Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

This topic has 6 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 14 years, 3 months ago by thehauserfamily.

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March 19, 2011 at 10:41 pm
dmccall3
Participant
Hi everyone!
I know some of you live far from your extended family as we do (whether overseas or still in the States).
We are currently on furlough, leaving for another 2.5 year term in 5 weeks. Our plan is to do 2.5 year terms with 6 month furloughs in between each term. In other words, this is a long term commitment.
How do your extended families handle you being far away? As in, how pitiful or joyful do they seem? Do they act happy for you or bitter?
In turn, how do you handle being far from family? Do you feel guilt? If so, how do you handle it? Do you cater to your families’ hard feelings at all?
We have worked hard building the relationships between our son and his grandparents utilizing skype, blogs, and the postal service while gone then doing a lot together while we’re here. But leaving is still hard and now that we’re here (close to leaving) you’d think we hadn’t had any good times. I kind of feel like giving up the extreme effort since the results continuously seem to fall short.
Then there’s the heartbreak of telling a 3 year old he won’t see his grandparents for a long time. Or maybe it won’t bother him! Who knows!
Any experiences with living far from extended family you have to share?
Thanks a lot!
Dana
March 20, 2011 at 1:33 pm
houseofchaos
Participant
Hi Dana,
We don’t live as far away as you do (we are 2 provinces away from our family in Canada), but it is far enough away to make relationships difficult.   It is about eighteen hours if we drive straight through to see our family. We also deal with a lot of carsickness with our children, so that complicates things.
My dad has been working full time up until now, so we haven’t seen much of them, as his holidays are always in December, which isn’t a great time for a seventy year old to try and drive that distance in a Canadian winter. It’s easier for them to come here, though, than for us to go there (we are a family of ten, and they really don’t have the space).
I think it was a bit tough at first (we moved away after our first child was a year old, eleven years ago), but really this is just how it is. My mother was bitter about it for years, but our relationship is good now, and I think she understands that we have lives of our own to live. We love to see them, they love to see us. We don’t do skype or anything like that, but we pray for them, talk about them, have pictures of them around the house.
I struggled with guilt for a while some years ago. I have two sisters, neither of them have any children, so we have the only grandkids. But this is where our paths have taken us, and where I know God has brought us, so guilt has no part. I don’t cater to hard feelings. I address them, explain that we are in the place we need to be, invite people to move closer if they so desire 🙂
I don’t have much wisdom to offer, sorry. But if you are treading a God-ordained path, it is the right one, wherever it takes you.
Gaeleen
March 20, 2011 at 3:56 pm
MamaSnow
Participant
Hi Dana,
This is certainly a tricky issue, and I have to say for me is the hands-down hardest thing about living overseas (being away from family, missing out on family events, kids missing out on relationships with their grandparents). I don’t think there are any easy answers. We are fortunate in that both my parents and my husband’s parents are very supportive of our ministry and while yes, it is difficult for them not to see us and the kids as often as they might like, they don’t give us a hard time about it or put pressure on us to come back home permanently.  I do feel guilty at times, even without getting a lot of hard feelings from family. That is one of those issues that I have had to wrestle out with the Lord. One Scripture I have returned to over and over is Hebrews 4:16 – we can approach him with confidence because He understands where we are coming from and has the grace and mercy to help us in our time of need. I think Gaeleen is right when she says that “if you are treading a God-ordained path, it is the right one, wherever it takes you.” There are times that I think I would be happier if we could live closer to family, but I realize that while that might make me happy in the short-term, treading outside of God’s will for our family would not be good in the long-run. Don’t be afraid to ask Him to re-confirm His calling to you if you need it, and then cling to that when the sacrfices that you need to make seem great.
It sounds to me like you are doing all the right things in making use of what opportunities that you do have – skype, blogs, mail, spending quality time together when you are together etc.   I know it can be hard to make the effort when it seems unappreciated, but probably the best thing you can do is to continue to try to keep open whatever lines of communication that you do have available anyhow. You can’t control their response, and it’s not your responsibility to do so. So, I would encourage you to keep that all up even when it doesn’t feel like it’s worth it!
I have found that the kids tend to be more accepting and resiliant of saying goodbye that we are – remember that this lifestyle is all they know so it isn’t such a radical shift for them as it is for us. Skype with video has been an amazing blessing for us since the kids are much more willing to participate in the conversation when they can see grandma’s face on the screen than when it is just a strange voice coming out of the telephone! One other sort of special thing that my mom has done is make some little photo albums of pictures of special things that she and the kids have done together in the times that we are together. My dd especially treasures these books, and it could be helpful to have something tangible like that to hold onto if you find that your son does miss family a lot. These can also be good opportunities to teach him first hand about the God who never leaves or forsakes us wherever we go, and we can always call to Him…even if we feel sad about missing grandma and grandpa (or whomever). Shoot, it’s a good reminder for me too!
Lastly, I stumbled across this article recently which was an encouragment to me – dealing with this issue of how our calling to overseas ministry affects our children. Has more to do with transition in general…but I think this issue of extended family relationships is all sort of part of the package! http://www.incourage.me/2011/03/called-to-the-crazy.html
Not that I have this all figured out by any means…just a few things I’ve learned over the past decade of overseas living. =)
Jen
March 21, 2011 at 1:04 pm
dmccall3
Participant
Thank you both! 🙂 You know I don’t get aggressive comments as much as ones that project a “woe is us, how could you do this to us” feeling. And some comments state those type things pretty directly or just things like “no matter how much we skype or how much time we spend together it’s still not good enough”. Ugh.
Thanks for your encouragement. 🙂
Dana
March 21, 2011 at 4:35 pm
thehauserfamily
Member
It is hard. We skype like 1-2 times every 6 months. I don’t feel guilty at all. This is “my” life and I have to worry about my children and their life. Some of my family made it hard at first but just got over it when I chose to no longer call them.
We are military overseas not missionaries, but I regardless it is my husbands job that brought us here. We love living overseas and my family other than my mom/dad, sister, mother in law and good firend never call, write, send cards, or make any effort whatsoever! In the 5.5 years we have been overseas I have never received 1 phone call , brithday card or letter from anyone other than these previous mentioned people. They don’t even send us Christmas cards! If they say I never call I say the phone works both ways. I love my family I do but I don’t have time to do all the work. My children and husband are more important.
My whole family, cousins, aunts, grandparents all live in one metro area while hubbys family all live in Germany. My mom and his parents are the only ones who came here in 5.5 years. My sister would but can not afford it and my friend lived here until a year ago. His family lives in Germany for goodness sakes and didn’t come! I just can’t worry about it. I did make all the effort at first and just couldn’t do it any more!
Now we are moving back to the US. We will move in May but will not be that close. About a 2 days drive or a plane ride. I am excited to be alttle close, but I still doubt that anyone will visit. My mom and sister plan to visit in the summer, my friend will visit her parents 2 hours away (so us too) hopefully for Christmas! My sister in law wants to come after I visit my family August. But, those are the normal people we see. I doublt we will get any call or letters or whatever. Mind you we have had our number change 3 times in 5.5 years but our address has been the same. They say they don’t have it or whatever but it never changed. It was hard at first, but now it doens’t bother me. Once my mom said something about christmas cards and I said ohh it doesn’t matter they send us any and she had no idea. After the first year when I just stopped being the one taking all the time and spending all the money I only sent Christmas cards…with our address on them he he!
It is up to how you deal with it really. It might be hard for your little one or not. It realy stinks your family feels you are not doing enough.
March 22, 2011 at 12:18 am
dmccall3
Participant
Thank you ‘thehauserfamily’. This has been helpful. I think in a way I need to toughen up a bit and just let it go. This isn’t the only issue in which I find myself trying to please my parents. I guess at 37 it’s time to give it up. 🙂 (This also isn’t the only area of life in which they feel bitter so I should probably also quit taking it personally). 🙂
Off to France we go with smiles on our faces then! Hoorah! 🙂
Thanks to all!
Dana
March 22, 2011 at 9:22 am
thehauserfamily
Member
Sorry that was a bit messy. I didn’t have time to read back though it!
I told my parents long ago that I love them and respect their advice but cannot make them happy only myself, husband and children. They are responsible for making themselves happy and have to decide how to do that. It is not your fault that your parents are not happy it is theirs. They could perfectly well be happy for you just as easily! I personally think it is easier to just be happy for someone or about something than to be grumpy. Being grumpy takes up too much time!