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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Moving family 3 hours to be near parents

63 replies

Lifethroughlenses · 30/08/2022 07:02

I honestly don’t know what to do. I’ve lived down South since uni but DD is coming up to high school age and I can’t stand the thought of my parents struggling to get to hospital appointments, deal with everyday life etc without me as they age. They’d never ask me or expect me to move but the thought of being 3 or 4 hours away kills me. I also think it will get harder to drag the kids back for weekends and holidays once they are teens. My DH isn’t massively keen but would move if I really want to. I’m happyish down South but I feel this is last chance saloon really. There are other pros - family nearby (we have none here), slightly cheaper house prices, chance to explore new areas.

OP posts:

kitcat15 · 31/08/2022 07:52

Festoonlights · 30/08/2022 07:27

What? No. Don't do it.

Your parents came move to be nearer to you.
Uprooting your whole family, including a dh that is not keen on the move to be an unpaid carer is absolute madness
Have you considered how seriously unsettling it is going be for your dc to live their home, friends, memories and life to live elsewhere in a place they have no connection to?
What about their future prospects in your parents' home town?
Good jobs are plentiful in the south, will it be the same where your parents live?

I would not even consider doing this, your poor kids!

FFS 🙄

Novum · 31/08/2022 07:57

Do your parents actually need your help? Do they have any other friends and relatives around to support them? Do you have any friends in your parents' area? Where are your husband's family?

Ski4130 · 31/08/2022 08:07

All those posters saying it’s a terrible thing to move children, it genuinely isn’t, children are far more adaptable than people seem to give them credit for!

Yes it can be difficult and there are times when it feels emotionally fraught to uproot your family, but people can, and do, move away quite successfully. We’ve done two major moves (to NZ, and back again) when the children were 1, 4 & 7 and then 5, 8 and 11, and yes there were hard moments, but they coped far better than I’d tied myself up in knots thinking they would. We’ve also moved ds2 from a school where he was unhappy, to another mid way through Yr10, with no ill effects.

People move all the time OP, and for the reasons you give, I did (my dm had secondary cancer, and was very ill, I felt I needed to be home to help care for her, and I’m eternally grateful that I was, and am still, there for her)

Testina · 31/08/2022 08:14

Is your husband on Dadsnet posting about moving for caring for his parents? 😉

Nobody on this thread knows you’re children. It’s theoretically fine and most settle. I could have moved my youngest in Y5 easily. Going into Y7 she had a large and hugely important to her friendship group and I think it would have been really awful for her.

Ski4130 · 31/08/2022 08:14

Oh, and just to add, those stating that it’s as easy as paying for care, or not that difficult to arrange transport when sick/elderly people need it don’t sound like they’ve tried to access those services lately. My mum is unable to drive herself (her eyesight deteriorated badly during her illness and she had to give up her car) and was in the midst of chemo & radiotherapy, during covid, so taxis/hospital transport were off limits. The sheer volume of appointments (consultants, chemo, scans, steroid injections, unexpected hospital admissions etc) is mind blowing, and it was a struggle to coordinate them all even between my ds, db & I. Mum also lives alone, so one of us would stay with her when she felt too sick to function and she needed someone there to make sure she was ok.

It’s genuinely not as easy as just paying for care, and accessing support isn’t that easy.

Petronus · 31/08/2022 08:18

I think the key thing is that your husband isn’t keen.
if you are just moving because your parents might need help then I think you might be jumping the gun. Both my grandparents moved to where we lived when they got older, one to social housing. If they have a large family home at the moment they are not going to need it forever, when the time comes that family home probably would translate to a retirement flat even in the south. However if you would like to move to improve your own lifestyle and dh agrees I think you should go for it. One move for pre-secondary dc is absolutely fine.

TakeMeToYourLiar · 31/08/2022 08:20

You know people have kids at different ages right?

when my eldest starts secondary FIL will be 80

wheb my nephew starts his grandad will be 90

SleeplessInEngland · 31/08/2022 08:25

My youngest is only 5 so I’ve got a long wait before he leaves secondary. I think it would be hard for him if I moved as he went to uni as well.

Eh?

Anyway, I wouldn’t make decision based on your parents. Take them out of the equation and ask yourself if you’d move there anyway.

alphasox · 31/08/2022 08:50

We’ve had this discussion too but the main factor
in deciding for me was thinking even further ahead - ie what would we do after my parents died - which is likely for us to be anytime in the next decade. I realised that long term there are better opportunities for me, DP and the kids where we are now. So we are staying put, and helping parents from afar (eg I paid to get them meal delivery service when my DM was recovering from an op).

Interestingly my parents had this decision to make too and when I was 11 they moved us from a busy and prosperous city to a little village 90 minutes away, to be near my grandparents. I hated it as a teen and left and went back to the city for Uni and moved to London after graduation.

hewouldwouldnthe · 31/08/2022 09:14

If you add up all the pros and can have a better standard of living as well as be nearer family, then do it. There's no magic about living in the south. I was born in London and lived in Surrey and Hampshire. Kids born there. Moved to Yorkshire and have a much better standard of living, good schools, lovely countryside etc. Hampshire meant a busy town life and it wasn't for me, plus housing was ridiculously expensive Do it before the kids become really entrenched in school life

user1477391263 · 31/08/2022 09:27

Well surely if you have a DD going to secondary school your parents are not that old . Are they hard up and can't afford taxis?
I wouldn't move near until they are mid 80s (near 70 year old here)

Do you live in an area where most people have all their children really young? If Grandma and Mum both had their kids in their early 30s (hardly unusual), the grandparents will be close to 80 as the kids enter their teens.

user1477391263 · 31/08/2022 10:25

As for the move, I would only move if there are a lot of pluses to moving there anyway. Moving to somewhere nobody in the family likes "for the old folk" and then everyone resenting them heartily is not a good idea.

user1477391263 · 31/08/2022 10:28

I also think it will get harder to drag the kids back for weekends and holidays once they are teens.

Most teenagers see their grandparents "sometimes," but constantly dragging teenagers off to spend numerous weekends and holidays at their grandparents' place is a recipe for resentment, even if you live close by. They will have other things going on when they are teenagers. The question is, is this place you are thinking of moving to, a good place for teenagers anyway?

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