This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Ruth Davis, a Creative Director in LA. It has been edited for length and clarity.
In 2019, I relocated with my 12-year-old daughter and fiancé to Los Angeles, which is two hours away from the “family village” where I had grown up.
All my family — siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents — all lived within 15 minutes of each other. I knew it was going to be a hard move for our nuclear family unit, but I was convinced LA was the right place for us to be.
I didn’t fully understand the impact it would have on me.
My dad is my everything
It was my dad whom I immediately felt I had lost.
Before we moved, my dad was everything to me. He and my mom had split when I was young, so my dad had full custody. It was just the two of us all the time.
When I had my daughter, my dad moved in with us and was there to help with all the practical aspects of raising a child. But he was also just there as emotional support for me. He made me complete.
After we moved, we only saw him once a month, when he’d take the train to visit us. I missed him and felt overwhelmed without him.
In August 2025, I was grieving the loss of two family members, feeling overwhelmed with sadness, but also with life in general. I remember sitting on my bed, losing it, crying.
I called him, crying
My daughter was knocking on the door, asking me when we were leaving the house — we were going out for the day. I snapped at her. I couldn’t leave the bed. I wanted to show up for her in that moment, but couldn’t.
In that moment, I felt like a failure compared to my dad. He had lived through so much grief and so many hard times, and yet I never knew because he managed to hold everything together.
All I could think to do was to call my dad, crying as he answered. He listened to me and then told me he would call me right back.
“Everything is going to be OK,” he said before hanging up. Dad has never been a “words” person.
Not too long after, he called back and told me he had been to the train station to buy a train ticket to come visit the next day.
Knowing he was coming felt like a double-edged sword. I felt incredibly lucky to have a dad who would come and see me at the drop of a hat, but I also felt self-doubt because my elderly dad could get it together, but I couldn’t.
The next morning, when I knew my dad was on the train, bound for my house, I was certain everything would be OK. My dad was coming. With him, life feels normal and complete.
I won’t advise my daughter to move away
I don’t regret the wonderful changes the move afforded me and the position in life it put my nuclear family and me in. But had I known not seeing my dad every day would wreck me as it has, I don’t know if I would have done it the same way.
I had bought into the modern idea that decisions should always be made with the nuclear family in mind, but the distance from him made me realize how much I emotionally value my dad in ways I didn’t think imaginable.
Knowing what I know now, I would never advise my daughter to move away from her village, even if it means she’ll move closer to a partner’s village, as I did. I think as a mother, I did her a disservice by moving her away from my family, her tight-knit community.
