One minute you are taking your child to school, the next they’re turning into a young adult. It may seem like only months since you were first filling your child’s lunch box, but the school career moves with such momentum that it isn’t long before they are facing the challenges of further education, job hunting and living independently. This new book will help you to encourage self-reliance in your nearly grown children and prepare them for independence in the real world.

It also shows how you can prepare for a time when your child’s excitement at the prospect of leaving school, going to university or just living on their own leaves you feeling passed over and obsessed by detail they see as unimportant. How do you start to think about what to do with the rest of your life - picking up on ambitions, both personal and professional, and prioritising your own friends and interests?

And how do you handle the situation when, as is increasingly common, children later decide to return home to live? This book addresses current issues such as boomerang kids, sofa syndrome and how to motivate, money management for a generation disinclined to save, the hotel of Mum and Dad, and much more.

Later! is an empathetic guide to making sense of life at a time when all the ground rules need to be reconsidered, if not renegotiated. Packed with strategies, exercises and question-and-answer sections, Later! is user-friendly and entirely practical. It considers the hopes and plans of parents and children alike and, in the process, demonstrates how to ‘move on’ while sustaining a supportive, happy relationship.