Excellent advice to the man who wants his daughter not to move back home once she leaves. Great job.

Walter Crockett

Worcester, Mass.

When I left college, I didn't have the option of moving home. Sure, my parents would have taken me in if I needed it. I always knew they were there if my life really crashed, if I had a terrible accident or lost my job. But the reality was that my parents lived in a small town with no job prospects for a new graduate, beyond all those I'd already held (waitress, groundskeeper, ice-cream scooper, and so on). If I wanted a real job with a real paycheck, I had to go to the nearest big city, four hours drive away.

Add to that, I had no desire whatsoever to live with Mom and Dad.

Stick to your guns, Dad. I'd think about some ground rules. If your daughter does move home, there are some serious rules. She should pay rent (similar to what she'd pay sharing an apartment with a roommate in your town). She should do housework and follow house rules (phoning when she'll be late, letting you know if she'll be home for dinner, and so on). She should contribute her share of the groceries with her own money. She should contribute to her share of phone and other utility bills. If you share meals, she should do her share of the cooking. If you don't share meals, then she's on her own to cook for herself. She should, in short, be expected to do all the same things she would if she had an apartment and a roommate. If she can't find a job in her field, there's always Starbuck's or McDonald's until she can find a real job. This is not perpetual childhood. This is adulthood. Mom and Dad's house just won't be looking so nice after a while.

Be strong. You won't be doing her any favors to enter a prolonged teenagerhood after college.

I agree with the idea that once you finish college, moving home should only be a last resort, not a default option. 22 year olds should be responsible for their own lives.

But doesn't this father sound kind of chilling? He sounds as if he loathes his daughters. Overindulged and ungrateful is not actually the normal character of young adults, nor is it a normal description of one's own children.

Of course even if one does love their children, one doesn't have to let them move back in. Still. I am 30 and I have certainly not outgrown my father.

I was fairly shocked at this guy's attitude towards his own children. I can understand not wanting them to move back in on a permanent basis, but if they are overindulged, unappreciative etc, how did they get that way? who raised them? I hope that both father and daughters can learn to appreciate and support one another. I was a empty nester for a time, and my parent's generosity at the beginning of my career set a very good example. It's a debt that I intend to to repay when the time comes that they are no longer able, or no longer wish to live alone. They are my parents and they will always have a home with me.

EEEWWW! One can only hope that this self-centered cretin grows old alone and lonely, with no one to wipe his drool or change his diaper, or endure his insufferable, if thwarted, male ego. Why people like this bother to reproduce is beyond me, and certainly explains why the American Family is a dying institution.

I literally felt my skin crawl as I read this letter, Cary. The implications here are truly creepy, but if the daughter has a modicum of brain in her head, she will grab sis and mum and take off for points far far from this "home," never to return. I shudder to think what this young woman has had to deal with growing up with a man as hostile and resentful as this guy. Tell her to tell him to go fuck himself in a closet somewhere. Then turn around and RUN and never look back!

ahansen

The father reveals himself quite clearly in one sentence of his letter: "We have put our own lives on hold long enough". Though he speaks for his wife as well, and she may not agree with his sentiment, he obviously never enjoyed being a father. Face it pal, you did not put your life on hold to have kids, you made the decision to make your life happen with children in it. This IS your life, there is no going back. You may regret the decision, but it is far too late for that now and you have to grow up yourself and acknowledge that how these kids turned out is in most part a reflection of how you raised them. Honestly, I can't imagine why either daughter would want to move back in. It is surely plain to them that they are not wanted now (were they ever, really?) and will likely get as far away from dad as they can, for the rest of their lives. And for Cary to call this relationship a contract with obligations on both sides is ridiculous! When exactly were these kids asked to make this contract? They were given life at the whim of their parents, who then have the obligation to care for them. They did not choose this cold-hearted jerk as their father, so to me all they owe him is to treat him with the respect they should give any human being, father or not. This guy had better have one heck of a retirement plan, because when he is old and needy he may find that his kids feel no more obligation to him then than he does to them now. And I think he deserves what ever he gets.

I am truly disgusted by the undeserved bile that has been directed at this man by idiots whose position seems to be that parental obligation to indulge their children is unending, and that any refusal to gratify any whim, however unreasonable, makes him a "cold-hearted jerk". He isn�t planning to cut these kids off and let them starve in the street, people. He isn't suggesting they have no further contact with their family. He wants them to move out after college and get jobs. Please explain what�s unreasonable about this.

Damn, you people appall me, with your glib, sanctimonious assurance that anyone who doesn�t share your views on parenting must be some kind of closet child molester or psychopath who deserves only to be abandoned by his family. I left college a couple of years ago and it was made perfectly clear to me that moving back home on a permanent, or even semi-permanent, basis was not an option. My parents were willing to give me financial support until I could find a job, and I would always be welcome to return for visits, but moving back in and reverting to a college lifestyle, sans the distraction of academic work, was right out. There were tricky moments, but at no point did I delude myself into thinking my parents were somehow being unfair and cruel with their unwillingness to gratify my desire for a life of permanent ease and idleness. Anyone who dared suggest to me that this marked them out as heartless swine wouldn�t be kindly received.