Moving back in with their parents fixed their finances — and shook their sense of adulthood

• Adults moving in with parents for financial relief can face unanticipated identity crises.
• Multigenerational living reshapes their views on independence and adulthood.
• Unexpected benefits include deeper family ties, despite initial reluctance.

For many adults, moving in with parents or in-laws was supposed to solve a practical problem. The finances would stabilize. The help would be temporary. Privacy would be the main sacrifice.

What people didn't expect was how much the move would unsettle their sense of adulthood.

Across stories from ten people who lived in multigenerational households as adults — often after marriage, having kids, or hitting a breaking point at work — many said the financial relief mattered, but the harder, longer-lasting adjustment was emotional. The experience reshaped how they thought about independence, pride, and family roles.

Most people didn't want to move in. They felt they had to.

When Lauren Barnhill, a writer living in Midland, Texas, moved in with her parents at 32 shortly after getting married, it wasn't something the newlyweds had wanted.

"We weren't exactly thrilled at first — I mean, who wants to move back in with their parents right after getting married?" she wrote in an essay for Business Insider in 2025. The move allowed her husband to complete a required internship tied to his degree, and the couple framed it as temporary.

Others described similar pressure. Laura Kerr walked away from her career and rebuilt her life from her parents' home at 42 after her health collapsed. Katie Bunton moved her family in with her mother-in-law at 33 to save money after realizing their finances weren't sustainable on their own.

Several people said labeling the move as short-term made it easier to accept, even when circumstances offered no clear timeline for leaving.

The hardest parts weren't logistical. They were psychological.

For Natalia Molina, who moved back to her parents' home in Florida at 28 after burnout and debt, the emotional impact hit fast.

"The first two months of living with my parents were isolating, and I honestly felt like a failure," she said. "I felt like I had blown up my life and gone back to square one."

Others described the same tension in different terms. Ces Heradia, who lived in a multigenerational household in her 30s, said living with family stripped away the version of adulthood she thought she was supposed to have.

"I still don't feel like a real adult," she wrote.

What surprised people, for better and worse

Genevieve Dahl didn't expect her mother-in-law moving in to improve her family's daily life. Instead, she said the extra support eased marital strain and made parenting feel manageable again.

"For months, my husband and I were roommates at best," she wrote.

Others found unexpected closeness through routine. Barnhill, who had been uneasy about moving back home, found that ordinary moments with her parents became grounding. "It was refreshing — meditative even — to watch my mom come home from work, set her purse on the kitchen counter, and take off her shoes every day," she wrote.

For Hannah Howard, living with grandparents changed how parenting felt. "It's emotional support. It's feeling like I'm not parenting in a vacuum," she said.

Across their experiences, the move rarely felt like a clean win or failure. Some relationships deepened, others frayed. Several people said that once the money pressure eased, the harder work was sitting with what the move changed about how they saw themselves as adults.