Many parents find themselves balancing the valuable time spent with family and their demanding careers that require them to work away from home. Despite the distance, the bonds between parent and child remain crucial, with parents finding more ways to stay connected during the work week.
Since he was young, Junior Marshall Bagley has always understood that his father’s job as a neurosurgeon came with an immense workload and responsibility, so, when his parents approached him about a new opportunity that would require his dad to move to St. Louis, Bagley wasn’t worried.
“When my parents asked me before he moved out there, I was fine because I want him to be able to have the best opportunity in his work, and I didn’t see a major change in the way that we interacted caused by that,” Bagley said.
For Bagley, scheduled phone calls became the key to staying in touch during the week, and he feels that the formation of a regular routine has made it easier to stay connected.
“It’s just trying to get on a phone call every night,” Bagley said. “He’ll usually call right when I get home, just to check in with me and at least call my mom before we head to bed. So [we talk] through phone calls, and then he tries to be back most weekends.”
Teenagers typically take on increased independence as they mature, but Bagley’s unique situation has required him to take on more responsibilities than the normal teen – something he believes came naturally to him because of how he was raised.
“I was raised to be fairly responsible, and I think I still am pretty responsible for my age,” Bagley said. “Just having that sense of understanding responsibility and understanding people have different commitments has been really helpful.”
Bagley’s relationship with his father is still strong and has helped him grow individually. However, this may not be the case for all families. Some children may need both parents present in order to grow and flourish, especially during stressful times.
“We know that children thrive when they have a parent that is present, involved and really just there for them to meet their basic needs,” Upper School Counselor Dr. Mary Bonsu said. “Children also need a relationship with their parents that is based on trust, and it goes both ways; that leads to good psychological functioning.”
Bonsu highlights that a parent’s role in a child’s early life is crucial, especially when it comes to fostering a healthy relationship.
“It’s harder on younger children simply because they have a larger emotional need for their parents,” Bonsu said. “Before age 13, kids rely on their parents very heavily for social and emotional needs. And then once a kid is 13, 14 or 15, they’re more interested in their peers, and what their peers are saying and doing.”
If a child is left without the feeling of being cared for, it can lead to hindering their long term emotional development.
“It could bring up feelings of abandonment and loss,” Bonsu said. “Those things could come up and affect the child emotionally, and that could make it so that it’s hard for them to get closer to people and might affect their attachment style but usually someone’s attachment style is established in early life with a primary parent.”
Taking that into account, there are many ways that a parent, whether they are living with their child or not, can build a stronger connection to their kids.
“There’s lots of different ways to connect, keeping up with what’s going on with the child’s life as much as possible,” Bonsu said. “Checking in at night is probably one of the best times to do that. And then when home, trying to pick up where they left off, and going to games as much as possible, or performances or showcases. It’s really just presence.”
Bagley’s relationship with his father shows how closely a family can be bonded together, regardless of the distance that separates them. Bagley believes his father’s trust in his ability to manage his own responsibilities has allowed him to grow, and he believes other parents can embrace a similar approach when the time is right.
“If you raise your child with that sense of responsibility, and you feel like they are at a point in their life where they can be responsible, I think you can develop more time to your work and kind of let them kind of indulge themselves in their responsibilities, let them kind of grow on their own,” Bagley said.
As a junior, Bagley is in the early stages of preparing for life’s next big change, heading off to college. He believes his experience at maintaining relationships when separated by a large distance will help him to keep in contact with his family and friends.
“I think it’s the same way that my dad approaches being away for a lot of the year,” Bagley said. “Phone calls, trying to be fairly frequent, frequent checking in with people, making sure that they’re doing all right, seeing if they need any help.
