Family Matters
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Moving Out
I have recently moved out of my parents house to live with my boyfriend. Is it normal to be feeling a little bit of guilt? My Dad travels a lot with business and I am the youngest child in the family. I am feeling so much guilt about leaving my Mom alone. I know that she is lonely now and I talk to her every night on the phone. We were very, very close and I just can't help be feel like I should be with her every night.
What should I do? What can I do in this situation?
Re: Moving Out
Not normal. You shouldn't allow your mother to let you feel this way. She must be saying stuff and making you feel guilty.
You are an adult now. Your mom has her own life, and needs to learn to live it.
You shouldn't be feeling guilt for growing up and becoming an adult. It's not abnormal to feel bad right now, but it's something you're going to have to get over eventually.
Don't allow her to rely on you, and you alone, for companionship. Otherwise she's going to become co-dependent on you and that's going to present a HUGE problem later on when she refuses to do anything else in life and always looks to you to keep her company and take care of her. You are not her caretaker or her only friend ... if she says that you are, then you're in trouble and you need to put a stop to that ASAP.
Just like you're a fully functioning adult, so is she. She needs to make her own friends and find her own activities. It's fine to talk to her a few times a week if you want, but if she's spending hours on the phone with you and she's laying the guilt trip on you, then you have a problem. If she's just staying home and watching TV or whatever, and she's not finding something else to occupy her mind, it's not healthy for her.
Seriously? You don't need your parents blessing to become an adult and move out on your own. And often times in a dysfunctional family or enmeshed family you will hardly ever get support or approval for leaving the enmeshed relationship.
I agree w/ Kuus.
I'm not sure how one moves out "respectfully", nor does one need parental permission to do so. I agree that you need some therapy to understand that your mom's happiness is not your responsibility. You might want to suggest to your mom that she get some therapy, too, so she can learn how to have her own life and not rely on others to make her happy. If she's lonely, she needs to make some friends instead of making you feel obligated to give her so much attention.
I think it's good that you're moving out; living on your own for awhile instead of with your boyfriend would probably be good for you, too.
Your mom will be fine. Seriously. You have nothing to feel guilty about! The kids growing up and moving out is a part of parenthood. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's something your mom has had time to prepare for mentally and emotionally.
Is she saying things that are making you feel guilty?
I don't usually post on this board, but I have to say, she's talking about 'a little bit of guilt,' not re-designing her entire life around her mom. I think there's a huge difference.
When I moved thousands of miles away for grad school, I felt a bit of guilt for not being with my family. That's not crazy; it's normal for someone like me who is quite close to her family. I felt especially guilty about my mom, who is single and who had just become an empty nester--a difficult time for some, and an exciting time for others.
My advice is to set up a regular day/evening/activity with your mom. My DH and I used to have dinner and my mom's every Thursday and at his parents' every Sunday until we moved across the pond. That worked for us. Maybe for you, it's every other week, or once a month. Maybe it's finding a book club in common that will allow you to spend time with her, and also encourage her to make other connections so she doesn't just rely on you.
On the other hand, if you DO feel like you can't enjoy your new life because you are CONSUMED with guilt, then that is something else entirely. Read 'Codependent No More' and maybe speak with a counselor if this is the case.
I think it makes a difference whether she is talking to her mother every night because she WANTS to or whether she feels like she HAS to.
I also wonder if these feelings will subside on their own over time.
Um.....didn't say that she did, thank you.
Trying to get at her internal source of guilt so she can address that rationally.
It is not that I NEED to talk to her every night it is that I WANT to. I very much doubt that I need intensive therapy because I feel some guilt over leaving my mom in an empty house for weeks on end when my siblings all live far away and I'm the only one around. I do not feel bad, at all, when my Dad is in town and theres someone there with her but I am very close to my parents and would obviously feel some sort of saddness when I left home.
All the post was meant to ask is that if it is normal or common to feel some guilt or saddness when leaving your family home. That is all. I'm not obsessive about this or feel as though I can't function. I just said that I feel as though I should be driving home to my parents house when I leave work, not my condo. Its a reaction I'm still not over yet. My Mom and I have always been very, very close and I think its just a matter of time until I don't feel the need to go home as frequently as I want to right now.
How old are you?
Moving out does not mean that you cannot have a close relationship with your mom. I do find myself feeling sorry for your SO. You are not ready to choose your SO over your mother.
Hi OP,
This is my first ever post, but i read this and felt like I'd give you some insight as this situation is familiar to me.
I'm engaged and haven't moved out yet. I am also very close to my mom and dad. When I transferred to university for two years out of town, I'd call my mom nightly, just to chat about our days and to say goodnight (just as I would chat with her about my days and say goodnight when I lived with her). When i graduated I moved back in with my mom and will be moving out this October (I'll be 24, not sure how old you are).
Heck, my dad still calls his parents about twice a week, and they live in Mexico. He'd see them just as often if he could afford it. We have a very tight knit family, this is the norm for us (extended family included).
What I'm trying to say is, in my opinion its expected that you would feel nervous about leaving your mom alone, however, I know my mom has my dad and other family nearby that she can spend her time with, and she also has friends that she can see. My mom is a very independent woman and has told me she'll be fine, that I should never feel guilty for leaving her and "kids have to leave someday".
Try not to feel too guilty, you and your mom obviously love each other a lot, and that will not change when you leave. Of course it will take time to adjust when that closeness has been part of your entire life, but there have been many before us that have been in situations like ours, and they turn out alright ^_^.
Cheers,
K.
I agree that this does not automatically mean that you need therapy. Further, I didn't see anything in your original post that hinted that you were negatively emeshed with your mother, nor that she was specifically doing anything to cause you guilt.
Look, you, as the baby and I'm presuming the last one to leave the nest, that you saw your mother be a little misty-eyed at seeing her kiddos move out. I'm sure you also saw moments of pride and satisfaction at knowing her part as guardian and self-sacrifice were nearing and hopefully her adult children were independent rather than kids-with-adult bodies...that they actually had the marks of adulthood upon them. If that was the case, then you were able to see her get past that momentary nostalgia of having her kids there and was able to see her go forward with her life, busying herself with whatever that entailed which, I imagine would have included to some degree, you, since you were still at home.
What you do not have, from the vantage point of living outside the home, is seeing and being assured that yes, while Mom misses her child, Mom also has other things going on in her life, or at least now has the opportunity to fill her life up now that she's no longer a mother with dependents. If you could witness her getting on with her daily life, this would be somewhat easier, because of course you would be assured that sadness is not the entire make up of your mother. You feel, no doubt, a greater sense of responsibility because you were her last. That's not uncommon, I don't think, for people who are, as we should be, sensitive to other's sensitivities. But that doesn't mean that I think it is entirely accurate to have, either. Remember, this is a transition time for yourself as well. I think it would be really unhealthy for you to need to define your adulthood by comparing or declaring it abnormal to want interaction, to enjoy interaction, to even to some degree expect an ongoing relationship with your mother. That said, during this transition time it is not uncommon for either the parent or the child to have difficulty avoiding patterns of behaviors, even pleasant ones, that don't automatically revert back to an child-parent dynamics. So, watch that and be adult enough to be straight forward about that, and invite your mother to be just as straight forward with it. I'm saying that as a precautionary tale, not because I see some evidence of it needing to happen already. I'm shocked on this board, and in real life, how often advice is to invite a mitigator of some sort to state our peace of mind or to even fight our battles for us. Not everything is an insult, a slight, or a mental illness.
My earlier comment on did you have your parents blessing was not so much about did you ask them if you could move out. It was more about, do you have any tangible proof, had any concrete, plainly spoken conversation which relayed into their not approving and that is where your guilt is coming from? Did they suggest that you not move out just yet, and you having had no real conflict in the family before are feeling a little unsure footed at stepping out on a decision you've made on your own. Are they disappointed in the area of town your moving to, shocked that you aren't following something else that they understood was your path (like giving up college to move in with a fellow you've only known for a brief time) or is there a religious, moral, cultural or financial barrier you've crossed that they feel is unwise? You don't have to answer any of these questions...You've gone on to explain that this is more about having a physical distance and life change than it is about emotional disturbance. I just wanted to explain myself a little as to why those questions were asked, because a little reflective thought with yourself if any of those things had been in play would have given you a healthier start at a self-dialogue over what was reasonable or not unreasonable in your guilt/feelings - and thus could be addressed specifically with your mother. Same with asking if there was a big row between the two of you when you left. (I have an estranged family member, an adult, who left her home literally in a tempertantrum - very nasty post-move out too, and I imagine her pride keeps her away because she knows she was wrong in how she handled herself, not having anything to do with moving out itself or being an adult. In fact, had she been an adult relationships wouldn't have become the headache they are now for everyone involved and she still could have been out and independent.)
Hearing that it is more about the routines of what feels normal (like turning left to go home instead of right) is normal. In fact, you'll feel the same way if and when you move w/wo your now boyfriend into your next place. Patterns and behaviors get habitual, and when they are changed, even positively, there is a comparison between before and after.