What were the biggest shocks for you when you first moved out of your parents?

[reecejackox]

How much bills were.for me.

 

[shoney]

How horrible it was to do dishes and how bad I was at it. We always had a dishwasher growing up. I never did dishes until I moved out

 

[disykat]

That some of my roommates had never cleaned, shopped, cooked, paid bills, etc. I'd done all of the above so nothing was a big surprise.

I had one roommate who thought I was a pig because the bathroom would get dirty and need cleaning when it was her turn. She had never had her bathroom get dirty before so any grime that accumulated had to have been mine. Turns out her mom had always cleaned her bathroom. I always wondered what happened when/if she eventually lived on her own or somewhere where there wasn't someone else ever cleaning.

 

[BrianL]

How little things changed for me and how I didn't have to live on just ramen noodles. I didn't move out until after college and I was in great shape to buy a house. I was so nervious about it though, but it was never a struggle. I am probalby the exception though.

 

[fly girl]

How much I hated not having a washer and dryer in my apartment.

 

[BlueStarryHat]

Having to bank and write checks and stuff. My Mom always helped me with that. I was stunningly ignorant of how to do my own banking.

 

[luv2sewtjr]

I was always careful with money. Like a previous poster, I always had a dishwasher and hated hand washing dishes. I also really didn’t know how to cook. I got pretty good in my later twenties and now I have been teaching my kids.

 

[HeatherC]

How none of my roommates knew how to write a check to pay bills.

 

[jiminyC_fan]

Nothing really.

 

[FigmentSpark]

The 5 lbs I gained from dinners of a large plate of fries and gravy in the cafeteria. Also, that my roommates would use my kitchen stuff and then just leave it in the sink for me to wash.

 

[RogueX]

That my stepmother was right, I would move out one day and actually have some "nice towels" that are only to be used when someone stays over. She gloated about it for a good 6 months when i mistakenly told her that.

All joking aside, I wasn't shocked by anything. I grew up broke and learned to live on a penny to penny budget for a long time.

 

[Pink Partridge]

The fact that my roommates could not cook was baffling to me. I was taught to make "a lot from a little". They ordered out so often. And then drooled over meals I made for basically $2.

 

[JAMIESMITH]

Laundry. My mom washed all my clothes at home growing up. My first apartment didn't have a washer or dryer. I spent a ton of time those first few years in some sketchy laundry mats.

 

[slpeters]

I was shocked how quickly my parents moved on. I called from the airport when I arrived in Boston and they had already changed my room into an office.

 

[tvguy]

My wife and I rented a new condo for 13 months, We got KILLED on taxes. Only made $30,000 combined income, rent was $500 a month. We HAD to buy a house, to reduce the tax bite.

 

[fla4fun]

How much I missed having family around to just hang out. It takes me a long time to trust people, and I don’t make friends easily. You really can be lonely in a crowd.

 

[Kittyblue]

It's not as much fun cooking when you have to do it all the time.

 

[NYCgrrl]

How much food other people wasted and how much convenience food they purchased. The inability to clean up behind themselves always threw me for a loop as well.

 

[Uncle Coaster]

How little space I needed. I started my post-living-with-my-parents life renting a small one-bedroom apartment. I didn't upgrade until about 18 years later. When a new job led to a move, I downgraded again.

 

[Mysterian]

You definitely start to understand your parents on some things. But there were pluses: more privacy, a place you can arrange yourself without mom's fake plants or rustic decor. So much quieter without loud family too.