Living at Home Again

And by “home” I mean with the parents.

What did you do when you turned 40?

What I did was move back in with my parents due to my house being….uninhabitable.  Then I dealt with it like an adult took off on a “bucket list” vacation to celebrate my birthday by pretending for a week that my life wasn’t in shambles.  (Maine, by the way, was amazing!!  More on that in a later post.)

For those just tuning in, I have an older house that had some repair needs stacking up.  Within a week or two of obtaining the financing I would need to make the necessary repairs and (hopefully) sell or rent this house, I started displaying symptoms of an autoimmune disease.  I talk all about that <<in this post>>.

I began to suspect my house was the culprit behind the illness and this is why, at 39.99 years of age, I moved back in with my parents.  #winning

In truth, this would probably have had to happen sooner or later in the process of me renovating and selling my house, and finally purchasing an RV.  However, the health scare did serve as a stick of dynamite, so to speak, behind the process.

Fortunately it turned out to be the right decision because as of now, my health issues have disappeared on their own – without medication – and the long planned repairs are now happening at my house.  So far, the crawl space is fully supported, which means the floors in my house are no longer sagging.  Said crawl space is also now weatherproofed.  The pipes to my kitchen sink have been replaced along with the actual sink and faucet.  A fancy new garbage disposal has also been installed.

As happens with most repairs, once work begins all kinds of unexpected things start popping up.  I returned from my bucket list vacation to find they’d had to remove and replace half of my kitchen wall after repairing the pipe leak.  That’s because the pipe issue was less a “leak” and more a “direct path to my crawl space”.  Turns out the pipe was completely disconnected and everything that went into that sink drain immediately dropped straight down under my house.  This meant the wall was damaged where the water had fallen through.  Hence, half the wall is now being replaced.

I joke above about moving in with my parents.  Let’s be honest, it’s not something a person typically includes in a “where I see myself in 10 years” list.  However, I have to admit it hasn’t all been bad.  In fact, aside from my hurt pride, it has been a good thing.

Believe me when I say I never thought those words would come from me.

My mother and I had a difficult relationship over the years and were never able to live together peacefully in the past.  Between that and, you know, being an adult and all, I never thought I’d live with my parents again.  However, I’ve learned that life has a way of making things happen that we would probably never choose, but in the end we find out we really needed.

Being the Super Introvert that I am, I convinced myself that I loved living alone, coming home to my cat and my silence, and spending the majority of my life alone.

Since moving in with my parents I’ve found I actually quite enjoy spending time with them.  In fact, I find myself looking forward to getting home most of the time now.  Not for anything special, some days it’s just to sit and watch TV or run random errands with my mom, but boring or not, I enjoy having people around to couch potato the evening away with.

I’ve also found, shockingly, that my mom and I are actually getting along better than we ever have!  I think life has maybe sandpapered some of our immaturities rough edges down over the years I’ve been living in my house but whatever the reason, we have found a way to meet in the middle of our differences.  I am so genuinely thankful for this new relationship!  We now do regular mom and daughter things like have conversations and exchange links on Messenger and Pinterest.  I’m also thankful that I am at an age where I am able to appreciate this change.

My little buddy, Oliver, made the move with me and I can tell he is loving all the extra love and attention he gets from his “Granny and Grandaddy”.

I don’t have actual kids for them to spoil, but they’ve done an excellent job of living vicariously with Oliver.   My mom especially gives him lots of snuggles and play “battles” that he adores while my step-father has served as Oliver’s advocate for fun “cat” things like free-range outside time.  Since Oliver has no front claws and doesn’t understand things like “cars” and “smash” and “dead cat”, his outside time has been closely monitored by me.

I was pretty strict with this when first moving in.  My step-father would remind me “he’s just being a cat” as I shepherded Oliver back to our property, typically from hiding in the neighbor’s yard where they have all the local birds and squirrels vying for breakfast and dinner at their bird feeders.  Over the weeks I’ve learned to loosen up a bit because in all fairness, Oliver is well-behaved and so far hasn’t gone farther than next door.

If Oliver could comprehend all of this my step-father would, I have no doubt, be his favorite human on the planet as Oliver is a huge fan of free-range outside time.

Another positive result of living at home – healthier eating.  This means I’ve dropped 16 pounds!!  This is more than I’ve been able to lose in years (probably due to my thyroid issues) and I am ecstatic!!  I mostly attribute this to my mom’s influence as she eats far healthier than I ever dreamed of eating but also, I was living in a permanent state of depression when I was alone.  It took moving out to realize exactly how lonely I’d been and to feel the changes that come with being happier.

Also, my mom lives in a neighborhood with lots of beautiful, mature trees and over the past week I’ve gotten out to walk around in the evenings when it drops slightly from Hell° Farenheit.  The shade of those trees makes it nearly bearable as I stroll down the street enjoying the neighbors’ houses and landscaping.  I’ve already found a deep purple hydrangea and an old, remodeled Ford Bronco that I have fallen in love with along with a few of those massive, giant oak trees with the great sprawling branches.

Overall, positive things and forward movement are beginning to happen.  Having been stagnant for so long I feel like I’m breathing fresh air (literally and figuratively) now.  I feel so much happier in general and more positive about the future.  I am so thankful to be able to talk about a real relationship with my mother.  Little changes here and there are making a big difference in my life.

Basically…things are good!