My partner moved here from the US in 2010 – we met shortly after and married. He never really adjusted to London or the UK, he feels lonely, like an outsider and all in all hopeless. On the face of it, our lives have progressed very well after a lot of struggle. Slowly moved up the ladder in our careers (after a lot of setbacks), managed to buy a flat in London, two gorgeous healthy kids and our latest ‘success’ has been moving out to a commuter town outside of London to our dream house, with great schools. However, behind closed doors, my partner’s feeling of loneliness and being a misfit in the UK has never eased and also recently been exacerbated by a highly toxic work environment. Now that all the visible ‘challenges’ are behind us – getting a house, moving up in our careers etc, this remains the elephant in the room that is getting harder to avoid. His depression (he is on medication/CBT) is getting worse. We/he have tried for years to move back to the US – but for some reason or the other it just hasn’t worked out. His desperation is heart-breaking. He doesn’t want to quit his job and just go to the US to look for a job (reasons being he is not comfortable with the financial instability that would bring), he has tried for years to secure a job from here but it seems to fizzle out in the last round (which has really damaged his self-confidence as well) and he feels we are too far deep in (have a house, both of us working, my parents live nearby). I feel so stuck – I want to ask him to quit his job and just go and we well follow. Am I being naïve to think if we move to a place where he feels he ‘belongs’ his mental health will improve? That we can just go out on a whim and find jobs and restart our lives at the age of 40? Our kids are 5 and 8.