6000 Miles Apart: Successful Long-Distance Relationships

Navigating life 6000 miles apart? Discover how families manage long-distance parenting, frequent business travel, and co-parenting challenges—while maintaining connections across distance, strengthening parent-child relationships, and building resilient family culture across borders.

In episode #84 Of Holding the Fort Abroad, Susana Ortega Roig shares her lived experience of family life while her husband worked in other countries. From Barcelona to Tokyo, Brussels, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, and beyond, Susana’s life has been shaped by love, movement, and change. When her husband’s work took him to São Paulo and Los Angeles (putting 6000 miles between them), she remained in Amsterdam so their sons could finish school. Her story speaks directly to parents, partners, and professionals navigating multi-location family life, commuter marriages, and cross-border relationships.

Listen to the full episode HERE. 

Long-distance relationships are hard, and cross-border relationships, especially with children, raise the emotional stakes. What begins as an exciting opportunity promising growth, stability, or future freedom can quickly become a reality where global mobility separates your family and leaves you holding the fort alone, wondering not just how this will work, but how you stay a family when you’re miles apart. 

What begins as an exciting opportunity promising growth, stability, or future freedom can quickly become a reality where global mobility separates your family and leaves you holding the fort alone

Here’s the top 5 takeaways from the podcast that can help you navigate living apart.

The Power of Defining your Why – Choosing Long-Distance

This is not just a long-distance relationship. It’s parenting apart, loving across borders, and building resilience in isolation.

Multi-location life collapses when it rests on vague reasoning:

• “Because my partner has to.”
• “Because this is how global careers work.”
• “Because everyone else does it.”

Susana insists on something different: define your “why” together. Not a corporate why. Not a recruiter’s why. A family why.

Your why becomes the emotional anchor when you’re alone at bedtime, navigating illness or having school crises. 

A clear why helps reframe the story from I’m abandoned to WE chose this for something meaningful.

In healthy relationships, both partners own the decision, even when it may not feel that way.

Try This
Use Susana’s words as your starting point. Listen to the podcast together and pause where her story touches yours. 

Use these as conversation starters

• What are we building through this separation?
• What matters more than proximity right now?
• What does “success” look like for us—not for the company?

Mindset Really Helps

The ‘holding the fort parent’ often lives in overwhelm. You manage school runs, broken boilers, teenage meltdowns, and your own exhaustion, while your partner builds a life somewhere else.

Susana lived this reality. When her husband’s career sent him to a number of different locations, she stayed in Amsterdam so their sons could finish school. She didn’t frame it as sacrifice. She framed it as a conscious, values-led decision.

That mindset changed everything. They knew their ‘why’.

Try This 

If this feels familiar, pause and listen to Susana’s full story on the podcast. Hearing another parent name these emotions can be deeply grounding

Avoid Open-Ended Separation Times

Open-ended separation erodes trust and emotional safety. “We’ll see” turns into “Will this ever end?”

Set clear timeframes. Revisit the arrangement regularly. This gives everyone, children included, a sense of structure.

“You have to be very clear on the time frame, because otherwise you keep pushing this ball for years and years.”

Healthy long-distance family life needs defined periods apart, check in points for renegotiation and permission to say this no longer works. 

In global mobility, flexibility often favors the employer. Your family needs flexibility too.

This approach protects:

• Your mental health
• Your partnership
• Your children’s emotional stability

It transforms distance from a life sentence into a season.

Try This
Write down one boundary you need. Use the podcast as permission to advocate for yourself.

4. Staying Connected Across Borders

Connection doesn’t happen by accident. It happens by design.  Intentionally keeping the other parent emotionally present in the children’s lives is crucial. 

“Day to day, he knew about the boys… He was very much involved…“I would show him the football match… ‘Look, Daigo scored a goal.”

Create rituals:

• Daily FaceTime calls during dog walks
• Find creative ways for children to stay emotionally close to the parent who is living abroad
• Predictable rhythms of presence, even when physically apart

In long-distance parenting, consistency builds security. Children don’t need constant presence; they need reliable connection.

In your relationship, prioritise connection. 

Try This

Choose one ritual you can start this week, it might be morning coffee, a good night message or a walk. 

5. The Hidden Strength in Solo Seasons

One of the most powerful parts of Susana’s story lies in what she discovered about herself. She realized she was stronger than she believed.

She navigated teenage years, carried the emotional weight and she emerged with confidence.

Multi-location family life can become a time for growth:

• You learn to trust yourself
• You redefine your identity beyond “partner of”
• You model resilience for your children

Try this
This chapter of your life can shape you in powerful ways. Listen to the episode and notice where Susana’s growth mirrors your own.

Remember: You Are Not Alone 

Thousands of globally mobile families live in commuter marriages, long-distance partnerships, and cross-border parenting arrangements. Yet many feel isolated.

If you are living in a long-distance relationship shaped by global mobility, this story belongs to you.

Listen to the podcast episode featuring Susana Ortega Roig.
Let her story normalize your experience, strengthen your resolve, and remind you that family isn’t defined by geography: it’s defined by intention.

Today, Susana’s mission is to support expat spouses and mums who find themselves in a new country, feeling disconnected, lonely, or unsure where to begin. 

For direct support, connect with Susana via her instagram @abroadwithsusana. 

Want more?

Listen to the full episode of Holding the Fort Abroad featuring Susan Ortega Roig, and check out the show notes for specific strategy links and recommended reading.

And let’s keep talking: come and say hi on Linkedin . You don’t need to figure this out alone.