🕐 Time difference makes family calls hard

My mother is in Hyderabad and I'm in New Jersey. The gap is around 10 hours, and it wrecks our calls. By the time I'm home in the evening it's 4 in the morning there. When she's free, I'm at work. So most weekdays are a voice note from me and a one line reply from her, hours apart. Two people leaving messages for each other doesn't feel like a conversation. Weekends are easier, but we still have to plan it. I text her the night before to ask what time works. Then she says after lunch, then a cousin drops in, then it's tomorrow morning and my Saturday is gone. My mother now wakes up early on weekends to catch me before my evening is over. She says she doesn't mind. I still feel bad every time she calls that early. A few friends who've lived abroad longer tell me it gets easier after a while. Nobody says when. What I've started doing is booking calls like appointments. Tuesday and Sunday, same time, set a reminder on my phone. Before that I left it open and it just never happened. Work or tiredness always got in the way. It's not perfect. Last week my reminder went off during a meeting and I had to decline her call. So here's what I want to know. What schedule do you keep with family back home? Do you have a fixed day, or do you just wing it and hope? Mine falls apart in busy weeks. I'm also curious if anyone has found a time that works for both sides without anybody losing sleep. I've been in New Jersey almost 3 years and still haven't worked it out.

My sister lives in California and I'm in Hyderabad, so I know the other side of this. I'm the one who gets up at 6 on Sundays, because that's her Saturday evening.

Same problem here, ridersgang21. I fixed Sunday mornings for the family call and it made things much easier. That's the one day everyone's schedule lines up without much planning beforehand. Try a fixed weekly slot instead of leaving it open. It cuts out the last minute rescheduling. That back and forth used to eat into the time we had to talk.