I visited my family recently and it's made me feel so sad. They live in the region where I'm from, which is a poor region in England. I moved to another region and now live in a big city. I have a modest but happy life, a secure job, hobbies shared by friends, a great relationship (all of these things are hard to find in my hometown where there's a lot of poverty and people have a lot of issues). Of course I feel so lucky, and I really enjoy living in the city where I am now but I feel a huge wave of guilt and sadness for rarely seeing my family and also that the place they live in is so run down and with less going on.
I think part of it is that I miss them and part of me would like to live near them again but it isn't very appealing since I wouldn't find a job easily and there aren't as many opportunities in other ways as well. Like many towns, my hometown has suffered massively from the economic downturn over time. I have so many happy memories of growing up there when things were a little better, we never had a lot but we made the most of what we had and the town centre had more going on and more community. Now the town looks so sad. Everything is run down and shops have either closed down and been left empty or turned into something else. There's little sense of community or pride. Within my family there's concerns as well such as illness and the realities of getting older.
I'm not sure what I want to get from this I just felt I needed to share as it really is an intense sadness I'm feeling right now and I wonder if anyone is experiencing anything similar.