Do Grandchildren make us stay?

I did. My dd and gc lived with me, I got a new job offer and left them in a market town where they were settled.

Sadly, after moving to literally the middle of nowhere (a mining village in Derbyshire where the mine had closed) my new employer had some competition open in the area and “let me go” so I was up that famous creek with no paddle, but that’s a whole other story.

My dd managed very well without me and in fact went in to have twins and still kept her career on track.

We stay because we like our home, area, friends, and children. Everything I want to have is here.

hillyann

Thanks for your advice, gmelon, realistically I don't think there is much chance of us moving any time soon and although the house is really too big for us it does hold lots of memories. I would like a bungalow but, as my OH rightly points out, the stairs help to keep us fit!

I moved from the South East to the North West to help look after my DGS from 1 week before his birth although DD did not go back to work until he was 4 months old. We are building a granny annexe in their garden so I hope they never move as DD and I have spent our life savings on it. They were thinking long term as SIL insisted it had an extra downstairs bathroom as well as a second bedroom for a carer in my dotage ?
But for now even the builder calls that bedroom 'the baby's room' so hopefully that dotage is in the very distant future ?
It's not the retirement I imagined, I'll say that much ?

jura2 i think you make an excellent point about making more effort the further away. My son lives in the same town, 4 miles away and I’ve seen him once since Christmas, hear from him via text very few weeks, but usually only a very brief reply to what I’ve sent him. Fortunately my dil is very good about keeping in touch, we text most days and she sends lots of pics of dgs. She’s also the one who arranges my visits to dgs, thanks to her I see him at least once most weeks.

We know many grandparents who live in the UK, like their adult children and grandchildren - and see them a lot less than we do ours.

Stragely enough, if you do live abroad- everyone makes a lot more effort to organise and get together, somehow - as you are more 'aware' of the distance and how important it is.

Oh Debsroly I feel for you! Wouldn’t it be brilliant to get a nice big family house with extra bathrooms & a huge sitting room, like a commune, where the extended family could live, close by to the younger members!

Oh Legs55. .. I was thinking over some of these posts later today whilst in the shower & your comment about seeing your 89y old mum ‘twice a year’ made me feel really sad for her. It stuck in my mind. I note you say she copes well. Still. I do hope she has other family nearby?

My PiL downsized and came to live near us without much discussion beforehand. Our AC have all married and live miles from us and from eachother. When we married I moved 500mls from my family home. Would I like to downsize and move away and live nearer some of our gc? I'd love to but DH really would not and we both feel a responsibility towards his Ps. Also would our DAC really want us near them cramping their style. How could they then move away?

Like a previous poster said, we'll just have to save up for holidays in a cottage by the sea.

When I met DH my DD was nearly 9 & I moved 250 miles away from my DM & Step-F. DD went for school holidays & they came to stay with us.

We downsized in 2011 & moved to Somerset, half way between my DD & my Step-D. DM was widowed by then & DD had moved to Devon. When DGS1 was born we were still 70 miles from DD so were not immediately on hand for childcare.

After DH died 5 years ago I had decided to move closer to DD & in 2015 I made the move to Devon, about 10 miles from DD. When DGS2 was born I was able to help out. I don't see DGSs often as DGS1 is now 8 & with school, after school activities & swimming lessons we fit around by agreement. I am very happy with my move, I'm here in emergencies & as I get older DD will be nearer to help me out.

DM is now 89 & it's a 300 mile (each way) journey, whilst I can still drive & cope with the journey I go up twice a year, DD & her OH try & visit once a year, DM is still in her own home & manages with a little help (not carers).

I could re-write Mamie's post word for word.

When we were looking for a small place to rent here, to be able to spend more time with my very elderly parents- we 'fell upon' this great big old farmhouse/Vicarage for sale. It was very close to my parents' and I'd admired this house and its position for a long time. We never ever had considered moving here, despite me being born and bred down the valley. All our life was in the UK.

After we were offered a look around, and having fallen in love with it and been told it would be put on the market the next day ... we put a hold on it and went to discuss it with our DDs- and ask them what they thought. YES, YES, YES they said, go for it- and we will be there all the time- so we did. We were also VERY lucky to be able to buy a small flat in the UK- so we would always have the option to visit often and even go back, if ... But things are not so simple- my parents, in their mid 90s- died- mum in fact just before we moved, and dad, 3 months later.

Then our DDs careers took off exponentially - and although they come a couple of times a year- it is not the 'all the time' we had all expected. Then grandson developed a VERY severe allergy to egg and any traces of egg. It was thought he would outgrow it by age 7-8- but he has not. And SIL is massively anxious about letting him and his younger sister come to stay alone- as was planned beforehand- that they would come and spend many weeks during school holidays. We totally understand that, of course- and hope and hope that now he is older, and we have shown that we really make a massive effort to avoid all possible contamination- things will change.

If it does not, then we will probably go back to UK - so we could be near and they could come and stay with SIL being so anxious. But it would be a massive wrench to leave this house and the area- but GCs come first. Brexit has left us in total limbo - because DD and family are very likely to leave the UK and come and start new wings of their business here- they are very lucky to have dual nationality and to speak excellent French. Would be totally heart breaking to move back to be able to be with GCs more, for them to move over here afterwards !?!?!

This works for us too we had to move around a lot for work when our children were growing up so they never had grandparents living close. and a consequence of us moving over the later years meant that we all ended up living in different parts of the country. we have our GC during holidays and go to them for long weekends and whenever needed, plus they all enjoy coming to stay and have a little holiday of their own as we now live in the country, I am not there for school runs etc or everyday care but I still feel very much a part of my GC life as a grandparent not a full time carer.

HillyN So many memories in your home. You may miss your house desperately and once you've sold it's too late. Be very, very, sure.

Your daughters have moved nearby, your husband wants to remain at this house.
You sound ideally placed at the moment.

Is it ideal for you though?

These decisions can be so difficult.
What we need is "crystal ball gransnetter".

debsroly you and I both. I'm with you in the head spinning department.
It takes over my life.
The only decision I've made is not to make a decision yet.
Because it's driving me nuts.

I live with my husband in the midlands. My daughter has relocated to North Yorkshire and has had a baby daughter who is now 5 months old. Her husband has a son from a previous marriage who he sees every week. We try and visit every month or so, and she has visited us whilst she has been on maternity leave. Shes going back to work soon and has a nursery place booked. She keeps asking us to move up by her. My son lives in Nottingham with his girlfriend and we keep in touch every couple of months.
My dilemma is that my elderly parents live in North Devon, my husband wants to live in Dorset as he is not keen on North Yorkshire, my daughter wants us to live by her and we want to move to downsize next year.
Where do we go? I keep going round in circles thinking about it!

We have lived in the same house all our married life but our DDs married and moved away with their careers. However since the GC arrived they both moved back to live 5mins away (one walking, the other in the car) so that we can regularly help out with childcare. At some point I would like to downsize (DH says no) but I don't feel we could move far now as I would miss the GC so much and it would leave my DDs in the lurch!

gmelon: We moved away from our children and grandchildren 5 years ago. Son 1 married (no children when we moved) lived about 20 miles from us, they now have 2 daughters. Son 2 (single) moved with us. Son 3 married with 3 daughters lived right next door to us. It was sometimes a little too close for comfort, as if our house and our lives were just an extension of theirs, and I think it influenced our decision to move. We had always planned to leave London when DH retired, so now we live 100 miles away across water. Son 2 now has a partner, a stepson and a baby due in Autumn, we see very little of them even though they're only 10 miles away. Our sons and grandchildren visit several times a year and we keep in touch via phone, text and email. We have very close relationships with all our grandchildren and thoroughly enjoy their visits, knowing that we can have our home and privacy back after a few days or weeks. Occasionally I wonder if we should have stayed a bit nearer to them if only to make the travelling easier, but we are settled where we are and have no desire to move again. Son 3 is now talking about emigrating, and if they do go I very much doubt they would be able to afford return visits, and DH and I have no desire to make long haul flights around the world, so we would probably never see them again except via the internet. But we'll cross that bridge if/when we come to it.

Seems like we are in the minority Mamie & Daisyboots
The decision was the right one for me but other posters clearly have other priorities, should I feel guilty ?

We moved abroad 10 years ago but half my large brood of grandchildren were late teens and 20s so were more interested in their own lives than what Nana was doing. It was my lovely mother I couldn't have left and she came with us and lived for another 7 years.

We moved country and it's the worst thing we ever did. I hardly know my oldest four granchildren and I have to travel from the northern end of Spain to the southern end, to see my youngest one. I can visit him more easily, if I was flying from Newcastle airport (thirty minutes from where we lived) than from our local one here (two and a quarter hours away).

We moved to France when eldest GC was three. Our son and his family live in another European country.
I think the point is that there are as many different ways of being a grandparent as there are families. You can stay/move near your grandchildren and provide hands-on care. You can have your children move abroad and have to find a different way of doing things. You can move away yourself for all sorts of reasons.
None of us love our families more or less for making those decisions. We have to find a way to be loving and supportive grandparents in different situations. There are no right answers here.

At the moment, we would never consider moving away from our three grandchildren. One is in his 20's and we see very little of him, but the other two are still quite young and we look after them 2 or 3 times a week. Added to that, I need to be near enough to my Mum to do a day visit once a week.

Although I can think of more scenic places to live and would probably, in different circumstances, move back to Sussex, my husband and I really enjoy our grandchildren's company, and, apart from missing them very much, our help with child care is important to my son and his partner.

I suppose at some point we will see much less of them but probably by that time we will be significantly older and will be wary of moving to a completely different area - where public transport and other amenities are thinner on the ground - however tempting it might be.

I sometimes think a compromise might be to get a static caravan but I've heard that site fees can be expensive and there is little, if any, regulation of fee increases.

My circumstances have meant that I've stayed put, and will do now forever, probably.
I would have loved to live somewhere different.

I'm feeling less of a grandma and more of a substitute mother/co parent at the moment.

Due to my 33yr old son moving out of his own home and the acrimonious split from his wife. He has 50/50 custody of his under 10yr old and is now at his wife's mercy as to seeing his under 3yr old.

Grandparenting has certainly changed since I was a child.