MILs: how far away could your adult son move?

[CurlyClairey]

Right here’s the scenario. You have a married adult son who wants to buy a bigger house with his wife. He’s always lived within a few streets of you. You’re in you late 60s if that matters. You’re fit and healthy, married yourself and have a good circle of friends but you enjoy regularly popping into adult son’s house throughout the week. How far away could your son move from you before you kick up a fuss about it?? MIL thinks us moving 20 minutes drive away is the end of the world and is NOT happy. Weve offered to continue visiting but she’s saying we’re “moving away”. I can’t see why she can’t just drive the 20 minutes to pop round when she wants to anyway??? What does everyone else think?

He could move to Mars if he wanted to (and it was possible). Keeping in touch is much easier these days.

Thanks everyone! I genuinely can’t see the issue and wanted to double check I wasn’t being heartless. Husband really wants to move but feels bad for his mother. Her main concerns seem to be that she’s “getting older” and doesn’t want to have to rely on driving to get to us forever, doesn’t like using the motorway (because it’s too fast) so she’d use smaller roads and that would take longer than 20 minutes, she doesn’t yet know the roads, she doesn’t like parking on streets she doesn’t know and our drive would only be big enough for our two cars so she’d have to always phone in advance to get us to move a car, and mainly just the fact we’re “moving awaaaay”. I suggested she just get taxis to come and visit when she likes and we can visit her too on the weekend. Currently she’s very unhappy with us.

My dad was like that. He followed us around the country losing a shit load of money in house sales in the process. It ruined our relationship for many reasons.

For dh, his relationship with his parents was far better when we lived 200 miles away. It was okay when they came to visit for the weekend every 6-8 weeks. We moved to the same town a few years ago and now I am no contact and dh has seen them about 5 times. They could not stop interfering when we were closer and turned really fucking odd.

Agree with this. My DC have their own lives and they should do whatever makes them happy.

My MIL has four adult DC. Two live abroad. We live the closest at 230 miles away.

I would never kick up a fuss, but would move near him, we all have a great relationship.

I say she'll have to be unhappy then because you can't live life according to what MIL wants. Very selfish of her.

My mil moaned about bil wanting to move 10 miles away! Me and my DH said we would love to live in a certain town 2 hours drive away and she said "oh no I'm not having that!". DH told her in no uncertain terms that she would have no say in the matter!

He could move any distance as he's an adult and he makes his own decisions. Doesn't mean I wouldn't be sad and quietly upset about it but I can't do anything about it.

Ds1 is in the army so has already moved hundreds of miles away but is single so comes home for holidays etc which would probably change if he was married, one other thing that I always think of is if he gets married and has dc I'll more than likely always be the "other nana" who they rarely see and won't be close to - physically or emotionally which makes me sad. Good job he says he doesnt want to get married or have kids!

I wouldn't be letting my parents it in laws dictate where I could move. I also wouldn't be telling my kids how far they can move, tell her to cop on.

We moved 40-45 minutes away from PIL for jobs and a bigger house. The reason BIL's grandchildren are the favoured ones is because we "moved away". 🙄

BIL's children that should say

As far as they wanted to. But, if they moved so far away that it was difficult to maintain a close relationship we would all have to accept that

My ss who I love dearly and have been in his life since he was 6 moved to Australia in February I wanted to shout and scream, oh is disabled and will never be able to fly to visit, this could mean they never see each other in person again, what I in fact did was hug him tightly told him to explore and see as much as he could, enjoy and send pics.

Eldest went to uni in London 300 miles away dont think they will ever live in our home town again,also didn't want them to go but again they need to live their lives for themselves not for us

20 minutes is no distance at all. Sure, mil can be upset, but her reaction is over the top & quite selfish actually.

On a separate note - you have done well to be ok with mil just ‘popping’ by several times a week. I guess it depends on the individual relationship, but I would go stir crazy if my mil did that.

We live 40 mins away, thankfully.

He could move as far away as he wanted to so could DD, I wouldn't dictate to them and would expect the same respect from them.

Loosen those apron strings now!

Our children do not belong to us, nurture them, care for them, we guide them, advise them and support them to be independent adults who can live wherever they like.

she’s being ridiculous!

DS and DIL live very few miles away but about an hour in the car. I would never, ever visit without arranging it first. We are busy and they are busy. It would not surprise me if they spent some time in the States. DD and BF I imagine will embark on a period overseas too. I look forward to visiting them if so and staying in an hotel if it happens.

Your MIL, a few years older than me, sounds like hard work.

We’ve always been at least 2.5 hours away. You just have to plan visits. It’s fine.

Trying to control your lives and making demands will drive you further apart than a 20mins year drive.

Tell her that you are reconsidering moving 20mins away and now think 200 miles would be a beneficial distance.

We live very close to my Mother. We are now NC and moving 200 miles to be a 5min walk for my in laws.

P.S My Mother favoured the stalkers' jump scare method of visiting. A quick, inaudible knock on the back door before quickly letting herself in.

One of the many, many reasons why she will never see or hear from me again and is block via every method of communication.

I would prefer if my daughter lived within an hour of me, but her choice.

My English DH lives with me in Australia. As far as I’m aware his parents didn’t make a fuss although they were understandably sad.

Exactly this. I would miss DS terribly if he moved far away but I'd never try to stop him. I'd just grit my teeth and smile and remind myself that it meant I had raised him well if he felt capable of moving far away.