Flying the Nest

Flying the Nest, posted with vodpod

As thousands of young people prepare to fly the nest for university this week, a new study by Endsleigh, has revealed an emerging generation of internet-savvy students and midlife parents is significantly changing the way families are now keeping in touch.

According to the study, parents rely heavily on social media platforms like Facebook to keep tabs on their children once they’ve left home, with 75% admitting to regularly checking their profiles to see what they’ve been up to. However interestingly, only 36% of the 18-25 year olds surveyed are actually friends with their parents on Facebook and almost three quarters (72%) deliberately choose not to be as they do not want their parents seeing personal pictures and messages.

The study also shows that 72% of 18-25 year olds who have left home now use the internet to communicate with their parents – 36% via email, 23% use social media and 13% Skype.  Mobile phones are almost as popular to keep in touch, with 70% using their handsets to call home and 60% to send text messages to their parents.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, only 7% of young people use post to keep in touch with their parents, which has reduced considerably from previous generations – 25% of 45+ year old midlife parents surveyed in the same study used post to stay in touch with their parents when they first left home.

When it comes to working out how to do basic household tasks, young people are becoming increasingly independent and self-reliant, with 44% of 18-25 year olds choosing to use self-help websites such as YouTube or VideoJug to find out how to boil an egg, work a washing machine or iron a shirt, compared to only 20% contacting home.

However despite the rise in usage of the internet and social media, young people are getting more homesick than ever – 62% of the 18-25 years surveyed confessed to missing home when they first left, compared to 55% of the 45+ year olds who were asked the same question about when they first left home.

Young people still need the emotional support of parents, with 67% confessing that the main reason they contact home is for a general catch up. Surprisingly, only 13% of the young people surveyed contact home to ask for money.

Commenting on the findings, Relationship Expert Christine Webber said: “These days parents are becoming less anxious about their kids flying the nest as there are so many different ways to keep in touch, but they must be careful not to invade their privacy by checking up on them too much. However it seems nothing can replace the comfort of the human voice, which is why so many students still need to ring home for a regular catch up.”

Aaron Porter, NUS President, added, “Students are becoming increasingly self-reliant and their faithful laptop has played a massive role in this, almost becoming a surrogate parent as they use it to keep in touch, share information and find out how to do things. However, parents can still play an important role by ensuring that things like anti-virus software and insurance is covered. Many students would feel as if they had lost their right arm if their laptop was lost or stolen so setting up insurance means one less thing to worry about.”

Endsleigh’s student possession report published last month revealed that every student surveyed returning to university for the start of the new term will be taking either a laptop (94%) or a desktop computer (6%) with them. The same study also showed that today’s students carry over £1,300 worth of goods on them on their person around town and campus.

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The 7 myths about women over 50

1. Women over fifty don’t care what they look like.
Since two out of the three of us are planning to have our next round of cosmetic surgery, we take exception to this. We now remember with fondness that construction workers used to give us wolf-whistles. We thought it obnoxious then. We miss it now. Women like us drag ourselves to the gym, where we get to compete with twenty-somethings for parking spaces and treadmills. We take Yoga and Pilates, go on diets, run marathons, go on diets, dye our hair, go on diets, get contact lenses, go on diets  We care. A lot.

2.   Women over fifty don’t like sex.
Since one of the three of us is married, this is a touchy subject. The answer is, just let a healthy, willing, attractive male show up in our vicinity and we will be ready. Or, if even two out of three of those categories show up, we will be ready. Actually, “willing” might make up for any other shortfalls, depending on how long it’s been. And just think, since we can’t get pregnant, we can just zip past the pregnancy prevention shelf at the drug store.

3.   Women over fifty find menopause terrible and debilitating.
YES! Menopause is TERRIBLE and DEBILITATING. It ruins our lives. It is the worst thing that has ever been invented in the history of the universe. It is worse than diet ice cream. OK, now that we have acknowledged that, can we please move on? The fact is that two of us didn’t even notice menopause, except that we could also zip right past the sanitary products shelf too. So, menopause exists and we’ll have it for awhile, and then we’ll get over it.

4.   Women over fifty can’t keep up with the times.
Interesting, since women over fifty are the fastest growing group on Facebook. We three have six computers among us. We have and use  PDAs, GPSs, and iPods. We have almost outgrown email, and are Facebooking and twittering. And let’s face it: Without us, a lot of the Help Lines would go out of business.  We may have grown up in the Stone Age, but we have managed to survive into the computer age.

5.   Women over fifty miss our children and only want to be with our grandchildren.
We love and adore our children.  We love and adore our grandchildren.  That’s the only acceptable answer, isn’t it, since this will be in print?  We love them the most when they don’t ask us to baby sit too much.  But seriously, we can love them and still want a life. That’s the bottom line.

6.   Women over fifty fear change.
That’s really funny, since virtually everything about us is changing.  Body parts are moving to different locations or vacating entirely.  Hair is now appearing in places it never was and disappearing from places it used to be. We could go on and on.  So, we say we don’t fear change.  We are, and have been, the movers and shakers of our lives.  Go to any art class and see who is involved in creative pursuit.  Go to yoga or meditation classes to see the same.  Look at the women starting new careers, or the ones running for office.  Check out writing classes, art appreciation classes, cooking classes.  Look at who is doing work in developing countries, starting foundations, traveling the world, raising money for causes, marching for causes. Change? Bring it on! We are well-practiced, and good at it.

7.   Women over fifty are counting the days until retirement.
We agree with this statement. No matter how much we love our careers, we are chomping at the bit to have the time to travel, to explore, to start new businesses, to enroll in college, to volunteer, to write books, to inspire our daughters’ and granddaughters’ generations with the unlimited possibility we have.  We can’t wait to retire so we can see what’s next. We have lived only the first half of our lives and are anxious to see what we will create in the second half.

Reproduced with the kind permission of Renee Fisher  – DC Boomer Humor Examiner

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