Thought I’d responded. Parents kicked me out at 18 over the guy I was seeing, fled with him to his parents’ house upstate NY, they insisted we marry, so I did.
After high school, I waited a year, then went on a Mormon mission to Japan, under close supervision and far more rules than any dorm, so that doesn’t count. Came home, went to school a bit, then back to Japan for a year where I really was on my own.
My abusive father had cancer and was slooowly dying when I came back. The family structure had gone to hell and during the year and a not quite a half that he lasted, I went to school and tried to keep my mom from going nuts. Younger brother needed to get committed to the psych ward, one older sibling was couch surfing and really having problems, and my mom, a battered wife and going crazy trying to deal with her abusive husband dying and the children being nuts.
It was a crazy few years until I finally could get out of it. I was trying to work full time while going to school part time. Eventually, got the degree and got the hell out of Dodge, putting an ocean between me and my family of origin.
actually being disabled ive never actually lived on my own but I did have to leave the house that I lived in for almost 15 years due to my mom passing on during what was supposed to be a routine operation,… and after that, I made several decisions based on others feelings that ive since regretted
I’m so sorry about your mom. What a terrible time that must have been. It’s definitely a challenge to look out for one’s own best interest while dealing with the fallout this creates. I haven’t been up to it myself in the past, and I’ve thrown away a few years that way… Hope things are getting better for you.
After graduating college, I spent six weeks with my parents waiting until I had to report to Fort Benning* for the Infantry Officers’ Course. Oddly after I retired from the Army, I drove a garabe truck for a year. I noticed at least three bedrooms worth of stuff on the curb the day after high school graduation. I suppose that is also a technique.
*Soon to be Fort Moore. Get used to it.
Grew up in the bush, finished High school in 1983, applied to some Universities (and got accepted) but the logistics of moving, living, money did me in so I never went.
Got a secure government job in Melbourne, only a 3 hour drive from home, so at 19 I packed up, got some second hand furniture, found a flat/apartment in what seemed like a good area and moved out.
Been in the city ever since, moved my mum in with me a few years back after dad died and she fell over and busted her hip, bought a place back where I grew up as a holiday house/retirement home.
A couple of years after my parents divorced I convinced them to let me attend a boarding school a couple hours away. I came home for holidays and over the Summer. Then I did a gap year after graduating and lived in my own apartments/group houses with some financial support from Mom. Started university the following Fall, and never spent another Summer at home (I worked at a beach resort the first two summers, then stayed on campus for the next two). Spent a year after graduating working in my college town before spending a couple months at Mom’s before moving to Asia to teach.
I lived with my parents until I was 23 and went from Canada to the Czech Republic to teach English. This period included living at home during my studies (I grew up in Toronto and attended the University of Toronto) and the part of that stay during which I was an adult included: 1) a fifth year of high school (back then, Ontario had a “Grade 13” or Ontario Academic Credit year that most students tood) 2) four years of university a gap year after my studies during which I volunteered in classrooms and did other things in a failed second attempt to get into teachers’ college. However, before I left home, I did spend three periods away from home: 1) a month at a course in France in the summer of my sophomore year; 2) two three-month long summer jobs in Quebec after my junior and senior years; during these periods, if relatively brief, I was, once I started getting paid, effectively self-supporting.
At age 18, still living with my parents and sisters, I started feeling I wanted to move out on my own. I didn’t have the (substantial) money to do it, so I worked my ass off until, at age 20, I could rent an apartment with all the attendant costs from real estate agent payments and massive security deposits on up.
Laying in bed for the first night in the new apartment, I truely, deeply felt things were now as they were supposed to be. And that didn’t change. From that day on, I lived a totally independent life, paying my bills, cooking my food and doing my laundry.
If I had had the money, I would have made it earlier, and still done OK, I think.
It was just time to leave home. That and the fact that my father started charging me rent. I had no problem contributing my share, but I didn’t agree with his Marxist math.
Shep?
Bit further north, Toc. Just over the Murray.
Haha, in my day my car only did 80 km/h, safely.