moving in, although kind of hazy now.

That house has been in my life ever since then to a greater or lesser extent. My parents are in their eighties now and increasingly housebound and frail (they have carers). I cannot picture them living anywhere but that house (a bungalow) and nor can I picture the house without them in it. They are inextricably entwined.

user1471604848 · 18/12/2020 10:42

Snap! @Cacacoisfarraige! (Love the user name)

Livefortherain · 18/12/2020 10:46

My mum lives down the road from me. I grew up in that house. I say "going to mums" or "going up the road"

Another family member lives opposite me and I say "going to Xs" or "going over the road"

But if I'm talking to my younger sister, I always refer to it as home by accident! Even though I moved out 10 years ago!

StrawberrySquash · 18/12/2020 10:47

My own home is my flat, but I'd still say I was going 'home' to the childhood family home. And at the end of the trip I'd go home to my flat. Both have home elements.

GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER · 18/12/2020 10:48

Our dds both have their own homes, but as far as I’m concerned our house will always be their home, too.
They’d probably say ‘going to mum and dad’s’ but I hope and expect it’s still a second home to them.

SeptSpiral · 18/12/2020 10:49

I’ve been NC with my mum for about 5 years (her choice). But weirdly I still kind of think of her house a ‘home’ and miss having that going home and not being the adult anymore feeling. It not being my responsibility to make sure there’s food in, cook etc.

fairydustandpixies · 18/12/2020 10:50

I moved from one end of the UK to another with my parents as a young teenager. I always called the previous city 'home'. I then raised a family in the new location as an adult and, when divorced and my sons had left home, I upped sticks and moved away again. I still call where my parents are 'home', not the city I was born and raised in. My mother ('in her 70s) still calls her birthplace 'home'. My sister also calls her birthplace home even though she has no memories of it.

FAQs · 18/12/2020 10:53

@RedskyAtnight I’d love it is my daughter always referred to my house as home, to me it’ll mean I did a much better job raising her than my parents did, who house I’ve never considered home, as a child or adult.

ForeverAintEnough · 18/12/2020 11:18

I would say I’m going home if going back to my home I grew up in. Myself and my siblings are all grown up owning our own houses and some with kids etc but we still talk about ‘when are you going home next/ will we go joke the same weekend.

I do consider my house my home and I love it and am very happy here with DH and DDog but I’ve only lived here 4 years whereas my parents place has been home for 30 years - I don’t count flats I rented as I tended to move each year.

But I can see why it’s confusing for you if you don’t consider your parents house a home.

LadyR77 · 18/12/2020 11:51

My parents still live in the house in London we moved to just before I turned 5 - I still feel like it is home, just as much as my current home with DH and DS is. If they move to a different house at any point then obviously that wouldn't be the case any more (although I'd still consider London to be "home" despite moving away 10 years ago).

Backtoreality1 · 18/12/2020 11:55

I grew up in teh house my mother still lives in and so it was and always will be home. I also have my own home. Don't get why its confusing, and also don't understand why you would have a problem with it?

poshme · 18/12/2020 12:15

This:

My home is my home but my parents house is my home to, I feel at home there and I grew up there. Many of my happy memories happened there. You can have more than one home.

Theterrorrun · 18/12/2020 12:18

I grew up in Africa with UK parents who always referred to the UK as "Home" and so I did too (it has been Home to me in every sense for very many years now). Oddly, this was the case even though both my parents had spent large parts of their own childhoods living in other countries too (not Africa, and different from each other too).

I will refer to my daughter "coming home" to stay for a few days, but ask her to make sure she messages to let me know when she's "safely home" afterwards too! We both know what I mean 😁

thecatsthecats · 18/12/2020 12:18

There's 'home', where I currently live, 'home home' where I was literally born and which looks out directly to the spot my parents met.

One day I will move from here, but home home will be there forever.

Reminds me of a chat we had in the office explaining the difference between out and out out to our boss - then the ultimate - home home out out.

That special kind of drinking you only do on reunions in your home town!

SantasBritchesSpelleas · 18/12/2020 12:23

I think you're more likely to call your parents' house 'home' if they still live in the house you grew up in, and if you've moved away from that area.

Yes, that's why I call it 'home'. I call my own house 'home' too but in different contexts.

Megan2018 · 18/12/2020 12:23

I agree with you @RedskyAtnight

My parents have houses that I lived in and used to be Home. And the town they live in was Home for the biggest part of my life. But my home is always where I live now. I’ve only been in my house for 2 years and the area for 5 years but it’s definitely my only Home.

I feel perfectly welcome and “at home” in my parent’s houses and I have keys so can just let myself in if I needed to. But it’s not Home.

HighSpecWhistle · 18/12/2020 12:25

Who actually cares??

YABU for giving this any thought.