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<p>Jet-lag (3 hour time difference), travel cost and sometimes it’s more than 8 hours if there are flight transfers or delays due to bad weather. </p>
<p>But do it anyway. They’re young.</p>
<p>I was grousing to a friend about how my 9th grade D only wants to talk to me about serious stuff at 11:00 at night, when I’m ready to go to sleep. Said friend laughed, and said that her sons had shown the same pattern into college, but that as they were on the east coast and she was on the west, that meant that the deep heart-to-heart talks could be conducted at the parentally civilized hour of 8 pm.</p>
<p>Everytime I read one of these threads about kids leaving home and traveling long distances and the high cost of airfare etc I cry, selfishly I cry cause I desperately miss my girls. Then I step back- take a breath and realize that the greatest gift we have given our girls is WINGS. My girls doing what they are supposed to be doing right now. They are 4 time zones and 5000 miles away. They work hard and have amazing opportunities. We are blessed with strong independent young women. We will always be here for them - I will bask in the breeze of their new found wings. It’s ok to go :)</p>
<p>4 time zones and 5000 miles away</p>
<p>Wow! where is that?</p>
<p>Shrinkrap, I’m guessing Hawaii and East Coast for Crabby.</p>
<p>I had to look to see how many time zones away from son we are. umm, depends on which way you go, but we are about 10,000 miles away. Yep, when he has a freshman moment of angst at midnight or two in the morning, it doesn’t bother me at all to talk to him as that is right around tea time for me. </p>
<p>We offered to send him to a university that was closer to Bangladesh, but he wanted to go home to the states for college. He is happy, so I am okay with it, but we miss him.</p>
<p>And… you want to know something else? My D is only 3 hours away, and I cry each time she leaves to go back to school. She doesn’t come home more than the school vacations, and yes, it’s by bus rather than plane, but she is still gone and the nest is still empty. I don’t think it’s different just because it’s far. It hurts either way. I’m told we will get used to it. Somehow, I both believe that advice and I also know there will always be a little hole in my heart… But the happiness and pride that we feel for our fledglings helps a lot. We knew it was coming, and we wouldn’t want it any other way. Would we??? Hang in there. It’s the natural order of things. It hurts.</p>
<p>Our freshman son is in Minnesota, and we’re in Tennessee (I think that’s about 1000 miles, but I’m not sure I want to know exactly). H and I flew up with S to take him to school, and after we got home we both sat in the living room and cried. He’s a great kid, and we miss him tons. But–he’s thriving. He loves his school, his friends, his classes, his teachers. As others have said, you take your cue from your kid. If he or she wants to attend school far away, then you go with it. The reward is watching them thrive–albeit from a distance.;)</p>
<p>My son is currently 6 hours away and goes back and forth by bus. It is unsettling to me that an airport is not withing a few minutes of his school. He can only get home on scheduled vacations because his bus is a charter. My younger son might look at schools that are further away, but might have better access to an airport. I am wondering what the trade off between distance, and access to an airport will feel like. </p>
<p>To the OP, I found the first semester the most difficult (as in heart wrenching difficult). We did see our son for a few hours on 2 different occasions between August and Thanksgiving. It was something, but really not quality time. It was a dinner, seeing that he looked healthy, a quick peek into his dorm room, and dropping off a few items. It wasn’t the kind of time that I wanted with him though. That did not come until Thanksgiving. He was home for 5 days, and it was easy to send him back knowing that 3 weeks later he would be home between semesters (December break). The second semester was easier because I knew that he was happy and his break was split up better, so he was gone for 2mos., home for a week, gone anther 2 mos. and then home for the summer. For me, it did get easier. The hardest part was when he got rather ill and I was so far away. I was very close to going to his school to take him for medical attention, even though he went to 2 different docs on his own. My son got through his illness without me, and he actually survived;)! The next time he gets sick it won’t be any easier on me unless it is just a cold.</p>
<p>Okay, my D went 200 miles to college–just to Portland, OR–and now that she’s graduated I see her less than I see my son–who went to Boston for college and now lives in California. </p>
<p>I have to second the person who said to get a mileage credit card and charge everything you can. We do that, and it’s the frequent flyer miles from that–and from the same procedure with our business–that let my son come home regularly for two or three day visits.</p>
<p>I talk to my daughter almost every day and we email a lot. I love having independent strong-minded kids!</p>
<p>My S is only 2.5 hours away but it may as well be 1000 miles. He just comes home for school breaks (except not Spring Break…must go off with friends). When here, he is around the house very little. He’s usually off and running with friends who are also at home for the break, often spending the night with one or the other. He has friends at the local state u. and spends time at their apts. So even though he is here, it’s like he’s not here. Somehow that seems worse than when he is at school. I have wondered if he had gone further away from home if he would be more likely to spend more time with us when he is here…seriously doubt it.</p>
<p>franglish, Yes, the hole is still there, but it is getting smaller, and I don’t focus on the hole like I used to. There’s that old saying that having a child means that, forever more, a part of your heart lives outside your body. </p>
<p>It helps to recall that we were supposed to help them be ready to go off on their own.</p>
<p>Assuming transportation costs not an issue and given today’s communication vehicles, distance doesn’t have to be much of a problem. The one exception worth mentioning is if there are health issues; you may want to be able to get there quickly and child probably would appreciate that. In any case, be sure to check out emergency care; not all schools have it available 24/7.</p>
<p>S is over 1,000 miles away but never felt very attached to our hometown and by now is not even very attached to his HS friends by now. Distance requires planning ahead for breaks, etc., and we only pay for a maximum of one trip home during the semester. He’s averaged 2 in fall semesters because he wants to come home for a football game at the local state U + Thanksgiving (after not coming home his freshman year and being more lonely than he thought he would in spite of going to his roommate’s for Thanksgiving dinner), but manages his personal spending otherwise to do so. It’s all what works for the individual and his/her family; I was shocked when he was a HS senior and I heard another parent say that they wanted their son within a day’s drive in case he needed them, but now I understand it’s not an uncommon emotion.</p>
<p>D comes home infrequently from 10 hours away. Mostly breaks and usually not for the whole time. I am lucky that her Thanksgiving and Spring breaks are always different from her friends, so I get her to myself sometimes! She has made the comment that the kids who stayed within an hour of home seem to have not changed much and seem to still be clinging much more to high school memories and such. They come home for many football games, band competitions, etc. Her big comment is “they need to move on”. Of course, this is just her viewpoint.</p>
<p>S (freshman) goes to college 725 miles away. He spent only part of Winter and Spring breaks in town. I didn’t expect it to be any different than this. </p>
<p>He goes to a LAC and has made friends with people across the country. They go places on these holidays. (skiing, the beach). He pays, it’s his money so I take the time I’m given. FWIW–we have a deal, every 2 summers we take a father-son (only) trip. First post-HS is this summer. I can’t wait. Iceland.</p>
<p>If you think you will feel hurt and slighted if your student doesn’t spend their time with you on breaks, you might want to consider how you will feel if they are close by and never seem to visit on the weekends.</p>
<p>Its the hole in your heart you have to deal with. Physical distance has little to do with that hole.</p>
<p>We live in Virginia, and my son finished his final classes in LA last week. It wasn’t bad when he was in school and had long breaks in which he could come home to visit. Now he’s gotten his first full-time job, and it’s also in LA–but he only gets 2 weeks vacation a year, and we doubt he’ll want to spend much of that time at our hose. So we’re going to spend more time out there, which isn’t so bad! Also, we were told that if we want to see him during his vacation time, we should pick interesting places for our own vacations, and invite him along. As long as I can afford it, it’s probably a good idea.</p>
<p>T’giving is the worst.
For many kids it just isn’t worth the expense and hassle of flying home, especially when the term/sem/quarter ends soon afterward. BUT, T’giving at a friend’s house just isn’t the same, particularly not that first year. I recommend making some special accomodation for that first T’giving away.</p>
<p>cangel, I agree. It’s also often the one time that they especially want to touch base with the kids from HS, even the ones with whom they weren’t especially close. </p>
<p>(It’s good for the parents, too!)</p>
<p>My parents also would vacation at interesting places & invite us kids in college to show up & meet them in cities near where we were attending Us. I flew to meet them in Portland, SF, Las Vegas, Tahoe. It worked for us. They also flew out to other places & met up with my sibblings near their Us.</p>
<p>I will try that strategy with our kids. Both seem to be indicating that they want to return to HI to live, but we shall see.</p>
<p>I think it’s hard no matter how far your kid goes, once they’re no longer living at home full time. But beyond the heartache for mom and dad, which we can learn to deal with if our child is really happy at their school, comes the practical problems, which are a pain.</p>
<p>My son is 5 hours away (assuming travel/traffic conditions are perfect, which they rarely are, there are several bottlenecks between us and him and it seems we can never get thru all of them unscathed.) He is also not really near a large airport, which makes flying a lot less convenient. OP, your dd will be at a large school in Dallas, so I assume they have frequent shuttles, etc, to DFW, which will help you out.</p>
<p>Many of my son’s hs friends are now 1 - 2 hours away, and holidays etc are not an issue at all for them. Whereas for us… ugh. We have relatives who live 3 1/2 hours away, DS’s school is 1 1/2 hours beyond them. DS got a ride home for Spring Break. For the return trip, we drove on Sat to the relative’s house and spent the night. Easter afternoon we left the relatives at 3pm, drove to campus (we wanted to drop him off since we don’t get to campus very often), visited for 1/2 hour, then drove home. Thanks to traffic the 5 hour trip home turned into 7 hours. We got home at midnight, and younger sis had to be at school at 7:30 am the next morning. Ugh.</p>
<p>I do wish he were closer, not only for the travel convenience, but because I’d like to meet his college friends. But he probably appreciates having his life be more separate from his parents, as it’s his first real taste of independence. And he loves his school, it’s an excellent fit for him and he’s doing well, so we’ll just have to deal with the inconveniences.</p>