Mattha Busby, 32, recently moved back home with his mother Mandy, 63, for the first time in 12 years. He has become one of the 33.7 per cent of British men aged 20 to 34 who now live with their parents, according to Office for National Statistics data reported earlier this year, a figure far above the pre-millennium rate. But while the cost of living usually drives this generation back to the nest, Mattha’s decision instead involves wanting to get to know his mother better.
‘I finally understand my mum – and she’s taught me how to understand women better’
Mattha Busby
Living in Plymouth in a two-bedroom house with my mother and her pet Schnauzer at the age of 32 was not on my to-do list. Previously, I was on the other side of the world, in Vancouver, and had spent only six months in the UK since 2021 after extended sojourns not only in Canada but Mexico, Portugal, and Morocco. My work has taken me to Colombia and America over the past year, and I had my sights set on moving to Los Angeles next. Then, during an ayahuasca trip (which I embarked upon in the name of journalism), I had an unexpected realisation: I needed to move back in with my mum.
I mulled it over for about 24 hours after the psychedelic epiphany. My roommate’s chaotic friend had taken over our living room indefinitely, so getting out of there was appealing. Plus, mum was still convalescing from major surgery. So, I booked a flight back to the UK for early March, and moved into my mother’s spare room. I had never lived there before, having grown up in Bletchley, Milton Keynes, so it wasn’t exactly a nostalgic “coming home”, back to my old bedroom, but more of a fresh start. Approaching six months later, I’ve got no regrets. It might, in fact, be the best decision I’ve ever made.
My mother and I had not lived together since I was 19, when I came home for summer after my first year of university, when my dad was still alive and my brother was entering his teens. After that, I very much flew the nest. We still spoke on the phone most weeks, but our conversation increasingly became catch-ups: where I was, what I was working on, what mum had been doing. We knew most of what was happening in each other’s lives without necessarily knowing each other particularly well.
Our relationship hasn’t always been entirely straightforward. Mum almost died after giving birth to me, she also couldn’t breastfeed me, and perhaps this fed into our early bond. I could sometimes be combustible when I was younger. The complications of my parents’ marriage didn’t always leave much room for the two of us to develop a relationship of our own, either. We have certainly had some fractious fallings out in our time.
But it turns out we’ve both softened with age. To be able to find ease in long periods of each other’s company for the first time is an incredible gift.
We’ve taken trips to Cornwall, Bristol, Glastonbury, and the nearby Bovisand Beach. I was actually able to spend Mother’s Day with her for the first time in years, taking her to the local pool hall, where I shamefully showed her no mercy. We’ve also started jamming together during our nightly “music time”. And we celebrated her beloved Arsenal’s Premier League title victory before consoling each other after England’s loss to Argentina, having watched the whole tense yet, until then, joyful World Cup together.
For years, our phone calls largely involved me reeling off memories I’ve made with other people, or by myself, somewhere else in the world. Now, we’re making memories together again.
Now that I’m a bit older, I can really see myself in her, too. Not just in her looks, though some younger photos of her look exactly like me. But in her idiosyncrasies and mannerisms, which is both scary and adorable. She becomes flustered in some of the same situations where I find my breath becoming shallow. I, however, do not make double-barrelled guffaws when I laugh – ha, haaa – but it makes me grin all the same, reminding me of when she laughed like that when I was a kid. Occasionally, I’ve even caught myself slipping into the high-pitched voice I used with her when I was child. I’ve made a point of stamping that out.
Mum has been teaching me, too: how to live more frugally, how to understand women better and perhaps most importantly, how much you can still learn about someone so close to you who you thought you already knew.
It does seem strange to tell people that I live in Plymouth. They’re certainly surprised. But there’s something quite poetic about living in this bastion of the old world, where the Mayflower ship with the original pilgrims who colonised the US set sail in the 17th century. That is to say that I’m enjoying focusing on myself, my family and my work, though I am still travelling fairly often. As for dating, Mum has forbidden me from bringing anyone home as it is a rather cosy house, but I’m trying to stay away from all that anyway. I figure that once I’ve truly healed my relationship with my mother, someone special may just appear.
For now at least, I’m in no hurry to fly the nest once again. After so many years on the move, in house-shares, unfamiliar settings and doomed relationships, I’ve started to wonder if all that movement also made it very easy to avoid certain relationships closer to home, including, perhaps, the one with my mother. And maybe she has sometimes avoided me, too. Because we see ourselves in each other. And maybe it was not until now that we were both ready to look in the mirror. Turns out, the reflection isn’t so bad after all.
***
‘It’s been healing for us both – we accept each other now’
Mandy Busby
There have certainly been adjustments. I’m a vegetarian and suddenly there’s fish back in my kitchen. He likes to have the lights on a lot more than me, and I have to run the dishwasher almost every day now. He also has a habit of moving things around in the living room. But these concerns seem trivial when I see them written down.
When Mattha told me he wanted to come home, I did wonder how it was going to work. He had come and gone over the years, but I’d never really lived with him as an adult since he left for university. I’d previously had my younger son, Rory, living with me for over a year until he moved to Australia, last October, and that had been tricky at first until we found our lanes, so perhaps that made the transition of living with Mattha easier.
Both of my sons are very focused on clean living, food and exercise. I’m in my sixties now and I’m rather less interested in all that. I just want to relax. But I think, as adults, we realise that we are who we are. Mattha has to accept me as I am and I have to accept him as he is.
He has encouraged me to try new things again, though. We’ve started singing together, which isn’t something I ever imagined us doing. He plays guitar and we choose songs to sing. He also got me to read The Artist’s Way, which is a sort of protocol to rediscovering your creativity. I eventually started it and even got my old sketchbook out for a bit of drawing, which I hadn’t done for years. We also went to church together on Easter Sunday and both thoroughly enjoyed it.
About a month ago, I came home after thinking about Mattha being back and told him that I feel it is a privilege to have him here. He looked surprised. But to get to know him as an adult, just me and him, has mostly been a lovely journey. Of course, we clash sometimes (when he rearranges the furniture, or complains about things around the house), but we’re human. You try to say sorry when you’ve done something wrong, be kind, encourage each other and give each other space.
Having had him home and learning who he is as an adult, listening more, understanding how he felt as a child and what he experienced, has been healing for both of us.
Mattha and I have become more tolerant and patient with each other since he has come home. I have definitely seen the changes in him and the work he has done on himself in the last few years. He is less reactive, and I believe I am too. However, I’ve also recognised his complexity, his need for me to show him my love.
A lot has happened to me in the last five years. Mattha has spent much of that time travelling and building his life elsewhere, but I haven’t been standing still either. There has been the loss of his father, my brush with breast cancer, a partial nephrectomy and a failed complicated relationship resulting in me, I believe, becoming stronger and prioritising what is important to me in life.
As a mum, what you really want is for your children to be healthy and happy. But you have to let them go, let them blossom and find their own way – and hope you’ve been a nice enough person that they still want to be in your world.
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