Everyone hates those 10 o’clock curfews that feel like they’re really at 6 o’clock, or being forced to stay home because a little sibling needs babysitting. However, some highschoolers don’t have to worry about things like that; instead, they worry about paying for their rent. Senior Cheyenne Thai is quite familiar with living alone. 

“Everything like chores and groceries are all on you now,” Thai said. 

An emancipated minor is an underage person free from guardian and parental control

Thai is emancipated from her family: she lives alone in an apartment she pays for with a job. Thai wanted to finish high school and stay in Texas while her family had to move to California, and since she was living alone as a minor, she had to be emancipated. Emancipation is no walk in the park: Thai had to prove to the court that she had a job that allowed her to be financially stable. If a minor cannot prove financial stability, he or she would be allowed to live alone with supervision but cannot get fully emancipated. Although Thai is independent in nearly every aspect, she does receive minimal financial aid from her parents as well as the government. But living alone no matter what help you get is a major change.

“My favorite part of living alone is definitely the freedom, getting to decorate my own place, the privacy,” Thai said.

Living alone does come with some very nice perks, like being in total control of one’s own space or just having a much bigger space. Living alone also means not being regulated to others’ needs or schedules. But for every good there is also the bad, like getting lazy about buying groceries and suddenly having nothing to eat or you have food but you don’t know how to make a meal out of it and now you have to learn a bunch of different recipes. Emancipation might seem extremely scary when one realizes that one basically has to become completely self-sufficient, but this harsh blow is softened by the fact that a person who has emancipated essentially becomes an independent person who has developed skills that most people only start to develop after graduating from college. 

“They [my parents] wanted me to learn how to be independent,” Thai said.