Fellow Irish abroad, do you ever think seriously about going home? Or have you?

[FlattenedWhite]

Just wondering whether any of you who have lived away for, say, more then ten years, have seriously considered returning to Ireland, and if you did, how has it been? I've been living perfectly happily all over the world since the mid nineties, but the nagging thought that we might be happier in Ireland occasionally comes up. Especially having had a child who is growing up culturally English in a place where neither DH (also Irish) nor I feel as if we want to stay on much longer, and which got us thinking about how different it would be for him growing up in Ireland. And there are things I get impatient with, like the hysteria about Good Schools and the middle-class parenting angst I've never come across to anywhere near the same extent in Ireland. Not to mention Brexit.

But I'm very aware of the experiences of some family friends who'd lived in the US for years, had two children there, moved back to Ireland and lasted less than two years because they weren't able to settle (plus picked an unfortunate moment of downturn...)

Thoughts? I know it's Craicnet, but the heat is making me gloomy...

Amalfi
You are one lucky duck
Living in Amalfi.
Wow! Just Wow!

hollyisalovelyname

The grass is always greener. There are days I'd sell the DC to be back in Tyrone.......

Like middling and Teddy I feel like I found my home in the UK.
Unfortunately we had to move back last year for my husband's job. We moved to Dublin - I didn't know it at all before we moved here.

So far I find it inferior in every way to our city in the UK - renting here is a nightmare. Everything is very expensive. Healthcare is a travesty.

The only plus sides for me are living near the sea, Manhattan popcorn, and being nearer family (still a 3hr drive away mind you).

I would happily have taken citizenship but at the time we thought it was a big expense and that we'd get around to it at some point. By the time we discovered we would have to leave I didn't have time to organise it. My biggest regret.

Can't you move back to the UK in that case?

Are you concerned post Brexit vote you wouldn't get leave to live in the UK?

Another one feeling at home in the UK. I was born in the UK to Irish parents who moved back to Ireland when I was 8, and I was always looked on with dire suspicion as a West Brit anyway, due to my accent not being local enough. I think I always had one toe in England, and it feels very natural to live here now.

Also, dd is dual heritage/mixed race and even though I know Ireland has changed a lot in recent years, I still think she's less likely to get sideways looks in the UK than she would in Ireland.

squoosh, from my dim distant law studies recollection, the right of Irish people to live in the UK (and vice versa) has nothing at all to do with EU and long predates it.

I thought that too but I don't think anything can be taken for granted until the UK decides what Brexit will actually mean.

Yup, agree with squoosh (and just said something similar on other thread).

The common travel area etc. might pre-date the EU, but that doesn't meant it's sacrosanct. Anything is possible and nothing is guaranteed when it comes to Brexit

Hi all

I left 17 years ago and although I really miss friends and family I don't think I could move back. When I'm here I miss home and when I'm home I miss here. It's a very odd feeling of having one foot in each place and not quite fully belonging in either.

Oh and my DSis has just told me how much she has had to spend on sending her DCs to school - I'd forgotten that you literally have to provide everything school books, stationary, uniform, school tracksuit, indoor shoes, outdoor shoes, photocopying costs and 'voluntary contribution' of €300. I'm surprised they don't ask for petrol money for the teachers car

So much for a state education.

It does make me a little sad to think that DD will start school here in 2 years, in an area where hysteria about schools is extremely high. I also find it strange hearing my 2 year old speak in a properly posh English accent given her very west of Ireland parents! And having to say arr (like a pirate) instead of r forever more makes me all misty eyed!

I don't know what we will do long term but the chances of DH and I getting jobs in same area at home are minimal so likely we'll be in the UK.

Ha Rinceoir, I have a dd who sounds posher than the queen. Given that we live in the north of England and neither of her parents speaks like that, I have no idea where she acquired the accent. (There are a few place names/personal names she only hears on visits to Ireland and she says them in the Irish way, which sounds quite funny in the mix).

One thing I'd struggle with in Ireland is not driving - where my parents live, it's a bus into town once a week and that's your lot. I could probably learn if I had to (she states confidently in defiance of all evidence to date) but it's much less of an issue where I live in the UK, and I feel a bit less like a freak as a non-driver too.

I left Ireland pretty much as soon as I left secondary school and I literally could not wait to leave. Same scenario as a lot of people I was born in the 60's raised as a catholic and schooled by the nuns. I have to say I had a blast as a teenager but just felt the whole place to be stiffling.

I lived all over the world and ended up in London c 1990 . I loved London passionately and had no intention of ever going back but then I started to think I would like to have children.

I was in a relationship with someone from a Ireland and we got married abroad and moved back to Ireland c. 1995. No exaggeration when I landed back I deeply regretted the move. I know I am being dramatic but I felt that the world had come to an end. I was so depressed. I had my first child about a year later, followed quickly by my second. I suppose my focus changed and in a matter of years they were in nursery and then primary school and I started to make friends.

By the time the kids were 2 and 1 I was a single parent and things were tough but I got an awful lot of comfort from being in Ireland and I started enjoying life again. I got a job with crap pay but somehow managed to survive and eventually by the time the kids were older I was on a decent wage and had bought a house (way before the madness began).

It's now 20 years later and I know I would have a much better standard of living if I lived outside Ireland. I do struggle financially at times but somehow cover the bills. My kids have left school and I am glad that I am living on this island.

The thing I love the most is that I speak to people and completely understand what they are saying. I love the sense of humour and I am not an outsider. It is not perfect but this is where I want to be. I no longer want to live anywhere else.

I can't recommend moving back because it is not for everyone. My folks are in their 80's and I can drive to see them. I don't see my brothers and sisters as much as I should but can when I get around to it and love to see them. I suppose that is life.

I went to London for a two week holiday back in 1984 and ended up staying for over 12 years. I enjoyed my time in London but my husband got the offer of a job in his home city in Ireland and we had one night to make up our minds. Our son was born in London and the chance of him to grow up surrounded by family helped us make up our minds for my husband to take the job. We rented out our home in London so that if things didn't work out in Ireland we could always move back.

It took me about 15 months to settle partly because I'm originally from the other side of the country and it took me a while to make friends because I got pregnant within a month of moving back so didn't bother looking for a job then.

I believe my quality of life is much better here for us, we live in a lovely part of our city and it's only an 8 minute drive to our nearest beach, there are a number of beaches within 15 mins drive, 3 - 4 mins we're in the countryside. Our children are in college now and although there are fees of €3000 per year per student about 50% of those attending college qualify for the grants and don't have to pay it.

With regard to religion in schools there are more and more ET schools opening and while religion and a religious ethos is the norm in most schools your child doesn't have to do religion in school and will often be given other work to do, some may go to a different room. In my childrens primary school there were a number of non-catholic children in most classes so the school was well used to facilitating them and that would be the norm in most schools.

One difference I've noticed between catholics in Ireland and the UK is that in Britain is seems to be taken more seriously compared to the catholics in Ireland, by that I mean here the catholic church go along with the whole farce of first holy communion and confirmations ie the majority of families who have a child making their first communion are rarely seen going to mass once they've made their first communion until it's time to make their confirmation and the vast majority will only go for baptisms, weddings and funerals after that. The church here will still let your child make their first communion or confirmation even if they haven't gone to the weekly masses. The has been such a huge decline in people going to mass that the number of masses have been slashed and the vast majority of attendees are elderly. Very few people - apart from mostly the elderly have any respect for the catholic church here, in fact so many people are very vocal in knocking the catholic church.

I think Dublin is very different from the rest of the country, it's a lot more expensive, constant traffic and it seems to be a bit of a palaver to get into certain schools.

There have been huge cutbacks in healthcare so waiting lists tend to be long for some things especially if it's for non urgent procedures so a lot of people have private health insurance.

I'm so glad we moved back but it did take time to settle.

Honeyrider, I laughed when you said you went on a two week holiday and stayed for 12 years. In 1994 I had just moved to Switzerland for a year and it took me over 10 years to get back to Ireland.

I get what your are saying about the farce of going to mass.

Some of my siblings with kids who need to make their communion or confirmatijust go to mass just to tick the boxes - don't get me started on that topic.

I was reared in a suburb of Dublin and when i was going (forced to go) to mass as a child there was hardly standing room in the church. I went to mass in our local church with my dad one Saturday night a few years ago and no joke but there were about 30 people there in a huge church.

Of them I would say 70% were Irish people over 65 years of age and the rest were Polish or Eastern European some of whom some brought their grandchildren. I was completely flabbergasted.

The Educate Together schools are great and no doubt are the future. I am from Dublin and kind of like the busyiness of town. I don't work there so the traffic isn't an issue for me but I get it that it is an issue for commuters.

I think if I had been reaared in the Dublin of today I might have stayed but who knows? My main aim was to get away from the church and the rest of the bullshit that went with it.

The comments about church attendance are so true. In the UK I have to go to mass every week or there's no chance of being baptised, making holy communion or going to a catholic school. The church is packed with young families. When I tell my mum and siblings back home they are amazed and horrified. My nieces and nephews have barely seen the inside of a church yet they will all make communion and confirmation. Many of my friends at home are totally anti church but still go through the motions cause they don't want their kids to miss out on the outfit and the big day

There is huge anti-church sentiment here now, the catholic church has lost it's grip on the younger generations including the middle-aged like myself who aren't afraid to tell priests/nuns where to go and not in a polite way either. After the extent of the child sex abuse allegations came to light you just look at a priest now and wonder is he an abuser. My children didn't go to mass not even when they were making their communion and confirmation yet no problem allowing them to make it. I didn't want them to and offered them money not to make them but their dad who's only been in a church for family funerals and weddings wanted them to so he could keep his parents happy. I think the Kerry Babies and the Anne Lovett tragedies were the start of people turning against the catholic church and it's influence on society.

That is a real blast from the past honey. If I told my teenage daughter about those 2 cases she probably wouldn't believe me or think that I was talking something that happened in the early 1900s.

I had to explain the Kerry Babies and Anne Lovett to a 40 year old male that I know recently, he'd have been too young to have known what was going on at the time. He was shocked to say the least.

I was 10 when Ann Lovett died and it made a huge impression on me. I still think of her from time to time.

I agree Honey, I'm amazed though that despite all the anti church sentiment people still go along with the baptism, communion and confirmation charade. As much as they hate the church they are still afraid to upset mammy and daddy

Some people just have a very deep faith in God and are trying their best to focus on the good that decent members of the catholic church do on a daily basis. It can't be easy for them.

I have no time at all for the frauds who flock to the church just for the sacraments.

I also think of Ann Lovett from time to time.

The reason most people give for getting their children baptised is to be able to go to their local school especially if it's an over-subscribed school.

Somebody, somewhere knows what happened to that poor baby in Kerry.