Moving out for the first time is always a big deal. Suddenly, you’re living with people you can’t blame stuff on (see: your siblings), and your washing doesn’t magically get done for you every Sunday.

One of the biggest shocks to the system when flying (or falling out of) the nest is the genuine need to cook for yourself, and the slow stages of decline that this experience entails.

Stage One: Matt Preston Who??

It starts off super exciting. Here you are going to the MARKET and buying GREEN THINGS with LEAVES and WASHING YOUR HANDS before preparation.

Suddenly, you no longer have to suffer through your mum’s eggplant moussaka, and can instead whip up a gorgeous lil stirfry situation from taste.com. You even start buying stuff to make dessert with, and you actually consume milk before the use-by date. Bliss.

Stage Two: AKA The Third Day of Living Out Of Home

Another thing super exciting thing about your food situation is that you also DON’T have to cook for yourself! You can literally go out every night and buy food and no one (apart from people who are genuinely concerned for your wellbeing) can stop you.

The only thing that WILL inevitably stop you is the fact that it’ll make you poor, and there are only so many things from the loose change menu that you can actually ingest.

Stage Three: The Mystery Box Challenge 

This is a super fun element of living out of home: the Sunday night whip-around where you gather up the contents of your shelf and have a long think about how you can transform these ingredients into something that you could potentially digest.

A list of things that I would 100 per cent eat on a Sunday night include:

• Potato gems and mayonnaise
• A peanut butter and banana sandwich
• Cauliflower and grated cheese in the microwave (how disgusting does that sound)
• 2 minute noodles with heated up but definitely still wilted broccoli
• Soup (water + tomato paste + 1 carrot = very bleak)
• Toast – just literally by itself, I’m not a millionaire
• Sweet potato, cut into circles and baked in the oven
• A milkshake??

Stage Four: When You Google “Scurvy” For A Laugh But Get Really Worried

This is the bit where you’re about a month in and have been eating heated up McCains pizzas for 90 per cent of those nights. Then you go home (with a full bag of laundry, #noshame) and your mum is like, “Wow, you’re looking… Interesting? Is that a bit of string cheese in your hair? Also your gums are bleeding? Isn’t that a telltale sign of scurvy?”

After vigorously denying any wrongdoing on your own part – common lies including that you have been brushing your hair and eating an apple every 24 hours – you book it home and buy up the whole citrus section of your local. You have a huge salad for dinner, and meticulously check your mouth for signs of blood for the next week. 

Stage Five: Hitting That Sweet Spot In The Venn Diagram Between Eating Stuff That Tastes Good And Not Dying (Refer To Fig. 1) 

After the various health scares/vomits/and complete cleanses that you will go through as a young adult in a share house, you do eventually hit a really great rhythm.

Combining a salad with several Golden Gaytimes? Yes. Fostering a better relationship between yourself and homemade food? Double yes.

 “I am big enough to admit that I am often inspired by myself” is Simone’s personal motto. She once took a tour of the Round The Twist lighthouse and proud owner of twin dogs.

(Lead image: The Simpsons/FOX)