How often do you speak to and/or your university student

[BigBagOfPasta]

Please also mention gender. Prompted by 'the Facebook page'.

DS 5th year FB messenger daily and call once a week
DD 3rd year FB messenger daily and facetime call 3 times a week

Dd in her third year.
Snapchat everyday and speak 4 or 5 times a week.
She's a real home bird, has anxiety and has struggled at times with the whole uni experience so we've worked out regular contact makes it easier for her.

They both left just over 3 weeks ago. DD in third year (abroad) and DS in first year. We've had one good long facetime phonecall with each of them. Arranged in advance. Conerversations by WA once or twice a week. More in the first week. DS a bit more with me, and DD a bit more with DH. We've never been a family that texts constantly!

I don't expect either of them to be home until Xmas. But DD is abroad and DS is over 4 hours away by train. We are going to visit them each once before Xmas, but I don't think that will be every term. Definitely not DD anyway.

We have a lot more contact than I did with my parents - didn't speak to them from one end of term to the other mostly. But technology is very different!

Rarely. DD1 often doesn't respond to messages or email. She sometimes calls DD2. No question of coming home during term time. Very wrapped up in intense uni life.

I'm sure they wouldn't think you were interfering!

Ds is first year, every day by what's app . Actually speaking to him 3/4 times since he's been gone which is around 6 weeks

DD sends me a picture of her home-made dinner most days.

I guess it’s the adult equivalent of a toddler showering you what they’ve coloured

We do the photo of dinner most days too ... slightly irritating when we have a budget conscious meal of jacket potato or similar and we get a picture of a steak or salmon .....

*A toddler showing you, obviously

Or when I have fish fingers and chips in the oven for mine Definitely not worthy of a picture.
I guess their generation has grown up with insta-perfection.

Back to the OP, I still text my mum every single day. I’m pretty sure my mum and my dd text very regularly too. I hadn’t ever given it much thought before. I just assumed it was normal

DD first year. FB messenger, not everyday, but at least 4 days a week I hear something, or I message her about something. We've been down once to take her TV and she was home last weekend - but to do social things so didn't see that much of her. We've had lots of convos about practical things - sorting her wifi, launderette etiquette, who's paying for what etc so I expect it might die off a bit on her part going forward. I would happily message daily but try not to.

Like pp - I have sent pics of the cat to engage conversation before. 😄

First year son and most days whatsapp or Snapchat short messages. Mostly from us, sometimes from him..he's been home once already and we have video called a couple of times..I think we are all settling into it now and it will be ok, but it's been a big change all round.

DD (second year) texts most days or I text her and she calls a couple of times a week. She also usually calls if she is walking home once it is dark and we speak until she is in her house.

DS, second year. Pretty random but nowhere near daily! Maybe once a fortnight we'll have a direct exchange by text, a bit more often he'll take part in the family WhatsApp. When I was at uni you had to queue up to use the phone and I think I spoke to my parents maybe once a fortnight or so once I'd settled in, so that seems normal for me. I'm now worried he's feeling under-missed!

@Elasmotherium I'm sorry to hear about your DH. Hope you and your DD are doing ok.

@Elasmotherium

PacificState I remember the days of queuing for the pay phone, I also used to write home once a week ... my DM had kept all my letters and showed them to me the other day ... it is over 40 years since I was at Uni .

Son, 21, second year, first year staying in halls. He has lived away for about six weeks now. He will text maybe once or twice a week. We speak to each other around every 10 days or so.
He has never been big on communication, so I haven't expected any different. We do have a very good relationship that doesn't rely on constant contact. I don't overwhelm him with messages, I do things as his pace.

Dd and I also send each other postcards .. .only about 2 a term but it’s nice. Just a few words of whatever we are doing at the time. Nothing personal . She seemed to like it when I first sent and sent me one back ..so we continued . Mine to her are probably more of a reminder how boring and unpicturesque this town is - and tbh I’m running out of postcards to buy of this place! Her uni city however, is postcard perfect so I’ve received v nice ones in return .

@Ragwort my dad recently gave me a big box of family memorabilia (apparently I'm The Keeper now ) and there were some letters in there I'd sent to my grandmother when I was in the first year. So cringey to read - why on earth I thought she'd want to know about minuscule dramas in my friendship group... bless her she always wrote back even when she must have been rolling her eyes with boredom

DS in Second Year.
Probably some sort of WhatsApp contact every day - sharing memes, asking Qs, photos of food cooked, recos for films etc
He video calls me about once a week.
This is my family-oriented home-loving child though.

DS1 (now graduated) would probably have gone a whole term without calling if we'd let him. Still a fair amount of WhatsApp comms tho.

I should add though that DS is 'artsy' and will send me photos of things he notices - e.g. a beautiful autumn leaf in a puddle! 😁
God, I love him to bits, I do!

Dd (despite studying a stem subject) is similar. Last week I received a picture of a beautiful toadstool she’d found on a walk with her friends 😁

Aw that’s lovely!

Amusing WhatsApp message conversations daily. Haven’t physically spoken to him since we dropped him off, though.