I've been away from home (2.5 hrs away) for almost 3 years now...and I'm still terribly homesick everyday.
I haven't been back home to see my family since Christmas. This is the longest I've been without seeing them in a really long time, and I hate it!
Been gone from "home" for 17 years now. Used to be a 20 hour drive but now down to a 9 hour drive. For the first 10 years we spent all of our spare time driving back home to visit friends and family. For the last 7 years or so, we invite them out to see us.
Been in Edmonton (from Toronto) since September, and am definately definately homesick.....miss my mom the most, my friends, other cats, good restaurants...everything. But I love it in Edmonton at the same time...
I moved from my family a little over 9 years ago, and I miss them of course but I can go see them whenever I want, they are 12 hours away by car and 3by plane. I love it here and would not want to go back there to live.
I am about 8 hours away and have been for about 12 years. I do have a couple of family members near me (about an 1hour drive), but I don't really miss anyone except my sister. Of course, she's only an hour away so she's not too far. My feet are itching though so I think another big move is in my near future.
I moved from Australia to Canada almost 5 years ago and was home sick pretty much everyday.
I'm on vacation back in Aus right now and really miss my hubby & pets but it's so nice being back after so long.
I left "home" 33 years ago. Over half my life ago. It took six months for me to realize that "home" had shifted, and while I missed people, and would always have a special feeling for what had been home, I was not, and never would be, homesick for it. My family is all still there or within a few hundred miles. I'm 3000 miles away, visit infrequently, but love to have visitors.
When I left Florida many years ago, it didn't bother me at all. Sun, surf and DisneyWorld seemed so blase for the longest time. But the last two or three years, I long for salty air and that particular sunshine. It's like a siren song calling me back. If only I had the $$ to make the move! Plus it would do wonders for my upper respiratory ailments.
We left Augusta, GA the first time in 1991, and have bounced around from there to NC, MO, and back to Augusta a couple times. I think I miss it until I stay there for a while, then I have to go. We always end up back in Jacksonville, so I guess this is home now.
Well Eithne, you're close to your family and that makes a huge difference. You'll always miss them.
I just rang my friend in New Zealand last night and felt terribly homesick as I always do when calling NZ. She was talking about having a picnic dinner on the beach and watching her baby girl paddling in the sea. I feel like I've missed out on so much as everyone has had kids and things have changed so much since I left 11 years ago.
My parents only live about 45 minutes away, so not a problem. However, because I'm so close, my mother thinks I should be out there visiting more often than I do - for example pop out on a Saturday for a tea or whatever! Unfortunately, with working full-time and then a house to look after, I don't have a lot of spare time on the weekends! Course, I could probably spend less time on the computer - lets not tell her that!
To be honest, it's hard to get homesick when you no longer know where "home" is. Is my home Philly, where I was born and raised, and still have family and friends? Germany, where I've spent over half my life with my German husband, and have had most of my career? Omaha, where what remains of my immediate family now lives, and which I therefore visit every year, although I never lived there?
It has gotten so much easier to be in touch with people who are far away, via cheap international phone calls, the Internet, faxes, and relatively cheap air travel, that I don't feel the homesickness that I experienced when I first moved thousands of miles away from my family.
Whenever I travel to the U.S., whoever checks my passport says, "Welcome home!" Then I come back to Germany, and the official checking my passport sees my permanent residence permit, and says, "Willkommen zu Hause!"