It was a month after my 18th birthday. I moved in with my sister, she lived in a nice two floor, two bedroom, 1 1/2 bath apartment. Her roommate had gotten married and moved out and she offered me the apartment. I pulled my own weight just like any roommate. I paid my own rent, paid half of all utilities and phone. I was “assigned” my share of cleaning duties. It was pretty cool in a lot of ways. I had LOTS of freedom. I could come and go as I please. I could smoke pot in my room and I had a couple friends at the time. I worked and I had a car. I did a lot of stuff with my friends. I lived there about a year and a half. It was actually quite weird that I did this. I was never the leader type but I moved out on my own before my two close childhood friends. Unfortunately near the end I got extremely agoraphobic. Going to the supermarket was an ordeal.So was driving, I felt everybody was looking at me and I was almost panicking when I did these things. I started staying in the apartment a lot because it was unbearable for me to be seen by my neighbors. To top it off the whole time I lived there I was virtually alone. My friends had moved on and my sister was gone 85% of the time. She had a boyfriend and other friends and she was always busy going out with them. All this was before I got sick so even with the isolating I actually had a life. I partied all ovev town drove across the city to my friends when I had them.
It was a unique chapter in my life. Something I’m kind of proud of.
I was 20 when I first moved out. A friend and I found a third floor two bedroom apartment up on a hill overlooking downtown Portland Maine. Our kitchen/living room floor was slanted on an angle and every time an airplane flew over the house would shake and sway. But it was awesome having our own place…my friend and then roommate was the more creative type so she and I got the place looking pretty funky. We had some good times there, sad and bad times too but I’d rather remember the good times. The parties lasting well into the night and sometimes the next day as well. Once I turned 21 up there the party never seemed to cease. There are times when I miss that apartment and that girl who has since grown up. She was always working on a comic book/art book during that time and her walls were always plastered with the pages of this.
It didn’t last long as things got real dark for me and I got to the point where I felt I’d be better off living back home but it was a time in my life I will never forget and always look back on with a little pang of longing for those days…but those days are in the past and I wouldn’t trade knowing what I know now for going back there in the least.
I left when I was 18.
The first time I left home, as opposed to temporarily going into hospital and then returning , was when I was 24 . I went to a social services half way house for the mentally ill. It wasn’t really independent living. That happened when I was 26.
I moved in with my older brother when I was 18, but my parents kind of moved out of their house with me left in it (I was in high school at the time I have a birthday in August). They moved to a smaller town and I stayed at my mom’s and on friends couches for the last year of high school.
I started college when I moved in with my brother. It was in a big city, even so I made it like a small town by frequenting small businesses as is my habit. I moved in with my boyfriend who I met in my home town. Schizophrenia took over and I ended up being to afraid to leave him. Things didn’t work out, but before that I lost my student worker job due to Hurricane Katrina. It was a traumatic time. I barely kept my head above water (figuratively). I moved into my own apartment, got a room mate, and started a new job. Another hurricane flooded my room and destroyed my brand new mattress. So for that semester I was again on my brother’s couch (after the post breakup staying on his couch).
I had some real good times at college, but it was always tainted with the hell in my head and the Cerberus at my door.
I was 19 and working in the oil field so I could easily afford living costs. I went to college when the oil field dropped out and have living on my own ever since. There was a period when I was 36 that I lived with my mom when I first stabilized from falling ill but other than that, on my own.
I was 13 when I first left home. I received an offer from a selective high school that summer. Only 3 out of 120 students in our local junior high school passed the selection exam for the selective senior high schools. That high school required all students to live in the school like a boarding house. I experienced adversity in that high school as I could not understand what the physics and math teachers said in the classroom. My position on the ranking of academic performance plumbed from top 5 to the average. Then I got the pressure from the class mother who urged me to regain my motivation and fighting spirit. Instead of fighting for better grades, I withdrew from the competition among classmates and indulged myself in hobbies like reading literary books and cosmetics. I failed the 1981 university entrance exam and then received an offer to The County High School because my score in the university entrance exam was relatively high. The county high school had better teachers who’s classroom performance inspired me to study harder. I regained my confidence in doing academic. One year later I succeeded in the 1982 university entrance exam.
After I turned 14 and we had the house fire… at the new house… I lived in an airstream trailer in the back yard for a while. That doesn’t really count I’m sure, but I wasn’t directly in the house all the time.
At 17 I began ping ponging back and fourth between hospital and home. I was about 20 when I went homeless… so I guess that might count.
Then it was assisted living and group homes and shelters… round and round that went.
Then section 8 housing with a visiting nurse and I was starting to loose it big time… My sis moved out and in with me many times. She was 14 when she was allowed to officially move in with me.
About two years ago we got out of the section 8 housing and got this place… it’s the first place where I’m on the lease, not my parents… I’m responsible for my own part of the rent. (I have help managing the money)
I guess I’m just now feeling like I’ve grown up a little and I’m living on my own for real.