What if you don't know where you want to "settle"?

[AmericasTorturedBrow]

Been in CA 2yrs, pretty much signed up for another 2yrs - DH I am certain wants to stay, I don't know what I want but know I don't want to settle here.

We have 2DC currently 5&2, eldest will start kindergarten in august. I know wherever we are once DS is 10/11 is where I want to stay until DD finishes school as I think it's important for them to have that security through teenage.years. I'm very open to going somewhere else inbetween here and then, I'm fairly keen to go back to the UK for those secondary school years.

At some point we will have to talk about it, but how do I start having the conversation when I don't even really know what I want? of course what I really want is to sell everything we own and take off traveling round the world for a few years

[Blondietoday]

No advice either, but I feel the same too ...

[schokolade]

Same boat here... DH and I have been all over the place together. We're currently in Switzerland, where DH is from, and it looks like we'll be staying a while yet.

I'm worried that our DD (4 months) will only ever think of Switzerland as home, when I am from NZ and really want to go 'home' at some point. But I'm also worried that if we went back, NZ wouldn't seem like home anymore.

I am slowly coming round to the idea that it doesn't matter much in the end where we are, but who we are with. Doesn't help when I'm missing my mum, in another hemisphere, though.

[HerRoyalNotness]

I feel the same! Must be the curse of the expats.

DH from England, me from NZ, live in US currently. He keeps talking about staying the full 7yr visa length here, erm.... NO THANKS! Have a 7 and 4yo. No clue whatsoever where to settle or when.

I keep panicking about the DC going off to college and having to leave them somewhere while we move on. Not to mention the international student fees! Dh only thinks of today and doesn't plan for the future at all. We will just drift around until forced to decide I imagine.

[AmericasTorturedBrow]

oh god don't even get me started on financial stuff and International Student fees - I'm literally barely dealing with the emotional stuff.

schokolade that thing of being with those people? That's what draws me home to the UK - I miss my friends and my people. I know I can visit the UK whenever I want and take the good bits (M&S Food Hall) without having to live there and experience the bad again but my friends are what makes me and while I have some good friends here, I can't help but feel they are temporary

We have very difficult conversations coming up in the next few years

[Isthiscorrect]

DS is moving back to the UK for uni. He leaves here (ME) early July and thats it. Gone forever. Of course he will be home for holidays and with friends etc but, oh yes, we are moving on as well to country neither he or we have ever lived in. This is making me feel really rootless although I am very excited. He is als0 very excited although we dont talk musch about as he is deep in revision mode for A2's starting Monday and I dont want to upset him. He will have no home at all :-(

[scottswede]

Wow Isthiscorrect that has made me think. When I was travelling and working abroad, knowing that I always had home to go back too was huge for me. It gave the confidence too travel somehow. Even after I married and continued to live abroad, anytime I would go home for visits I always felt comforted.
I want my children to have this security too. I know that home will always be where we are as a family for them.
BUT
I don't and never have felt home here, hence the reason we are moving back to the UK.
I have been On the road since 1988 and yet I still consider the UK home.
I don't have many friends or family left there, it's not financially beneficial and it's certainly not the weather that's drawing me back.
My heart says its time to go home that's all.