re: How do you deal with the guilt of living far away from your aging parents?

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Send cards, send physical letters. They most probably will take a ton of pride in you doing things for your family that they couldn't.

Send your mom flowers the third Friday of every month (she will circle that on the calendar for sure). Send your dad a BBQ box (or whatever he's into) every month. Give him a gift certificate for a lawnmower blade sharpening, or send him stuff from Bass Pro that he likes. Order them home delivery food once a month.

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Excellent suggestion, one of our daughters living in Seattle does similar things for us. She also FaceTimes frequently with her kids which is a joy.

Rest of our grandkids are an hour away and as the older ones grow and start college we don’t see them much, especially the boys. It can be disheartening but they have their own lives to live.

I’ve talked to the older ones about future careers and my advice is always to go where the best opportunities are along with quality of life conditions. Unfortunately that’s mostly not in Louisiana.

Sometimes you’ve got to move out to move up, either geographically or employer wise. They’ve got lives ahead long after I’m gone, and I’m proud of them all regardless of where they live.