How the Pandemic Forced One Family Closer Javascript must be enabled to use this site. Please enable Javascript in your browser and try again. × Search search POPULAR SEARCHES SUGGESTED LINKS Join AARP for just $9 per year when you sign up for a 5-year term. Get instant access to members-only products and hundreds of discounts, a free second membership, and a subscription to AARP the Magazine. Leaving AARP.org Website You are now leaving AARP.org and going to a website that is not operated by AARP. A different privacy policy and terms of service will apply.

How the Pandemic Forced One Family Closer

A mom shares the story of when her adult daughter returned home

Jake Stangel Get instant access to members-only products and hundreds of discounts, a free second membership, and a subscription to AARP the Magazine. Two weeks later, Juliet was on the road, driving a loaded car north. Our lives had changed drastically since her first text. The Bay Area was on lockdown. The restaurant where Juliet had been working as a cook shut abruptly, and she had been laid off. Grocery shelves had been stripped bare of . Juliet arrived in the early evening, and we collapsed into each another's arms. It felt so good to squeeze her, to savor the tightness of her arms around me. I hadn't seen enough of her in recent years as she left for college and then crossed oceans to pursue her passion for growing and cooking food. Though I was delighted when she settled in L.A., my more-than-full-time job as a news editor gave me little opportunity to visit her. As I helped Juliet carry her bags to her childhood bedroom, I told myself to be careful. She was no longer a young girl who needed supervision or chore lists. I made myself a promise to parent her as little as possible. Gary and I were not alone in this sudden transition from to roommates of an adult child. Parents across the country have had or show up seeking sanctuary from the . For the first time since the Great Depression, a majority of the country's 18- to 29-year-olds — 52 percent — now live with their parents. And in Berkeley, soon there were four of us. Juliet's boyfriend, Wes, left his graduate program in Wisconsin and moved in. It was more noise and activity than Gary, who is retired, and I were used to, but we were grateful to have Juliet and Wes nearby; our older daughter was in New York City, where COVID-19 was killing people at alarming rates. We had no idea when we would see her again. Once at home, Juliet started cooking with a vengeance. Our kitchen morphed into a sourdough starter lab. Then she started making face masks, setting up her sewing machine on the dining room table. She, Wes and I tackled the garden, and then Juliet and I immersed ourselves in YouTube videos featuring home makeovers. We took long walks in our hilly neighborhood. than I liked. Flowers & Gifts 25% off sitewide and 30% off select items See more Flowers & Gifts offers > And the costs! Our water bill had never been so high. It seems long showers were the soul-soothing antidote for dark days, and not only for the kids. The grocery bill climbed as well, but it was offset by the fact that we never went out to eat anymore. Another issue: Much as I love my daughter, I missed my independence. When Juliet lived in L.A., I didn't think about her whereabouts constantly, but now a big part of my brain thought about her all the time. Once in a while, I broke my resolution not to mother her, nagging her to file a health insurance claim and update her car insurance. I had expected Juliet to feel like she was going backward in life. I hadn't expected to feel like I was going backward, too. Then, in late May, she was offered her job back. It was at a trendy Los Angeles restaurant where the kitchen was minuscule, barely 8 feet wide. Juliet had to work side by side with another cook, and servers came in and out of the kitchen constantly. There was no way she could stay 6 feet away from others, and wearing a mask while standing over a hot stove would also be a challenge. Compounding the danger: Juliet has Addison's disease, a rare adrenal disorder in which the body stops producing critical hormones. Juliet had almost died from it during her first year in college. Addison's is not curable, but it is controllable with medicine. Still, if she got COVID-19, Even so, Juliet thought she should go back to work. She felt it wasn't right for her to live safely with her parents while other didn't have that option. She FaceTimed for hours with her colleagues, trying to figure out what to do. AARP NEWSLETTERS %{ newsLetterPromoText }% %{ description }% Subscribe bingeing on Netflix and letting her dirty coffee cups pile up even higher. Wes couldn't cheer her up. I felt helpless. I kept asking her if she wanted to go for a walk, take an online class, . The answer was mostly no, and, as a parent turned roommate, that sidelined me. I couldn't sign her up for therapy and make her go. I couldn't love her out of her depression. I had to let her work through her troubles by herself. In the end, it was sewing, not cooking, that brought Juliet out of her malaise. She needed some more pants—she had left most of her clothes in L.A.—so she bought a bolt of white canvas and fashioned it into a pair of jeans. They looked cute, especially with the wide pockets she had improvised. That success buoyed her confidence, and she moved on to making a dress and then some curtains. Sewing, like cooking, meant that Juliet could work with her hands and bring a task to fruition. Months later, as we still hunker down at home to protect ourselves and others, our group of four has found its equilibrium. Juliet and Wes have started to live a bit separately, shopping for food and often eating dinner by themselves. Wes has found work, Juliet is looking, and they now pay us rent. We all still get together for dinner sometimes, but Gary and I increasingly interact with them around house projects. Juliet and her dad are building a table. She and I are . And what did Juliet text me about her day recently? “Deep cleaning the kitchen!!” Those are words to make a roommate — and a mother — smile. Frances Dinkelspiel, 61, is the cofounder and editor of the news site Berkeleyside and the author, most recently, of Tangled Vines: Greed, Murder, Obsession and an Arsonist in the Vineyards of California. 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