to miss London so much even though we live in the lovely town of Horsham? :-(

[Lostandlostsomemore]

Everyone keeps telling me I'm mental.
We were living in a tiny 2 bed house ( with 2 toddlers ) with a patio in sutton and now live in a 2 double bed house with a massive garden and drive for the same price ( renting ) but I just miss London.
Well Sutton to be exact.
I know it had it's problems, schools were a major concern for me as they were all 3 intakes a year and some were struggling with the change of the amount of non English speaking children and we have the perfect school here for my daughter to start in September but it just doesn't feel right.
Everyone is very well off and are always astounded that at 33 I'm still renting but that's the card I was dealt so no point moaning about it. I hate having to drive everywhere, even into town is 2 miles so too long for the 3 year old to walk unless I have an hour to do it with all the stopping and starting.
Even parks aren't close together so you find yourself driving from one to another so we are spending way more than we were in petrol plus my husband lost London weighting so weighed up we are worse off financially.
Luckily I've found a part time evening job to top us up however that just feels like I'm missing time at home to accommodate this new life that I hate anyway.
My husband doesn't want to go back now, crime rate / gangs as a few stabbings happened just before we moved last year and really enjoys the green space / fishing etc which growing up in battersea I'm not used to nor do I like!
Biggest problem is obviously all school allocations have now been made so the school we would get if any would be terrible no doubt and we are signed into a tenancy until December so it's all just a massive mess.

I absolutely love it here, I used to live in a much larger town and it was dire. Horsham is a great place to raise children.

I'm going to be keeping an eye out now for fellow mn in town.

There's loads of us here. It must be a very MN town, whatever that means

Another one raised in Horsham here! My parents still live there, and the town is changing and expanding. There are frequent buses and a lot to do! The schools are also exceptional. Do try and give it a chance. There are heaps of children's groups and the cinema, lovely park, bowling alley and shopping. Also a new John Lewis at Home and big Waitrose have just opened - what more do you want?
And snarf at moving to Crawley.

You should all have t-shirts printed with "Sutton is a shithole"

Shall we all go get our free coffee at the new John lewis one day? I miss waitrose, the old one is opposite my work and we miss the sandwiches

OP, your situation is very similar to another MNer who made the same move as you and has posted about it here a lot. Maybe you could organise a MN meet up for Horsham, meeting some friendly people could be just what you need.

Ooh grinch were you in the Carfax? You must be either an estate agent or a barista!!

Haha neither! piries place, I'm staring at the donkey statue as we speak

op get a babysitter one night and I'll take you to shelleys! '-or whatever it's called now--

:) thanks for your help
Neighbours have made a few comments I've over heard about this being a rental house ( the only one in the close ) so maybe that's not helping.
It just has an air of snobbery which obviously Sutton did not!

ignore those neighbours lost, sad fuckers to be making comments like that.....
It is a v dull middle class town IMO, but there will be an upside as well. You just have to find it.

Confusedmartie999, look her up, your situations are very similar.

It is a bit snobby, granted, but only in some places. People are v friendly I always found and it isn't dull if you make the effort to integrate.
Grinch you either frame pictures, mix cocktails or sell lovely clothes!!

Some people can be snobby but I think you'd get that anywhere. I do indeed do one of those things --that isn't the first two-.

I can see the similarity but she wants to move to Bognor Regis for more room and cheaper rent.
At the minute I would clean the streets to earn enough to go back :(

Also your neighbours might have been saying ''ohhh yes it is a rented house' without intending any offence to you personally....just passing comments.

I think you are just finding it hard to accept change. I recently moved from South london to North London and it feels strange. I know it's still all london but i just feel alien i have to get use to everything again. I think you will settle in soon

Op if you like I'm more than happy to meet you for a coffee one day and introduce you to some of my friends if you like? I promise we aren't snobby at all.

Do bear in mind that even if you were to move back it wouldn't be the same as before. What did you used to do with your dc that you feel is no longer possible? When dc are at school you won't have to walk them into town.

Msgrinch
This must be affecting me more than I thought as I read your post and burst into tears!
A coffee would be fab, maybe it's just that I know nobody and even had I moved 10 mins up the road from where I lived before I would feel cut off and isolated.
The neighbours comments were def not like that believe me, it was " oh yes they're the new neighbours more renters in their 30s and her husband isn't English by the looks of things "
And they've never said a word to us since December, even when the kids have waved at them. Believe me when I say how bad it is.

Horsham seems to get a lot of threads on MN, who'd have thought!!

Op Sutton is not somewhere I'd like to live, I agree with you about schools being full to bursting there and a lot of English as an additional language children. I think you need to give your new area more of a chance, see if you can make some more friends, join clubs etc

Sussex is quite multi cultural so I'm about racist comments, I've never heard any.

And the things that aren't possible are just things like walking to the big parks ( we are North Horsham for locals info ) as the ones we have near are quite small.
Constant driving and spending money on petrol just to get them to pre school ( and school come September as school is other side of town )
Cheap cinema tickets on the weekends that most big towns do ( I know Crawley does but by the time I've paid the petrol it's no longer as cheap! )
Had to take the little one to hospital a few months back and had to go all the way to redhill instead of what used to be a 5 minute cab ride if needed
Just little things I guess but they're all adding up

" Sussex is quite multi cultural "

eh? how did you come to that conclusion?
My friends son who looks rather southern European suffered serious racist abuse at his lovely school in Sussex....

Maybe it's because my children are mixed that the comments are picked up on more easily by me as obviously is a worry living in an area that they may not be accepted