Aibu to not want to move to Canada

[Sjan82]

Dh and I (early 40s) were lucky with good jobs. We kept the jobs floating and focussed heavily on investment returns for the last 15yrs. We are now able to retire early. (Do we have a FIRE group on mumsnet ?)

Dh wants to move to Canada. A couple of our friends moved there and are really happy. His main reasons are : we get to experience new life, our money goes further and kids get access to North American education and job markets (we have a path to citizenship in Canada). He also wants a change I guess. He lost his mom suddenly recently and the push to Canada became stronger after that !

We almost moved last year but cancelled everything last minute as the pandemic hit. Although I broadly agree with him even now, I’m not totally sure. Things bothering me are: We have to uproot the kids. My daughter is in Y8 at a lovely secondary school and made lots of friends. However, We’ve been to Canada on a few holidays and she loves it there. We have family abroad (asia) and they are double travel time away from Canada :(
I quit my job last month and I’m already struggling with withdrawal symptoms. I don’t think DH wants to quit totally either. He has plans to start a Phd program and move into academics. We are thinking we should just pick low stress jobs in smaller towns so we have quick commutes.

Smaller towns was the plan anyway. Can we not achieve it here in the UK? We are currently in the London-Kent border. We can afford a good size house here, but no where close to what we get in Canada for half the money. The money we’ll save on the house is only surplus, it won’t affect our lifestyle or income, but it could be life changing long term if invested for the kids. Dh says “what’s the difference between moving to Leeds vs moving to Canada”. Hmm, I don’t know!

Sorry I sound totally confused, because I am. I was really onboard and enthusiastic about canada move before the pandemic but now think I just want “normal” like everyone else. My normal is (was?) our city jobs, our old house, our lovely child minder, etc. Two years ago, we hated the 1+ hr commute so much we wanted to move!!

What would you do if you were me? Move or stay? We have time until Jan 2022 to move (if we move after that, we won’t have enough time left on our PR to apply for citizenships).

Option A: Canada. Huge house, friends, mountains, great lifestyle, small town, less congestion, shorter commutes to work, new experiences. This involves uprooting the kids and moving even further from family :(

Option B: stay where we are. Get a nice house spending 1/3rd of our net worth. Local friends, familiarity and Europe holidays. Quicker to visit family abroad. This comes with London commute, congestion etc seriously impacting quality of life.

Option C : Move to smaller towns in the UK. Best of both worlds! Dh doesn’t see why this should be preferred over option A :( We visit family aboard only once a year, it’ll only mean 9+ hours of extra flight time once a year.

AIBU to want option B or C ? I don’t know why though. Just familiarity perhaps.

Thanks all :) We have lot to think about !

@PandaLady There are no jobs in our sector where we live now. We are still testing waters with retirement, so we definitely want a decent job market nearby for the next few years.

Your comment 'much wants more' is totally inappropriate and irrelevant in my context.

I think you just need to work out what is your motivation for moving when you have a very lovely life in the UK? Relocating 1000s of miles is really hard and there has to be a tangible reason as to how it will significantly benefit you and your dh. It will really impact your kids in a huge way too.

My brother and his wife emigrated to Canada but his wife has family there. Having her Mum and sisters close by has made the fact my brother can't find a job and my sil is still on a temporary contract two years down the line much easier to cope with. It hasn't been easy but they knew absolutely why they wanted to do it.

It would be A or B for me, as if you are going to have an upheaval and significant change it would be to Canada not some small town in the UK.

Lucky you for having the choice. Most of us do not have it now that even migration to EU countries is not available.

Another major point DH makes is, if we don’t like canada, we could always move to the US (have lots of family there). Canadians move to the US on TN visas in our field of work and it’s fairly popular. We need Canadian citizenship for that though (3 yrs).

But you don’t want to move your kids to yet another school system, do you?

So you’re not likely to move to the US until your kids have finished high school, at which point they are Canadians.

I emigrated to the US when mine were little. They are very much Americans now, making it less likely that I will move abroad again.

I think if you're going to do a huge move like this then you've both got to really want it - or at least both be totally on board with giving it a wholehearted try - and from your posts it doesn't sound like you're at all convinced that it's the right thing to do. Based on that, I'd go for B.

DH and I have lived in the US and that was a really big upheaval, even though he's from there and knows how everything works. It's hard getting to grips with a new culture, new city, the tedious bureaucracy of expat living, having to learn how to do all the basic things - who to talk to, how to get things hooked up and sorted out, what not to do, it's endless. When we moved to the US it took me five years to feel at home there. Five years! And of that it took a good 1-2 years to get our life set up the way I like it - to find a good doctor, a good job, someone who does my hair the way I like, some fitness classes I enjoyed, to make a few friends and feel at home - it was exhausting! Then you've got your DC to consider, that loooong trip to Asia to visit your family, and actually the lack of anywhere nearby to go on holiday. That's one of the major reasons we moved back - we'd done all the places that were within easy reach and we missed having Europe on our doorstep so much. It's all very well having a lake, or a nice ski resort within a couple of hours drive, but if everything else is a major expense and many hours on a plane away it's easy to feel a bit trapped.

A good friend of mine moved to Canada and married a Canadian guy - it was her dream to live there. They got married and had two kids and now she's stuck there, 9,000 miles from home ... she'd do anything to move back now, but her DH's job is something that doesn't even exist here.

@ZZTopGuitarSolo

Another major point DH makes is, if we don’t like canada, we could always move to the US (have lots of family there). Canadians move to the US on TN visas in our field of work and it’s fairly popular. We need Canadian citizenship for that though (3 yrs).

But you don’t want to move your kids to yet another school system, do you?

So you’re not likely to move to the US until your kids have finished high school, at which point they are Canadians.

I emigrated to the US when mine were little. They are very much Americans now, making it less likely that I will move abroad again.

Same here, ZZ, DD (16) definitely wouldn’t move back to the UK, DS is more amenable but effectively I’m stuck here if I want to remain in the same country as them when they’re adults.

@PicsInRed

I remember that thread.

That poor woman.

Stuck in NZ having been duped by her liar husband to move there.

A very sad read.

I wonder what happened to her too.

[quote billy1966]@PicsInRed

I remember that thread.

That poor woman.

Stuck in NZ having been duped by her liar husband to move there.

A very sad read.

I wonder what happened to her too.[/quote]
Watching her hoping and strategising and basically going through the bargaining stage of (what I knew as a Kiwi to be) an utterly hopeless situation... God it was so dreadfully sad.

I still think of her and hope she got herself and the kids out and home.

I wouldn't move to Canada, women's rights have been decimated there. And the way they treat the indigenous people is a disgrace.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/07/canada-indigenous-women-and-girls-missing