I’ve moved cross country twice. The first time, we left my husband’s family behind. The second time, we left my 68-year-old mother and three of our kids. 
It worked out well both times. Everyone survived, and the second move probably saved our relationship with my mom.
People are different, but I have rarely if ever heard a man express the level of angsty conflictedness women often do about making choices that may disappoint people or cause disruption in family peace or social relationships. Whether it’s socialization or simply the way women are wired is irrelevant. It is a fact that they behave this way much more often than men do, and it’s generally not a particularly useful or healthy attitude.
Re “You are such a woman. Get over it. Guilt is a useless negative emotion.”
It’s was clumsily stated, but the generalization is not altogether incorrect.
Make a new rule in your live: Never listen to guilt trips from fathers who spend all their time on man toys. Go already
Take that leap of faith, totter on the edge of the nest, and fly.
Go.
You’ve been itching for this forever, and your mother understands.
Never, (and I learned this the hard way,) never make a life decision for yourself based on somebody else’s needs.
Even if both your parents have strokes over the next few months and one of them’s leg falls off, don’t let that stop you. There’re always Home Health Care nurses, etc.
You come across like a change-of-life baby, a bonus baby. Your parents are probably older than your friend’s parents…am I right?
Doesn’t matter. There’s nothing you can do that’s going to stave off old age from your parents, no matter what your dad thinks. This is the only life you’re going to have on earth; do with it what you will.
Don’t feel guilty. Love them (and it sounds like you do) and remember to always wave bye. Because you’ve got places to go…
FWIW… I left home at the age of 21. First I went to live in Madrid, then Barcelona, and finally Japan. Right now I am living in the Netherlands.
My mother never took my moving particularly well (and, today, more than 20 years later, she still keeps asking me “when am I going to come back home”).
I never regretted a single minute of my life. Had I not moved out I wouldn’t have become the person I am.
I didn’t post for the benefit of women in general, but rather for the benefit of the OP.
I’ve received the comment “You are such a man” in relation to my inability to multitask like my wife for example.
I receive that comment positively, perhaps due to a slight angst about being normal. I’m acting like a man ? Great ! I know I received that trait due to the neccessity to focus when hunting thousands of years ago.
So I considered the comment “You are such a woman” as positive and comforting.
I try to be a positive force in this universe.
I’m fairly convinced that the OP knew the right answer to her question beforehand but like my wife and all her friends she wants to discuss her feelings about it anyway. That is another woman trait I rarely see in men. We men don’t often ask even if we don’t know sometimes.
Well, I was avoiding getting into this.
Flying Dutchman, the “You are such a woman. Get over it.” did come across as rude and I think your post would’ve contributed more, less those two sentences. But meh, I understand people feel the way they feel. I did like the “guilt is a useless negative emotion” line. It doesn’t usually serve me well, but sometimes it’s there. What can I say? I understand you’re seeing the me that is in the OP, without knowing any of the rest of my story - but I consider myself a pretty emotionally stable person, and I don’t think feeling guilty about moving across the country from my family is indicative of a character defect, as astro seemed to be suggesting in his first reply. So in that perspective, certain responses are expected and that’s fine - it’s all appreciated. The battle of the sexes is a little bit of a digression though.
Well, sort of but not really. My mom was 32 when she had me, dad was 27. They were a little bit older than most of my friends parents, but there were kids whose parents were older. I have a twin brother, but I’m the only girl.
I do kinda see things from my dad’s perspective (and yeah he’s just going to have to get over it). Both of my parents still live 15 miles from the town they both grew up in, which their parents (pretty much) grew up in, and every one of their sisters and brothers still lives in or very near (oh, and their kids too). It’s just not part of our family tradition to pick up and move far away, and he’s a little freaked out about it actually happening. I will just have to be the trailblazer of the family!
Yes, you have an excellent memory. Did indeed meet the love of my life there - and yes, our eyes did indeed meet across a crowded room (the bar “Dreizehn” which means “Thirteen” in English) we have been together almost 31 years now. So, no - I would never have met him if I hadn’t gone away and moved to Berlin and I think he would agree the match was good for him too…usually he would say that, but there are days…
However, the OP is taking the SO along - so the beauty in that is they can both discover all new and wonderful things together.
Your father is afraid of getting older as well as dealing with an aging wife. This is natural and understandable. But it is annoying that he expects you to alter your life to help him cope and deal. Those are his problems, not yours.
If you don’t move, you will feel resentment. I know someone who is like this, who views her mother as a lodestone keeping her in place, blocking opportunities, stunting her professional growth. The truth is that her mother probably doesn’t want her to ever move. But millions of other parents and their adult kids have found themselves in this same situation, and they have somehow coped. So would she. So will ya’ll.
Go as soon as possible.
It’s not a “character defect” I was addressing it’s your level of distress. The main point of concern I was trying to make is that, to be frank, you still don’t seem to fully engaged with how completely nuts, the request/demand/expectation is that you, in 2011 as a 30 year old American professional beginning her career, stick close to home to be available to your healthy, financially stable, sixty something parents.
That you are even willing to engage the conversation without telling your father he’s a complete loon, and beyond this that you feel conflicted about this is worrisome.
His attitude is 180 degrees from what reasonable American parents expect of kids pursuing professional careers.
It’s an utterly lunatic expectation, and that you have this guilt and conflict rejecting it vs telling your father “Wow Dad, that is some crazy, crazy shit!” is baffling. I have no clue where you are coming from to feel the way you do. The source of your self torturing “guilt” in dealing with your dad’s nonsense is incomprehensible to me. The only paradigm I can think of that would put this in context without making him seem like a manipulative monster is if he’s some sort of well off hillbilly without much education, who just doesn’t know any better.
Set up webcams so you and your parents can see each other live at least once a week.
Now, you haven’t left home at all, they can still see you every day after work, if they like.
Go already.
You should go and just encourage them to visit.
I do know how you feel, because in the past year I gave up a) internship in Rwanda and b) job in Singapore to be close® to my family…but I left home at 18 and have moved approximately every 3 years since then, progressively further away till I hit California and I’m now 32.
That said, I think your parents/father, guilting you is very selfish on their/his parts because they should want you to be happy, find professional opportunities and see something of the world. My own parents were really bummed when we left the house but seeing as they moved all over the world and then across the globe from their families, they understood the value of living independently. I am trying to skulk back now, but that is of my own volition. They’ve never once guilt-tripped me about it or even asked, I’m just at the point in my life where I want to go back to the part of the US that is closest to “home” (Boston). And in all honesty it’s because I know I’ll travel MORE if I live close to them because I don’t have to use vacation days to see them + my sib and I are just waiting for my mom to retire so we can take jobs in SE Asia.
Go. Have fun. Do hikey things. Transfer schools and follow your dreams.
I don’t think I’ve seen a thread filled with more overly-emotional euphemisms about travel and starting a new life. We’re talking about a potential cross-country move, this isn’t someone signing on to sail the Atlantic with Columbus.
I’ll take a bit of a contrarian position.
I grew up in a small, hick Virginia town. I went to the U.S. Military Academy (West Point), and to be honest to people in my town the concept of moving to New York state to spend four years at a Federal military academy was about as normal as trying to build a rocket in my back yard to launch myself to Mars.
After that, I had a full career in the Army and have traveled and lived in many different places. Ever hear the saying “I wouldn’t trade these experiences for anything in the world?” I’m sure some people feel that way, but not everyone does. I can tell you some places I’ve lived plain sucked, and yeah, I would probably trade my time in those places for time somewhere else.
I also know that sometimes people who dream big dreams of moving across the country or even the world can’t handle it. I knew a guy who came to the academy at the same time as me, he had dreamed of being a cadet ever since he knew what that meant. But he didn’t make it, he was gone before the first year was up. He was destroyed by the pressure, he was destroyed by not having the support system of mommy and daddy. He cried himself to sleep at night and eventually left.
You’re 30 years old and going into a very different situation, but the point stands. Some people that really want to leave home end up not being able to handle it. And even though you have lived away from home before, it’s impossible to say how you will react to certain things happening after you’ve “permanently relocated.” Maybe things won’t go the way you want them to go professionally up there, maybe you’ll go into a depression about it. Maybe you’ll want to go home but you really want to “make this experience work” so you’ll force yourself to stay up there even though it is causing you to become more and more depressed until some day you just crack and off yourself.
That’s obviously the absolute worst case scenario. What’s a more realistic bad outcome is you get into the program you want up there and can’t find a job you like or find a job that isn’t what you thought it’d be or etc. Or you find that instead of really liking Washington you don’t like it at all.
I have never once thought it valuable to just spew a bunch of supportive platitudes at someone looking at making a major life change. I think you need to really embrace the worst possible outcome and decide if you’re okay risking that.
That being said, you aren’t signing on to sail the Atlantic with Columbus, you aren’t a pioneer getting ready to make a 3,000 mile trip into unsettled wilderness. If things don’t work out, going back home is very, very easy. This is the year 2011 and we’re talking about a move within the borders of the continental United States. This isn’t a hard thing to reverse if it doesn’t work out. (Hell, you could literally leave all your stuff behind, buy the cheapest plane ticket you can find and be back in a day’s time for under $600.)
I will also say this, when I decided what I was doing with my life, I told my parents what day I was leaving and that was that. My mom cooked a special dinner the night before and that was it, I was very close with my parents but they were not involved with that decision that I made. I didn’t ask their permission nor did I care about their opinion, I had made a decision for myself, and they weren’t part of that decision making process. There is really no reason for your parents to be part of yours. However, everyone is different. So maybe you can’t make the decision without considering how it impacts your parents, if that’s the case you have to decide if you’re okay with the worst possible outcome in regards to your parents relationship with you.
I honestly never considered such things when I left home. I grew up in an area where your life options were extremely limited, you either left or you basically became impoverished and scraped by at a meager existence. South Florida is a totally different world, there is literally nothing you can’t do there career wise, so I don’t know how my decision would have been impacted if I was moving from a place where pretty much every career field has thousands of people employed to another similar place across country. In my scenario I either had to make a move or I had to get real happy with living in a mobile home and working in a coal mine (at best) or working at minimum wage jobs (at worst.)
Don’t worry OVERly much about feeling guilty; you’re gonna feel it. And…that’s the price. Simple as that. Your parents sound fine; go explore.
As has been stated already: despite the famous quotes, you CAN go home again if you want to.
Man… Flying Dutchman, I’m just posting to have a voice here from a woman who didn’t take the “you are such a woman” as an insult, much less your explanation that “women are, IME, more sensitive to the Guilt Stick than men”. Perhaps because making myself not respond to it automatically has been one of my lifetime achievements… last person to try it was a male soon to be ex-boss: “bossman, I’m leaving. This job isn’t as advertised and I’ve got another offer I’ve accepted” “but you can’t do this to me!” “why not?” - three months later I still don’t have an answer.
Your father sees you as The Girl, and The Girl is the one who takes care of mom when mom can’t take care of herself anymore. Don’t be The Girl. Be yourself.
You already know what the right decision is, in fact you’ve already made it. You just want to make sure you’re doing the right thing. I promise you, you are. Do not stick around that one-horse town a day longer than you have to.
Just wanted to say thanks again for all of your responses. I really appreciate the time you guys have taken to reply, and your posts had me doing a lot of good thinking. I’ve been composing my personal statement with gusto! It’s turning out great, and I’m optimistic and excited now! 
By chance, today I came across some ramblings I wrote before I left for the UK back when I was 20. The writing was shitty and embarrassing, but the sentiment was very familiar.
Doubts extinguished. I’m goin’ for it.
And I’m gonna do hikey things.
Good for you!
And do us a favor - write back after you get there, and do a follow up to this thread in a year. I have the feeling you will be happy with your choice.
I didn’t find the “You’re such a woman” comment insulting, either. Face it - women are expected and trained to feel more guilt about moving away from their mothers in this country.
(It’s funny, in India it’s the boys who are expected to stay home, and close to mom. Daughters are considered other people’s property from the start.)
Anyway, go and enjoy. It’s not going to help anything if you stay and resent them, is it?