I love my son to pieces BUT…he is a teenager and this can upset the domestic dynamic. I ever so slightly dread the idea of him coming home for the weekends and/or holidays. As he is a weekly boarder, Monday to Friday during term time is heaven at our house. I can cook low fat suppers which are relished by an appreciative husband who, like me, always has one eye on his weight. I stock the fridge and every ingredient I need for the week’s suppers keeps cool there. The TV remote is ours to do with as we wish. As we are anal about tidiness, the house is spotless and everything in its place (David Beckham would feel very at home). We are calm. We are peaceful.

Then Son strolls in, all 6’3″ of him. His ‘food’ of choice consists of pepperamis, crisps, coke, beer, bacon sandwiches, popcorn and (because there is still a child inside him) fizzy sweets. Most of which he decides to consume exactly four minutes before I am serving lunch or supper. Calorie counted meals go out the window because Son needs fuelling, so Husband and I end up putting on weight. Essential recipe ingredients disappear from the fridge. He asks if six friends can come for lunch, I agree, I buy the food, it gets wasted because their plans have changed and they are all now going to the pub. If they didn’t have mobiles they couldn’t keep changing their bloody minds. The house reverberates to dubstep and ring tones. I can only wade through his bedroom as there are so many discarded clothes on the floor. His movement around the house can be traced by the snail trail of items he leaves behind him – shoes, sweet wrappers, computer cables, empty glasses and drink cans, half eaten bacon sandwiches (a special favourite of our labrador who finishes them off), spare coins, and car keys.He is permanently glued to some item of technology, whether an iPod, iPhone or MacBook and consequently is rarely fully available for conversation.Teenagers I’ve never met before appear in our kitchen to thank me for letting them stay over – very polite of them but embarrassing for me as I’ve only popped downstairs to make coffee wearing my bra and pants (now wishing I hadn’t cancelled yesterday’s bikini wax appointment). TheOffice for National Statistics says many young adults in their mid-20s and early 30s, and especially men, are increasingly postponing the transition to adulthood. So not much chance of anything changing soon then. If there’s any Sauvignon Blanc left in the fridge I might just have a glass…