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There are plenty of people like poster Cheribelle (#11) who can accept to be MUCH farther away that the "two hours or more" maximum distance answer in the poll. (Yes, I know that "or more" technically allows for living in Russia, but my point is that the poll answers are biased in the direction of living VERY CLOSE to children. Nothing wrong with living very close to children, of course, but I find the poll choices bizarre in the extreme in not allowing for a greater range of answers to reflect the reality of American society in the 21st century.)
We haven't given much thought to where we will downsize to, but we won't be near our kids. One lives a 7 hour drive north already, and another will be moving to the west coast this summer. We're in GA. We have one more son who is currently local, but that won't sway us. We want to be where it's right for us.
I totally agree with this. We retired and found ourselves living in the same dull Georgia town where we raised our kids, but the kids now lived 1 hour, 6 hours and 7 hours away respectively. We moved to Florida in October, where we can live the way we want, and visiting the kids will work itself out. We are totally happy.
Right. Many of my friends think their children are close if they live within a day's drive (10-12 hours). My two children currently live about 1500 miles away and I'm just glad I don't need a passport to visit them! I have friends with children in Argentina, South Korea, New Zealand, and Australia.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Two hours or a little more is what we are looking at for our retirement home in a few years. People, especially retired, should live where they want, in a place they can afford comfortably. I have seen several cases where retirees stayed close to the kids/grandkids only to have one of them get transferred to another state, leaving them in an overly expensive area but still far away from their kids/grandkids. Two hours drive is not a big deal, in fact I live 3 hours from my parents by car and ferry, and find that my visits 4-5 times a year are sufficient for now. I expect to be moving closer to them as they will be hitting the late 80s when I retire and will need more help on their 5 acres. Ideally, we would be about 2 hours from the kids, an hour from the parents and we do like an area at that location.
Looking at the other side of the coin, of my parents six children, I was the only one who lived somewhat close to them after all of us 'reached maturity'. Living somewhat close to my parents really came in handy after my dad retired, and soon afterward suffered declining health. I was able to help my parents as needed, and toward the end, they asked me to stay with them during the work week to help out. Not a problem because I work at the same place my dad worked his whole career, which was about five miles distance.
On the weekends, I was an hour and a half away. After my dad died, my mom sold the house and moved to the coast where the climate was more agreeable to her. I would see her every other weekend to take her out to eat and go food shopping. I was close enough, (an hour and a half), where I could get to her in case of something drastic. At the end, when she couldn't live by herself anymore, I moved her into my own house. Her health declined so rapidly that she was gone within two weeks.
I am glad that I had that time with my parents. Our family wasn't a very openly affectionate family and rarely expressed such emotions. One day, something happened, and I don't know why or what caused me to say what I did when I did, but one morning before leaving for work, I talked with my dad for a few minutes and thanked him for the way he raised us kids, for being so generous with us, that he had big shoes to fill, (he was 6'6" tall), but that I would do my best to do so, and that I loved him. We 'never' said stuff like that to each other. Sometime during that night, he died peacefully in his sleep. If I did not express my feelings to him that morning, I would have never had the opportunity.
In my case, being close to my parents worked out well. It's a 'two-way street'.
No grandkids in the picture or spouses (yet), Kids and we will be living internationally on the 'move', we make it a point to adopt families in need wherever we happen to be. Appreciation level is more predictable without the 'family - blood' dynamic. (at least there is less blood / tears shed).
I am happy to see that someone with blood family can still appreciate family of choice. For many of us, that's the only family we're going to have (by choice!) and I think it should be acknowledged.
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