Funny my husband sent me this link:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9760232/

I forgot to add that my husband is way, way over 33 and he still wants kids. Ha Ha!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Gia-Gina,

Ha ha - same with my boyfriend!

I think the 40% of Italian men aged 30-34 who live with their mums might explain a few things. How can you go overnight from being a "child" to behaving like an adult?

I know men here in their 30s with jobs who still live at home with their parents and whose aging mother still do all the shopping, cooking, cleaning etc for their sons. Can't imagine those guys are going to make great dads and equal partners to their wives...

I also know lots of guys here in their 30's -who live with the mammy (mammones). What do they do if they meet a girl and want to take her to bed... ?? How do they explain that to mamma or does mamma make up a nice cosy bed for them? I read the article... it's on the right under the Headlines thing. Mary

When talking about men (and women too, I am one) who at the age of over 30 still live with their parents, you seem only to consider the "emotional" side of the whole thing. And it does exist. But you have to conside also a few other things.
In first place that the average Italian is not able to find a steady job until much later than 30. With steady job I do not mean a job tht this person will keep for the rest of his or her live, I mean a job that offers any prospective at all. jobs are really hard to find, it takes months to find one, one wahtsoever I mean. And they are mainly contracts that last a limited time, kinda like a couple of years. After these you must start all over again. Basically each one of us spends 3-9 months searching for a job that usually lasts only a couple of years, and than it's 3-9 months to find a different one. Even if you save money, you can't save enough to support you for the months needed to find a new job, ebcause wages are low.
Than there is the fact that it's almost impossible to find a home. Rentals are almost nonexistant, and those that are there are hideously costly (in Milano a one room apartment can cost up to 800 euro per month, which is often 3/4 of the monthly wage). Also purchase prices are... Uh, surprising.
How can one start a life on his or her own when this person does not know for how long he or she will be able to keep the job, and when a one room apartment costs almost his or her full monthly wage? This is why people tend to stay home for longer than our parents used to do. Yes, our parents (the people age 50 or 60) did leave their parents' homes much arlier.
My parents got married when my mom was 19 and my father was 23. But they found a job as soon as they finished their studies, the jobs they found were decently steady, one could expect to use no more than a couple of months to find a new one if needed and the rentals were much cheaper (let's say no more than 1/3 of their wages), leaving them with emough money to buy food, clothing and go camping for a couple of weeks ech summer. They didn't lead a fancy life, but they managed fairly well. Than they spilt up, had other stories, but now both of them returned to live with their parents because neither of them can afford living on his or her own.

Now, I am nost saying that in Italy there is no "mammismo". But that's only one of the problems. I could pinpoint another: thirty years ago both young men and young women were willing to live off scraps if required. Again, my parents had for years a bookshelf that was made of piled bricks and horizontal "compensato" boards. Other people were using pallets as beds, or simple metal wires riveted to the walls and covered with a tent as a cabinet or clothing storage.
Yonger people now want everything to be perfect and perfectly finished right from the start. They would not accept living in a house where the bed is made of four pallets with the mattress on top, or with a second-hand fridge or without a car each. And this happens because their parents have been buying them everything since the start, so they just can't adapt to adapting.
Luca is not a boy, at age 39. Yet, we were talking on Sunday and I told him that I didn't need nor wanted a finsihed house. I don't give a fig about having a finished house, not secondly because I have moed enouggh times to know that no houes if the final one (except the coffin ). He started to reply that he agreed, all he required was a house that was fit to be inhabited. I said Ok, what does fit to be inhabited mean to you? To me the "brianza" was already inhabitable, even though the bathroom was old. old, but the toiled flushed and the sink didn't drip, that's inhabitable to me. His reply was "But the tub was a bit chipped". To me it is, pallets as beds, bricks as shelves and flushable toilets, to him is newly remade and brand new furniture in every room.

I agree that wages in Italy are pretty low compared to rents. On the other hand, I don't get the urgency from my Italian over-30 friends to move out which I had (at age 21 when I moved out of my mums - and I felt soo old to move out!) when I lived at home. They aren't willing to do just ANY job to survive. I told some Italian friends that I used to work as a cleaning lady while I was a student and they were shocked! But why?

When I moved out of home at age 21 I moved into the ****tiest, grimiest student share house in Sydney. Carpets were stained, junkies slept in our front garden and one of my 4 flatmates was an alcoholic/cokehead. I worked two jobs (while I was a full time student) to pay the rent. Most of my friends were the same. I bought all my clothes at charity shops, ate only baked beans and rice. We did not use the phone as it was too expensive. I still remember not being able to afford a cup of coffee. My mother's house was comfortable and bourgeois - but it was(and is) important to me to be independent of my parents- to pay my bills myself and not have them asking where I'm going.

Here, I don't know anyone who worked as a student - not even at McDonalds or cleaning houses or babysitting. And then people complain that they can't afford to move out of home. Many of them have nice cars but still live wth their parents.

My student jobs were: waitress at a cafe, cleaning lady at an office, babysitter, picking grapes at the Australian vineyards over the summer etc. Not fun jobs but not hard to get either. Here immigrants, not students, do most of these jobs.

The indipenent issue is, for me, a very sore spot right now. I am grante dby my family a good level of indipendence (and indipendence also means responsability, obviously). That's the reason i am still there: I am not a guest, I am part of the family and contribute to it. (Currently more in practical way than in money because I am saving for the move to Tuscany.) A few years ago, Luca said something like "Oh, we will not spend too much on food, we will eat very often at my parents'". I left him with a double set of toothmarks on his nose (there's enough space for it on that nose).
On the whole, it's the same mechanism that drives many people here to feel the need of a completely finished house: many people are used to have the family care after them. So the prolem is not the young people per sé, it's the families. I happen to know this young woman who is able to burn all of her wage in crappy clothes in two weeks. She regularly goes under at the bank and each time the bank calls her father and he covers up the "hole". She is so used to it that she just can't manage herself. But, wht if her father had not ever done it? What if in the first such case he replied to the bank "That's my daughter's account, ask her, not me"?

Alice - I can see if you are saving to move to TUscany that living with your parents makes total sense. I would do the same in your shoes (at least for a few months) - just to save some money for the move.

I think there are people like your friend who buys tons of clothes on her credit card everywhere. However, I guess the difference is that in a lot of other countries moving out of your parents house is just culturally expected at a certain age (in the US it's usually 18 and in Australia, somewhere between 18-23). People would think you were pretty weird if you still lived at home at 28 or 30 in Australia - although I do know one Greek-Australian woman who still lives at home at 30 because her parents are Greek and consider it dishonorable for an unmarried daughter to move out of home. It drives her absolutely CRAZY though.

I know people in the US and AUstralia whose parents pay their rent and give them money. But neither the parents not the child would ever dream of actually living with the parents once they are past a certain age.

Anyway I guess once you're used to it - it actually makes sense. I just could never do it myself!

Ha ha! i wonder what Luca would have made of my first student house with the stained carpets, cockroaches, extremely old bathroom with dripping pipes? My bed was a mattress I inherited from my mum plus milk crates. Coffee table and bedside table were also milk crates. Bookshelves were bricks plus wooden planks. Dinner was BAKED BEANZ or muesli. Sometimes I made pasta. After I got paid I went to the pub for beer and a big bowl of laksa (malaysian coconut milk, chicken and chilli soup).

Ahhh...those were the days. Unfortunately, my standard of living has not improved that much since then.

Well, having your parents pay your rent, to me, is even worse than living at home! You have a bigger "cameretta", but that's a "cameretta" anyhow. Somewhere I read that being free is just a large enough prison,well having a house of your own but paid by your parents it's a too narrow prison for me. I's prefer staying where I am, where at least I know that I have to share my life with others!

Now, I am probably too old to live in an apartment shared with coakroaches I have an age when a minimum decency is stroingly required, it's just that I am much more flexible than most Italians of my age or younger than I am. And probably also better "equipped". A colleague of my mum got married one month ago or so, and she hasn't yet started cooking her own meals. She trusts her mother to bring her frozen meals each couple of days until she dies, probably. When her mom (by the way, an excellent Neapolitan cook ) offered her her cook books, the girl just said "I don't need them you are cooking for me".

oopps - double posted!

What's up with all these Italian mothers who continue to do the cooking, cleaning etc for their adult children without ever telling them to grow up and fend for themselves?

It seems sort of like a folie a deux - the parents facilitate the children's refusal to grow up and face adult responsibilities like paying the rent, utility bills, cooking and cleaning.

Well, this is a very interesting thread. My (pugliese but raised in piemonte) husband left home at 16 to join the servizio civile (he was one of the very first not to be jailed as a conscientious objector). He has always been very self sufficient and independent, cooking and cleaning for himself, and looking after his son when his wife was at work and later as a very young widower. However, when I came into the picture, I was quite appalled to the extent to which my (then 23 year old) stepson was being spoonfed and coddled by his father. In fact I began to wonder if the conditional form(which I had diligently learned years ago when studying italian) existed any longer....because all I ever heard way "DEVI comperarmi questo, quello, quell'altro" or "VOGLIO questo, quello, quell'altro". NEVER NEVER a "vorrei", a "per piacere", or a "grazie".... never a cleared table, never help setting the table....dishes piled up in the sink....etc. SLOWLY things have begun to change -- now my stepson lives on his own with his wonderful girlfriend (somewhat but not totally subsidized by us), and at least when I am cooking, some table setting and clearing action occurs. This may be due to my allure as an american....I am somehow linked bizarrely in my stepson and nephews' eyes with IL MONDO DEL HIP HOP because occasionally I go to New York....which makes me laugh as I am an old fuddy duddy who has spent her life working in the opera business...but they seem to think that New York consists of streets filled with laughing and dancing "africans" (this is how they define black people/african-americans who they cannot even imagine are "real" americans) whe spend their days skateboarding and cavorting in the streets. I do often try to explain that the young people in New York (AMERICANS of every colour) go to workor school every day.......

Anyway, it's enlightening and interesting to hear Alice and other natives' "take" on this huge and puzzling cultural difference. It's a tough thing to deal with as an expat and expat step/parent.....sometimes it's hard to be patient and understanding....and accept what seems so different.

I loved living on my own, while going to college and working.

In the states, most kids move out with roomates to help pay the rent. I had friends who lived on the beach in San Diego in small little apartments, 3 or 4 to a house. They went to college and worked, and ate Top Ramen a lot, but they were young and free and at the beach!

My first furniture was all hand me down from my nonni. I had the worlds largest and heaviest shiny gold couch. It was groovy, but it was mine.

I was talking to my mother in law the other day, and said how happy I was that I lived on my own, and learned how to cook, clean, do laundry, pay bills, shop, live peacefully with people other then your family, buy a home...all the things you need to survive in the world.

I waitressed, did telemarketing, and worked as a receptionist while going to school.

And when you are young, of course you make mistakes, and your parents are there to help you and you learn from your mistakes. So, when you are ready to get married and start a family, you don't need your parents to keep doing everything for you. (in the case of my SIL)

If I had never lived on my own, and then moved in with a husband, I don't know how I could have made it. I learned so much in my years as a single gal! It made my transition to Italy and married life so much easier, I think.

I think parents do a dis-service to their children when they do everything for them. Children need to learn to stand on their own two feet - before they are 40. ahah (In the case of my BIL)

Of course there are always exceptions, like Alice saving to move, or someone lost a job and had to move home, things like that.

I think kids need to learn that the world isn't perfect the minute they step out of their parents home. Sure, we would all love a perfect first home, decorated perfect, with the best of everything. Well, get a job, and pay for it! You appreciate things more when you have to work for them, and earn them for yourself.

People in NY and other big cities around US live in the tiniest of tiny, crappy apartments, and pay a fortune (like $3000 a month) for a hole in the wall, and live 4 or 5 to an apt, just to survive. And they start out making crap for salary in the beginning of their careers. The job market and apartment is extremely tough, but they still do it. It is a totally different culture. Kids in the US will do anything to live on their own. Kids in Italy will do anything to stay home. haha

I do understand a little more why kids do not move out, after we had to buy everything for our house - like lights, armadio, shower doors, etc. If you don't find a furniished apt, it can be pretty pricey just to get your place liveable. In an apt in the states, you need a bed, tv and towels and pots and pans, and you are set. it can be a little harder here.

But I think instead of buying a cell phone and fancy car, and sneakers, I would save up to move out, if I were a kid in Italy.

I forgot to mention I saw this story on the news last night on media set - however - they didn't mention this part:

quote:

Italian men ... do little or nothing to help their wives once their babies are born. When they eventually become fathers, Italian women need not expect much help around the house, Istat said, adding that Italian men’s dedication to domestic duties was “non-existent or unsatisfying.”

The newsman forgot to report that part of the study. haha

Take heart people, young people here moves out of their parental hoses everyday, even before 30.
I had many MANY friends from southern Italy coming to university in Perugia that lived there, having jobs like waiter, baby sitters etc..
I moved out at age 26 (rtpm horrid, right?)

But think that.
As Alice has well explained, Mammismo is not the answer.
Not only at least.

My mom, great ultra conservatory INapolitan lady, dreaming for me a lawyer career and husband.
Daddy, great person. Judge. Conservative.

I studied law at University because this was they were dreaming for me. I lived in Perugia in a stdent home, without insects and with flushing toilets ( I was joung but a little decency worked out fine for me also). Finally I think other wise and finally at the age of 24 Ileave university. Start job in a shop (that later I buy and it is still mine) at age of 26 after my mom didn't speak to me for months because i left university, I drop the bomb.
Mom I found a place I want to live in Cortona.
I did, and my mom didn't come to the apt for the whole 3 years I was there! No social justification. I lived 2 kilometres from her!
Come on, My mother still has panic attacks whenever we tell her that we will not go to her house for Christmas or easter...EVERY TIME!!!

It was hard and I am happyt I did it. But I also know that many of my friends did that after me (because I did it first) and many other didn't have the courage to!

My brother (30) lives at home with mom and dad.

He works as gardener and garden keeper for several foreigners that own houses here as side job, he drives buses since one year and has contracts that go 4 months to 4 months. Never knowing if next time he will get the job again.

Tell me how he will pay for rent. How he will get a family. Not all is so simple and easy as you think.

I know that the Mammismo reason is such a cute and funny and backward reason to say, but believe me it is only one of the reason. It is one of the generalizations that makes me scream! CLICHE CLICHE CLICHE!!!!

True also that jounger people want everything fixed from beginning, at least some of them, but hey, people makes of their lives what they want.

The fact that Italians are late parents comes mainly - I would say exclusively- for economical reason. I had my first child at 33 (hubby 48) and second at 37. My husband moved out his house at 15.

As a topic, this one's a scorcher. Because we've all of us, to some extent, dreamed of leaving the 'nest' or are 'living the dream'! Sound familiar? Our children need to be encouraged, not forbidden to make mistakes and gain their own knowledge of life. Just as those of us who are now 'living the dream' here in Italy have done. Have we not made mistakes? Have we not learned from them? Do we not seek, and are continuing to seek, advice from those who've gone before - just as children should be doing with their parents.
Then why do so many deny their offspring these opportunities? How unkind can they get? Do they really think they're doing these kids a favour?
How come so many, and I'm NOT saying all, don't have any idea how much things cost, or what the household outgoings are! They've been given everything they ask for, whether that leaves the family in financial difficulties or not. They wouldn't know anyway. Then we, as 'resposible adults/parents' expect them to go out into this, at times, rotten world and not make mistakes. Parents really need to learn something that unfortunately many have never been taught... To say NO to the 'Give me's, and I wants!. The old adage said "I want, doesn't get". About time some of them - parents and children - learned that lesson.

That's my two penn'th - for what it's worth..

quote:

My brother (30) lives at home with mom and dad.

He works as gardener and garden keeper for several foreigners that own houses here as side job, he drives buses since one year and has contracts that go 4 months to 4 months. Never knowing if next time he will get the job again.

Tell me how he will pay for rent. How he will get a family. Not all is so simple and easy as you think.

I know that the Mammismo reason is such a cute and funny and backward reason to say, but believe me it is only one of the reason. It is one of the generalizations that makes me scream! CLICHE CLICHE CLICHE!!!!

It may be a cliche but it has a real basis in reality. I think almost all of my boyfriend's friends (not my boyfriend thank goodness though!) either live with their parents or their parents give them money - and they are in their 30s and 40s.

Re your brother. I realize it's tough to get a job here - but he actually has two jobs - and I think this is a case of "leap and the net will appear". I managed to pay my rent every month with no parental help when I was a 21 year old student and worked as a cleaning lady (in offices) at night and as a waitress in a cafe 2 nights a week. Neither of these jobs paid well and in Australia we don't have work contracts at all for jobs like these - so I could have gotten fired at any moment and had no security. But I still managed to do it. I suspect your brother (and other Italians I know who say that they can't be independent of their parents) could do it but choose not to. Many people could, for example, move to a cheaper city in Italy or elsewhere in Europe, move to a city with more employment opportunities, stop spending money on brand new clothes and things like cellphones and motorini (although I have not found many second hand clothing shops in Italy but there are some - and I have found some great second hand clothes at markets here in Italy and very cheap), spend less money on food, furnish your house with second hand stuff and share the place with flatmates.

OK - I didn't quite understand what you were saying about your mum not visiting you. Was she angry that you had moved out before getting married - or was she angry because you were living with a man or something? That strikes me as very odd - especially since you say you had a job and paid your own rent and were 26!

Carole and American Girl - I think that some good old fashioned "tough love" is what is needed in the examples you guys cite. At a certain age it's time to cut the apron strings.

Edited quoting tag only. A.T.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: AliceTwain,

I think we expats are missing something here. I don't believe this is just about when we leave home but how important the family unit is. When I first arrived I was shocked by the level of interference (as I saw it then) by my in-laws. Now I appreciate everything they do for us and I realise this is about looking after ones family.
All my boyf's relatives live close together (many in the same apartment block) and they look after each other. So yes parents look after children for much longer than us English do, but when the time comes the children look after their parents instead of packing them off to some old folks home.

We don't live with the in-laws but I know if we needed to they would welcome us with open arms and provide us with everything we needed. I can't see that this is wrong. I don't subscribe to this tough love theory; life is too short to watch those you love suffer needlessly.
And so what if it makes you less independent and less able to stand on your own two feet, it doesn't matter if you don't to need stand on your own two feet.
I left home when I was 18 and have lived in many places but I don’t think I 'm any happier or well balanced than somebody who has lived with their parents all their life.
The English speaking world has developed a cult of the individual and now wherever we go we pour scorn on those who don't subscribe to the same 'me me me' culture. Now Italy seems to be going the same way. 20 years ago I'm sure nobody raised an eyebrow when an unmarried man lived with his parents at 30, now it's front page news. How sad when actually the sense of family duty in Italy is one of the things I love most about the country.

hi all! very interesting topic! as a mom of 2 daughters ages 29 and 25 we/my husband and I/their step dad, have had our fill of them having to come home for what ever reason.. one attended college in Seattle and the other moved here with us from Calif. but happily to say now the college girl is now self suffient and the other has her own apt in our town. but we have had all that every one mentions above. had to say no and set limits!~ they do need to make some mistakes and hopfully learn from them. I know I made MANY when I was young and getting out on my own at 19. I have never gone to live with my parents after I was out on my own, but I am reading that Italy is very different due to the family closeness.this is a on going challenge for all parents we are hoping to have all our 6 kids well on their way to self suffiency by the time we make out move to Tuscany, Umbria,?? not sure but in Italy..
We refuse to give up on our dreams!!

MamaMia

My brother in law is 41 and lives at home. His mother does everything for him. EVERYTHING. Laundry, cooks, cleans, makes his bed, does his clothes shopping, makes his lunch for work everday, sets out his keys for him everynight, makes sure the right car is in back for when he leaves in the morning, pays all the bills, does the books for his kiosk, puts gas in the car, pays the insurance, EVERYTHING. When they do go on vaca (which is hardly ever, because they worry about him) they return to a weeks worth of dishes in the sink - not washed, and not inthe dishwasher, jsut stacked up, waiting for his mom.

When his parents pass away - he will be lost. He does not know how to do ANYTHING. He does not have any girlfriends - he wants one that will do everything like his mom, and he knows he won't find one.

This, I am sorry to say, is not good. What is he going to do when they are gone?

His sister barely knows how to cook or clean. She is the laziest person alive. She has only worked about a year part time her whole life, and she complained the whole time how hard it was and how tired she was. She wants to move back to her parents house, with her husband and children. They have moved in three times. (They have their own beautiful free house - but don't want it, because she wants to move back in with her parents) When they do move back in (all the while leaving their beautiful apratment empty) they sit on the a*@es and do nothing, not even take care of their kid. My MIL does it all. She even changes their sheets, while SIL sits and watches TV. And she lets her to do it all.

BTW - the MIL is ill, and can't move around very well.

This, again, is not right. If you do everything for your children, they have a good chance of being incompetent, and when they find themselves out in the world, they can't cope. Luckily my husband is not like that. He takes care of his parents, he does lots of fix it jobs for them (while the BIL sits and watches), he buys them new appliances when they need it, he visits often, he is a good son, but he is living an adult life.

There is family duty, and then there is disfunction. A parents job is to raise intelligent, competent, caring children, who can find their way in the world and succeed. Not suckle the breast for 50 years.

That's what I think anyway.

Traditionally the children, once they had completed their schooling and any 'further education', got a job - yes in those days there were jobs!
The kind of job you got, as mentioned on this forum, wasn't down to your qualifications, but to who your parents knew...

Then when you began to earn, you did not get your wages!!!!! They were handed over in their entirety to the parents. They in turn would hand you (in my experience of seeing this system working) sufficient cash, nearly always on a daily basis for fares, food, entertainment etc. Any large items you may need were usually purchased by the parents - with little or no input from the child.

Mother generally didn't 'go out to work'. Her work was in the home - where as explained by everyone here - meant doing 'everything' for 'everyone' in the family. If a child tried to help, they were usually strongly discouraged... 'No, you sit down, you've been at work all day'!. No one was ever encouraged to think what the mother had been doing all day. Nor did 'anyone' consider how this system could provide any life experience to their children. It didn't matter.

Why did they need it? When they got married, the majority of their earnings over the years had been saved, and was now there to provide a wedding fit to show everyone 'how well their children had done in the world' a home, furniture, a honeymoon (even that was often with a parent (MIL) in tow...), and a bit of cash for a rainy day.

The house/flat/whatever, was often right in the parents home, or the same apartment block or at the very worst - in the same village/town - with two MIL/FIL's to help, guide and even better - interfere.

So.......... kids set up, doesn't matter if they don't know how to do anything! Then along come the grandchildren. Now you can see why they're made to live in their parents pockets... And the 'parental control' now extends to 'grandparental control'.

It didn't matter in years gone by if the children weren't capable of looking after themselves - the chain ensured that at some point there would alway be someone to make the decisions and do the work at home.
But now those same children have encouraged their own offspring to become (often) selfish, greedy, lazy individuals who scrounge off their parents incessanlty because they don't/can't contribute financially to the home because there are so few jobs around nowadays. Well if the job situation has changed, then it's about time the parental attitude changed along with it....so why hasn't it?

Why are many Italians refusing to 'get their heads out of the sand' and insist that their children are capable of confronting whatever changes are thrown at them? I can only imagine that they are 'short sighted control freaks', OR they are totally devoid of any common sense whatsoever!!!
You'll never convince me that a good dose of 'tough love' wouldn't do both parents and their children a power of good!

And if my 'high horse' got any higher I'd fall off my
(Phew.....)
Carole B