COMING HOME

[eastandwest24]

More searching for advice than AIBU - but if I need to frame it this way...AIBU to be s**ting myself about the welcome my children will have from the community we left a year ago to move abroad?

We came from a super tight knit community in England and have been living abroad for a year. my kids - who are both primary age with close friends in the UK - and I are coming back for the summer to the fiends and area we left - they have all carried on BAU - while my kids have learnt so much resilience from leaving everyone and everything they know and starting afresh in a totally different culture, AIBU to be terrified of the reception that awaits us in the UK? Will the tween girls be total cows because my DD has been living away somewhere else (which on paper is more glamorous than home, but in reality she just really misses her friends and feels stuck between two camps). we're only back visiting for the summer, but if anyone has any advice on how to manage expectations or navigate the heady mix of resentment, jealousy, loneliness and hormones, I'd happily take it! how do I make this an enjoyable visit, not one filled with tears and worry - TIA!

@pictoosh business as usual I think!

Oh right. I see, yes. Thank you.

Whilst going back home is special for you and your family, it’s not that special an event for everyone still living there.

I’ve lived in a few different countries and I don’t travel back home thinking that I’ll be seen as special because frankly, me leaving was a big deal to me, but not to anybody else in my community. And I come from a small, tight-knit one as well.

Don’t stress. Don’t anticipate people behaving strangely towards you - they won’t. The most important one though - don’t assume all they’ll want to talk about is how your time abroad has been so far. Please don’t monopolise conversations with that, instead show genuine interest in how their lives have been since you last saw everyone. Nothing worse than someone who comes back and feels like they need to share with everybody all the stories and new experiences they’ve had, but they don’t ask anything about the local events since they left.

90% of people won’t care, not because they don’t love you, but because they’ve had their own shit to deal with. Your girls learnt resilience by having to integrate themselves into a new culture - but their friends will have probably gone through challenging experiences as well in the past year, so it’s not like anyone’s year has been more special than the others’.

You're way overthinking. We
Were abroad as kids and came back every summer as it was so hot, slotted back into normal life. No dramatics required.

Also resentment and jealousy? Really?

No one will care where you have been. The girls friendship circle will have changed and they may or may not slot back in . Childhood strengths don’t just come from travel , more from life experiences and so don’t think your children are any different to anyone else to be honest . Enjoy your summer

Gosh this is a very odd thing to worry about and you seem like you are totally superior. I say this as someone who has lived abroad for 25 years and can tell you there will be many ups and downs to come.

I'm not sure you've thought about your kids in all of this? You'll probably decide to move back in a couple of years and really pi## them off by uprouting them in their teens. That's something you need to think about.

If the summer trip is bothering you that much then just don't go.

A friend who had been living abroad for some years, she came back a complete diva having had expat life with a maid etc,

Once home to humdrum town she once complained :

'It's as though everybody has forgotten I lived abroad for x years'

I said, it's not that anybody has forgotten, they just aren't interested in what you did then, they care about the here and now', it doesn't make you more special than anybody else.

She was mightily affronted!

Whose resentment? Your daughters or their friends?

I think you have to lower your expectations in terms of it 'being like it was'.

While I'd be pleased to see you and happy for our children to catch up, I wouldn't prioritise you.

I wouldn't want my children meeting up with yours at the expense of other relationships because you'll be off again at the end of the summer.

So some time together great, becoming best friends, no. Because then my daughter would be upset again come the end of the summer.

As long as you go back with a reasonable mindset I'm sure it will be fine.

If your daughters give across, as you do, the feeling that you are so much better than those who stayed home, then I'm sure they'll have a hard time.

If not, it'll be fine. Presumably you have your own stuff to do while back.

You’ve had some harsh responses here OP, which I think unfortunately reflect the way your post comes across. Whether intentional or not, your post does convey a bit of a tone of superiority when you talk about other people’s lives being ‘BAU’ while your family have been off doing ‘glamorous’ things and ‘building resilience’, and anticipating jealousy from other people as a result. I totally get that you’re just expressing your own worries and fears but it might be worth thinking a bit about how that potentially comes across to others, and what you might be projecting to your daughters ahead of the trip.

Your daughters’ friends and their families have likely had exciting developments in their lives too over the last year, they don’t need to have gone abroad for that to be the case. I’d encourage your daughters to take an interest in what their friends have been up to. Talk about how excited they must be to catch up with their friends and hear all their news, not just ‘I bet you can’t wait to tell Sophie about your big adventure’, if you see what I mean. Don’t diminish the experiences your friends and family back home might have been having while you’ve been away, either knowingly or subconsciously.

FWIW I’ve lived abroad a couple of times and things rarely feel like the big deal you’ve been anticipating when you ‘come home’. If anything it’ll feel disappointingly normal! We might like to think that everyone has been wistfully sitting around thinking about us and envying our glamorous adventures but people have their own lives to lead and honestly, nobody ever cares quite as much as you think they will.

@pictoosh in this context, business as usual means that OP and her kids have been living an amazing life, growing and developing in ways their old friends can’t imagine. Whilst the boring old UK friends have been doing all the same tedious stuff in their boring humdrum little lives.

thanks! this is really useful. I obviously didn't write the post well (writing not my forte) the post isn't about me, but about how my girls will be viewed when back - and the response of - literally no-one will care - is useful!

I'm after advice on how I should manage expectations FOR THEM, it's a big deal for them to reconnect with their friends and they're nervous. Our life isn't more glamorous - as post said, the reality is we just really miss everyone and specifically DON'T want to come across as acting like life has been more glamorous. the BAU reference wasn't meant as a criticism, more as they're literally just getting on with their life -

Dubai a good guess

Just show a bit of interest in their BAU and ask more questions than you answer. I'm sure all will be well.

the BAU reference wasn't meant as a criticism, more as they're literally just getting on with their life
But so are you. Your life is a bit different now but it's still BAU. You're still making it sound like you think your life is now so incredible that whatever your DC say about it will sound like boasting. I really doubt anyone will think it's that exciting or different unless they go round saying "England is awful. We have a pool now and we are so much cooler than you".

What are your children nervous about? My children have friends they don't see from year to year due to distance. They just click back in by just being themselves.

This really isn't a big deal.

Dubai has rubbish weather for 9 months of the year. There's nothing to feel superior about living there. You only changed your mind about how you came across in the OP as everyone disagreed with you.

But why do you think your daughter's friends will be jealous? At primary age I bet they haven't given the kind of life they're living a second thought.

One of my almost 10 year old daughter's friends moved to the Middle East last year and I promise you that it hasn't crossed her mind about her life being better.

They’ve sent her some messages which are sometimes and sometimes mean - specifically about moving

Such as?

Why would they be jealous just because you live somewhere different? I moved away from the UK many years ago. When I go back to visit friends and family (usually once a year), we are just happy to see one another. What a strange post.

If they've been mean then I don't know why you'd want your kids to meet up with them. But, I do wonder if it's been drummed into your kids how they've had this amazing experience while all their friends are back doing nothing at boring home. That's how your OP comes across and if that's rubbed off on your kids and how they write then maybe their friends are bored of hearing about it.

You want them to be jealous don't you.

Like the small-town kid who moves to London and is utterly insufferable on their first trip back home because they're just "soooo london" now

I'm laughing at Dubai being considered glamorous and made them more resilient, yeah that's what a lot of people who move their think, it's not glamorous at all.

I wouldn't move to that misogynistic shit hole for any money.

I wouldn't be jealous of anyone living in dubai.

I would be pretty judgmental of someone taking their daughters to live there though. I guess you would interpret that as jealousy.