I FELT like an actress in one of those low-budget TV horror movies as I finally plucked up the courage, broom handle in hand, to approach the room, at the end of a long, dark corridor, which I haven’t dared enter in months.

This is the bit where viewers are usually mouthing: “Don’t do it. Don’t do it,” as the foolhardy victim slowly places her hand upon the handle and nervously begins to turn it.

Neighbours may have heard an earpiercing scream after I pushed the door and walked inside.

This is the room where the two older boys have lived during the summer while they have been home from university. Given that they’re aged 20 and 19 and capable of looking after themselves, I have left them to do just that.

But they don’t lead normal lives.

Students exist in a parallel universe.

In between a bit of travelling and some working, they have spent most of their holidays sleeping, rising to have breakfast when most people have lunch. Then, at around 11pm, when everyone else is thinking of going to bed, they are heading out only to come back at about 4 or 5am.

Now that they’ve gone, the room is a scene of utter devastation. From the piles of damp, mouldy towels to rucksacks and clothes, some dirty, some clean, I don’t know where to start. There are stacks of books, DVDs, printers and cables.

There are a few sleeping bags and a spare mattress strewn across the floor, used when they’ve brought back friends to stay. I prod them gingerly with my foot, just to ensure there are no bodies left behind, before I begin the big clear-up.

Their detritus spreads throughout the rest of the house. But, bin bags in hand, now that they’ve gone, I am slowly starting to reclaim our home.

As it is, they don’t have their own bedrooms any more. The 13-year-old has taken over the older boy’s bedroom.

Son number two’s room has been turned into a bathroom. That is why they’re now both confined to the guest room, at the end of the long, dark corridor.

The boys complain, only halfjokingly, that we’re trying to get rid of them. And we reply, only halfjokingly, as we shoo them off down the drive, that of course we are.

Every time their dad watches yet another news report or reads another article about the increasing trend for hard-pressed 20 and 30-something children to move back home with their parents, he breaks out in a cold sweat.

“We can’t have them back, we just can’t,” he says, with increasing desperation as newsreaders talk about the lack of jobs and headlines highlight this generation’s dwindling hope of ever being able to afford a starter home of their own.

THE poet Seamus Heaney summed it up well when he described the moment your child leaves home as the “uncoupling from the parents”. It’s the point at which we start to loosen the ties.

Both for their sake, and for ours, we’re encouraging the boys to flee this nest and work towards building one of their own. We daren’t let them feel too comfortable.

So now I’ve cleared out their belongings, yet again. Some of it has gone off to the charity shops. The rest has been boxed up and stored under beds and in the attic.

The mess and the clutter has disappeared from the bedroom, the bedroom which was never really theirs in the first place. Spray polished and disinfected, it is now clean and airy.

All trace of the boys has been removed.

But still, now that they’re gone, I miss them so much. And I just want them back home again with me.

THE boys laughed when they caught their 52-year-old dad straining to touch his toes. “I’m just trying to improve my flexibility,” he told them. “Isn’t it far too late for that?” they told him. So it’s off to the knacker’s yard for us, then...