DH's parents visited us from England this week. It was the first time they'd met A and they totally loved her. When they said goodbye to her, it was the first time I'd ever seen my MIL cry. I felt awful about it. No one else in the family have met her yet and she's 6 months old now. My mum gets teary on Skype sometimes that she can see her but not cuddle her. I always feel so mean for bringing her up over here.
Do you ever feel bad for bringing up your LO away from family?
papaya / 10473 posts
All the time, and he's not even here yet. It breaks my heart. I would kill to move closer to my family.
pomelo / 5469 posts
@travelgirl1: After much deliberation, we have decided we are going to bring LO up further away from my parents in favour of a location much more suitable for DH and his business. It hasn't been an easy decision, though I don't feel guilty because we are making the best decision for our little family right now.
wonderful grape / 20453 posts
Nope. They can come visit whenever they want. Being not super close to them alleviates a lot of strain on my behalf!
apricot / 294 posts
We moved from the east coast, where my husband's and my family and friends live, to the west coast when our son was 6 months old. He is the only grandchild on both sides. We felt a lot of guilt, especially as my in laws are pretty advanced in age. But we moved because it was the best choice for our nuclear family. However, it is hard because we have no help out here, and will be tough if we have a second.
I doubt we will visit more than once a year. We did get iPads for both sets of grandparents so they can see their grandson on FaceTime.
Edit: we also feel guilty that our son wont grow up seeing his grandparents, aunts and uncle on a regular basis.
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
I'm not quite as far away as you are (4-5 hours from my family, but across the US from DH's). However, I do believe living where we are is better for our little family, even if it means we are farther from extended family and won't see them as much. Sometimes I do feel guilty, but then I remember that travel works both ways. So far, I have by far done the bulk of traveling to see my family, so when baby gets here, I'm expecting them to come to me a lot more. I think weighing what's best for your own family is more important than for your extended family.
That said, I do still feel sad that LO won't be as close to his relative, but DH grew up like that and has fond memories of being excited to go and visit his grandparents who lived far away. While he only saw them a couple of times a year, they were times he really looked forward to, and I have to admit that he is closer to his grandmother than I am to mine, who only lived 1.5 hours from where I grew up.
pomelo / 5469 posts
@Foodnerd81: Your last paragraph made me feel heaps better. I never thought of it that way before... I hope my LO(s) feel the same way about visiting my parents!
pomegranate / 3577 posts
We're moving about as far away from both of our families without (technically) leaving the country. I feel the worst that our LO will not grow up with his cousins.
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
@illumina: It did help that his grandparents live in a vacation destination (Cape Cod) but when they got old enough, he and his brothers would go by themselves (one at a time) to spend a week or so with just the grandparents and they loved it! His younger cousins do that now and they really are all really close and really enjoy the time. It does help that his grandmother is pretty awesome, too 
pomegranate / 3204 posts
I would feel guilty. One of the reasons we chose to stay in Oklahoma and not move.
cantaloupe / 6630 posts
@illumina: Are you in the UK? Is it fairly easy to go back to visit your parents? There are some plus points to being further away from family too, I had no interference which was fab, ha ha : )
@Foodnerd81: That's true about travel working both ways. Everyone complains they can't afford to come and see us, which I totally understand, but equally we can't afford to go see them all the time either and I'm not sure they understand that.
pomelo / 5621 posts
I wish we could live closer to our families, especially now that DS is here. But because of him I'm sure they will come visit more. For now we have to do what is best for our family and hopefully one day we can move closer. Thank goodness for things like Skype.
coconut / 8498 posts
I don't feel guilty, but I do wish we were a bit closer. I do know that we're living where we're supposed to, though.
GOLD / wonderful pea / 17697 posts
No, I don't feel guilty at all (we live across the country from most of my family). He's 9 months old and most of my family hasn't met him yet (except for my mom, who was here when he was born). To be perfectly honest I don't want to raise him around them. I had a very tumultuous upbringing and I don't want E exposed to them.
But we do live close to DH's family, and I would be so sad if we moved away from them. I love that he will grow up getting to see them on a regular basis.
grapefruit / 4712 posts
We live with my folks presently but otherwise we aren't in close range of any other family. All of our family is at least 2 hours away and most are more. It makes me a little sad but it is so much more special when we are with other family.
pineapple / 12566 posts
My family is in the US and DH's family is in France. We live in a different European country so we are relatively far from both sets of grandparents. We only make it back to the US about once a year and France maybe twice. However, we are currently vacationing with my dad for three weeks and we recently did a long weekend with my in-laws.
Sometimes I regret that we aren't closer to my dad. But there is no way I could live anywhere near where lives in the US because there aren't many job opportunities/culture. At least the distance allows us to spend more time together when we do see one another. If we were still in the US we would probably just do a few long weekends per year.
pomelo / 5321 posts
I've really been struggling with this. We're currently living in Hawaii and my family lives in Georgia. It kills me that they don't get to see my LO on a regular basis and that DS doesn't know who they are. It kills me. We haven't seen my grandparents in over a year and my grandmother got into the habit of asking me when we were coming home every single time we would talk. I had to have my Dad talk to her about it because it really kills me to say I don't know. Ughh talk about a guilt trip!
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