I believe Dazz also insisted that his kids leave home at 18. From memory, the parents of Lil's other half also had a rule that their kids leave at 18. Although it was not my choice, Lil left home at 18 and moved interstate.
Much as I miss Lil terribly, she is very happy living interstate. We have a close relationship, as does her boyfriend with his parents. But, in saying this, Lil is Lil, she was more than ready to move, and had goals and dreams that she wanted to fulfill.
From early on, my goal as a parent was to equip both my children that they could look after themselves by age 18. It was not mandatory to leave at this age, however. I believe that the job of the parent is to ensure that their children can cope emotionally, physically, financially, mentally etc by the time they are a legal adult.
I have not posted much about my second daughter, the oldest one. Early last year, we asked her to leave home too. She was 20. We did this because even though she was an adult, emotionally (with us, anyway) she had not moved on from a fourteen year old and was constantly picking arguments with us and generally taking us for granted. Although it was a tough decision that hurt both us and her, the decision was made with the hope that a dose of "real life" was like might eventually do her some good.
To say she was not happy with this was an understatement and it took some time for the relationship to heal, but, heal it did. A couple of months ago she asked if she could move back home and we agreed, but we also let her know the terms on which she was allowed to come back home and have a print out of those same terms attached to the fridge for all to see.
Well, I can tell you emphatically that the six months living out of home did her the world of good. While she is still the same young girl, her outlook on life has changed for the good. Having to live with flatmates, she found that her parents were not all that bad. Now, she is more considerate of others, she pays her board on time, she helps more often around the house, she will have a conversation with us, she appreciates the things we do for her, her disposition has changed and she is generally happy.
For the moment she is between jobs, but now she has goals that she did not have before. Her income is not wasted on junk, because she learnt that she could not do this, and still afford rent. In short, even though she is back home for the time being, she is acting like the adult that she is.
So.......while I can't speak for everyone else's children, I think keeping them at home, being adult children, is not a good thing. I believe that if the children are wanting to stay at home long term, they might need to be pushed out of the nest, much like a mother bird does to their offspring. Growing up is not all about just reaching age 18, it is about being mature and taking responsibility for yourself and not being so selfish that the world revolves around you.
As a side note, another young girl that we know, that is the same age as our oldest (21), lives at home with Mum, does not work and will not apply for any jobs, but won't apply for Centrelink either because "They expect you to apply for jobs and go there every two weeks, it's just so stupid." So she just spends her days doing what she wants and Mum pays for everything.
Another boy of the same age went to Uni for a while, but dropped out. He had a part-time job while at Uni because he was out of home, and his parents were struggling to pay everything for him, so he did this to supplement what they were giving him. Since moving back home he has no job and does not look for one, and the parents are struggling to pay for him. I don't think he is entitled to Centrelink, even if he applied because now they are dependants until they are 24
and since his parents were supporting him at Uni, he can not be considered independant. The thing is, they are now supporting the younger sibling who is studying at Armadale too. This one doesn't have a job either and they are not a wealthy family.
This family has four children, the third is in year 11 (I think) and the fourth I believe is 15. Out of all of the kids, the only one motivated enough to find any kind of work (other than the oldest when he was at Uni) is the youngest one who works part time after school. The youngest will do well for herself as she appears to know what she wants out of life.
