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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To think wanting to live in the area you grew up in is normal?

97 replies

Fallingovercliffs · 28/11/2014 15:12

I've just seen someone on another thread say, in passing, that a man who has bought a house a few minutes away from where his parents live must have issues?
I live about ten minutes drive from my mother. Loads of people I know have bought houses and brought up families in the area where they grew up and went to school.
AIBU to think there is nothing wrong with liking the place you grew up and having family living nearby and to use this as a criteria when choosing where to buy a house?

OP posts:

Fabulous46 · 28/11/2014 17:48

I don't find it odd at all. We live in the house I grew up in, my sister lives in the house my mother grew up in and DH's brother lives in the house they grew up in.

Fabulous46 · 28/11/2014 17:53

I think it's odd in people who have moved away to go to university, and then later return to their home town.

Not everyone moves away to go to Uni though. I didn't, I travelled daily as did 2 out of 4 of our kids. The one that did move away moved back and bought a house in the village. They commute to work as they prefer the lifestyle the village brings as they hated the city.

Blueteas · 28/11/2014 18:03

I'm not denigrating people who do it - I just can't imagine what it would be like, living surrounded by family and people who knew you since you were born, and having your children going to your old school etc. I can see obvious positives, of course, and, as I said, I'm considered the weirdo in my current environment where there are so few blow-ins.

I suppose so much of my own post-university identity over the last 20 years has been based on moving on, moving jobs, learning to live in different places and languages, and accustoming myself to new 'normal's. I imagine you'd gave a sense of self built on different things if you've stayed or returned home - more continuity than discontinuity etc?

MrsPiggie · 28/11/2014 18:37

I think it's odd in people who have moved away to go to university, and then later return to their home town.

It's only odd if you come from a small town/village but not at all unusual if you come from, say, London or Glasgow or Edinburgh or similarly big places. This is the best of both worlds, having both job opportunities and family nearby. Colleague of mine just returned home to Edinburgh after 10 years away. I'm very jealous.

Roussette · 28/11/2014 18:38

I can't think of anything worse than living where I grew up (and there was really nothing wrong with it!) I think some people feel OK with it and some really don't and I am one of those.

I don't know many people who have settled where they grew except for two families and I have to say they are so so unadventurous. To them... driving to the nearest shopping centre (25 minutes away) is a huge excursion. They tend to only travel in a 5 mile radius from their home. I find that really weird. I think nothing of motorway driving for hours, hopping on a train and crossing to the other side of the country yet they can barely go more than 5 miles. And they are rather boring because of this.

However, this does not typify everyone of course. It must be great to have family close. It just isn't for me.

Pfeffernusse · 28/11/2014 18:43

I'd love to live near my family - or DH's family, we couldn't be near both! -, and be able to see them all the time, and for my DC to be able to see their grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins all the time.

DH's siblings and my siblings all live near our respective parents (well, all less than half an hour away). But DH and I live really far from all of them.

It's not the place so much as the people, and it's not for me so much as for the DC. If we had the chance to move close to family, I'd jump at it.

ClawHandsIfYouBelieveInFreaks · 28/11/2014 18:49

My DH always wanted to get away from where he grew up but now we're 40 he wants desperately to move there! Of course he does...it's bloody lovely!

JeanneDeMontbaston · 28/11/2014 19:15

Sorry, just saw the thread title and thought, blimey, not if you grew up where I grew up!

Tiny little socially dead village in the East Mids. My parents are constantly bemused none of their children want to buy houses in the area even though they're 'so cheap'.

TheFriar · 28/11/2014 19:25

We'll if my family is to take as an example, then the answer us a resounding NO!!!!!

Nit me, not my parents or their brothers and sisters and not even my grand parents. We gave all moved away, and quite a few of us have moved abroad.

So is it normal to stay where you few up? It depends!

But I really really hope that my dcs will move out of the hole we are living in right now.

TheFriar · 28/11/2014 19:28

Btw the norm where I live us to stay where you grew up. Cue fir a small town where everyone knows everyone and 'you remember me from secondary/primary school' type and where people who have lived there 30 years still feel like outsiders.

I agree there us a sense of nit being adventurous with staying up like this.

YouAreBoring · 28/11/2014 19:37

I would have loved to live in my hometown close to my parents. I think it would be lovely. I wouldn't want to live around the corner from my MIL though . She is very nice but I like a bit of .........distance.

Definitely not weird to live in your hometown.

BendyMum15 · 28/11/2014 19:47

I've recently moved back to the area I grew up in as I wanted my DC to have a close relationship with the rest of the family.
I moved away at 18 to go to uni and stayed in my uni town for ages then moved a bit closer to family and finally moved to the town next to where I grew up.
I don't think its odd to want children to grow up near to family. It also has the added bonus of having people around if there is a problem.

GotToBeInItToWinIt · 28/11/2014 19:48

Haha Jeanne I'm wondering if you're from the same village as me, it's exactly how I would describe the village I grew up in .

halfdrunkcoffee · 28/11/2014 19:52

We used to live in London and moved a few years ago to be near my mum (my dad is 30 miles away). We live about 15 minutes' walk from her. This was mainly at DH's instigation - I was quite keen to move out of London but had no great desire to come and live in this area but he got a job nearby (although I could have insisted we lived nearer the job). He was quite adamant that we had to be near my family when we had children and this is most desirable bit of town. It is a bit over 10 miles from where I grew up (my mum moved to a smaller house in a nicer area a few years after my younger sister left school). DH's parents are dead and his sister lives 200 miles away (about two miles from where they grew up and 10 miles from where her DH grew up).

I would say that that majority of the people I know here have at least one side of the family nearby, although there are some exceptions, and many have been to school locally and sometimes say things like "Do you know so and so who was in the year below you?" I do feel like I've been unadventurous at times, and that there are more scenic parts of the country I'd like to live in. I didn't imagine coming back to this part of the world when I was at school and when I was at school I probably looked down a bit on people who had never moved away . I sometimes think living about 30 miles away would be good, so near enough to visit easily but not round the corner. There are advantages to living near family as well, particularly with young children. So I don't think it is weird (at least I hope not as that means I'm weird!) and as with many things each family has their own circumstances.

CharlesRyder · 28/11/2014 21:03

I think this is a bit of a complex generational and geographical issue.

Three generations back my family were Northern miners to a man. It was revolutionary to get your kids into the grammar school, have them go to a northern university and then get a job in a city.

In the next generation it was a big deal to be a professional family, have a lovely big house, put your kids into private school and them go to a Russell Group University.

Now what for my generation? CEO in London, kids to Eton, LEH and then Harvard? It's only the same jump really. Two forerunning generations expect The Jump.

Not sustainable, realistic or healthy. But no, culturally, being happy to grow up and live in the shadow of the pit wheel is not acceptable.

halfdrunkcoffee · 28/11/2014 21:19

CharlesRyder - DH's cousin is an Oxbridge-educated lawyer. She lives a mile or two from where she grew up. Her children go to the private school where she went for sixth form. A lot of DH's extended family still live in the area.

windymila - my mum is quite similar.

JeanneDeMontbaston · 28/11/2014 21:23

GoToBe - I think there are many, many, many of them!

usualsuspect333 · 28/11/2014 21:29

It's not that unusual is it?

I like living near my family. I grew up in the East Midland, still live there. Not in a village though.

blacktreaclecat · 28/11/2014 21:30

I live in the same village as my parents and love it. It's a lovely place to live, good school for DS, park in walking distance. I went to Uni at 18 though and then lived 80 miles away for 2 years and 15 miles away for 10 years before moving back here when I was expecting DS.
MIL is 10 miles away so fairly local and both our jobs are an ok commute.
Having retired grandparents so close is very useful and they are very close to DS which is lovely.

CharlesRyder · 28/11/2014 21:30

I'm not saying it's the same for everyone at all.

Just that in my family and their original community 'spreading your wings' (i.e. moving away) was considered to be a sign of success and this impression lingers on.

usualsuspect333 · 28/11/2014 21:34

It's a shame that people living in the North think it's a sign of success to move down South.

skylark2 · 28/11/2014 21:35

Depends on the area. I grew up genuinely believing that all scientists worked in universities. Beautiful area, but I never had any intention of living there even after I discovered that lots of scientists work in industry, because there's none of that type of industry there.

We live half an hour from where DH grew up.

nancy75 · 28/11/2014 21:35

I live within 10 minutes of my family and my dd goes to my old school. I have lived in lots of places but when i had dd I wanted to be close to my parents because I wanted DD to have the relationship with them that I had with my grandparents. It helps that we live in a london suburb rather than in the back of beyond and it happens to be an area with very good schools.
Dp on the other hand is Australian - he couldn't get further away from his family if he tried!

peckforton · 28/11/2014 21:38

I moved away at 21 and worked abroad then came back and worked 100 miles from were I grew up, met my boyfriend/ future husband who then by chance got a job near where I grew up. It worked out great when we went on to have kids with my mum and dad close by and I don't regret it. I don't have any of the friends I had when I was last their.

Fabulous46 · 28/11/2014 21:39

Charles Ryder. Some people's lives are perfectly sustainable, realistic and healthy even although they remain in the area they grew up in. I still live on the farm I grew up on. I was privately educated as were my children. It will be my children's choice whether they privately educate my grandchildren. I'm more than happy to live in the house my great grandfather built and we farm the land he did as well as my grandfather and my father. I love living in shadow of the fields on the hills, after all they're my families history. I think I can safely say from little acorns mighty oaks grow. Just let's say the farm we live on is one of many we own. I would never be ashamed of living in the shadow of a mine wheel where many hard working men and women lived. Likewise, I'm not ashamed to live on a farm where my ancestors worked to enable us to live the life we do today.

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