DH fired abroad - WWYD?

[decisionsdecisionsagain]

Hello wise people. I've NCed for this, as the details are very outing to anyone who knows me.

Earlier this year, we (me, DH and two small, barely school-aged children) moved to a European country for a great job opportunity for him. He speaks the language, I don't, and I gave up my job to come. (It's relevant that wild horses couldn't force me back into that job. I'm in the process of retraining, but my current earning potential is pretty much zero, regardless of which country we're in.)

8 months in, he was fired (a whole other thread in itself! He isn't totally blameless, but certainly no gross misconduct or anything like that - a combination of naivete on his part, toxic corporate politics, and an utter disregard for the disruption caused to us.) Financially, we are ok (no thanks to them!) but professionally and geographically, we are up shit creek.

Initially, we made the decision that he would search for another job here. The reasons for this are many, but here are some:

• our home is London, and Brexit is looming. It seems to me that the worst case scenario is that he is unemployed in London at Brexit. Theoretically, there are more opportunities here, although it's obviously a terrible time of year for job seeking.
• I actually quite like it here, although I didn't want to come, and so does DH.
• The children are at local schools, and picking up another language. This would disappear pretty much the moment we went home.
• We could get our house in London back from our tenants, but getting the children back into their old school would probably be difficult. This would be very disruptive for them, just 8 months after we made the first disruptive move.
• The children have found settling in quite hard, but they are just starting to make friends and feel more at home.

The thing is, we had always planned to go home eventually, and in 18 months or so, I will need to continue my retraining with hands-on experience, which would probably need to be in the UK. So now I am questioning our decision to stay - part of me thinks, why compound our error by staying here, when the original reason for coming (the job) has now disappeared? But the other part of me thinks, if we hold our nerve, this is a way better place to be than London at the moment.

I know you are not me, and I think I feel very differently in this situation to how many would feel, but I want to canvass some opinions. What do you think you'd do? We certainly did not think this move would be a mistake, but it has turned out to be, and my main fear is making another one. So I want to make sure I've considered all the angles and thought properly about what the best thing for everyone would be.

Thank you for reading, and sorry it's so long! I could talk about this shitty situation all day, as my poor friends know only too well!

I would come back to the UK. You're going to come back anyway and the longer you leave it the harder it will be on the children.

You're in Germany? I'd try to stay put. (Although obviously apply everywhere - getting/having a job will need to come first)

I agree with blueskiesandforests about the ambivalence of the German school system, but more and more German parents are beginning to feel the same way, with the result that a lot of very affordable semi-private (e.g. church) schools are springing up which offer a real alternative often, even in quite rural areas. So there's usually an option. And tbh, I wouldn't be that keen to rush back to (some years down the line) 10yos stressed about SATs and Y7s being put into isolation over minor uniform infractions.

You do have earning potential by virtue of your English skills, and you may find your retraining more flexible than you think. Whereabouts are you? Might you think about relocating within Germany?

Companies have to be really, really careful about references, as challenges are not uncommon. I might get an employment lawyer to check his over, IIWY, to be on the safe side. Does it have something like 'stets zu unserer vollsten Zufriedenheit' in?

I just can't bear to tell them it's all been for nothing, but maybe that's a short-term pain for a long-term gain.

Sounds like sunk-cost fallacy. The hard bit of moving homes and schools is already done - you can't change that now and you won't make it more meaningful by staying so that it's "worthwhile".

I know a number of families who have moved abroad for periods of time; it is really, really hard on the children. I think if you now know from experience that you're children struggle with big changes and if you're planning to go back in the next couple of years anyway, then I think if it was me then I would do it sooner rather than later.

anelderlylady yep, absolutely. My 5yo's old class in London have a spelling test in June that they are already prepping for .

We talked about relocating in Germany (we're in FFM - discussed Berlin or Munich) but for me, tentatively, any other move would have to be home. I may change my mind on that, but I'd have to see some hard evidence that it would be the right thing to do!!

Until Feb 2020, my training isn't at all location specific. But in order to "activate" it, IYSWIM, I will have to do further, hands on training. If my German was good enough (I would need to do a comprehensive course, but I'm confident, with work, it could be) I could do it here, maybe maybe. But you're right, I do have some earning potential, but currently no real time to earn in! If DH and I were to revamp how we live, I could make a contribution. These are very useful thoughts - thank you.

anelderlylady stets zu unserer vollsten Zufriedenheit oh yes, it's got all that and more - 4 paragraphs about how fabulous he is. He's taken it all out and sent it back to the company for them to sign, with only a confirmation of his dates of employment. It was weird, and he felt uneasy about it.

Further to what AnElderlyLadyOfMediumHeight said - reference are effectively written in code. Employers all know the code. My bil works in HR and advised me to challenge a reference in which my teamwork was referred to as gut instead of sehr gut...

Ist your DH a native speaker?

decisionsdecisionsagain

References are like school grades:

Sehr gut = 1 (the best)
Gut = 2
Zufrieden = 3 which is satisfactory.

He might be better going to a non German employer if his reference is mainly zufrieden...

reallybadidea yeah, I do have the words "sunk costs fallacy" ringing in my ears at the moment. Although as I said upthread, I do think life here is good (better? don't like to make a value judgement really) than life in London, particularly while they're small.

It IS really hard on children. I don't know why people say otherwise. We know from babyhood that routine is important - regular sleep, food, familiar environment and people - and IME, small DCs don't really even like holidays for those reasons. And yet people go around saying how flexible and adaptable they are.

I would come back.

anelderlylady I don't know exactly what the reference said, but I was also pretty sure it was written in code. It doesn't say anything anymore, so it's a moot point!

I also think you're over estimating rhe Brexit impact, right now it's life as usual. There is no reason he can't apply for London jobs whilst in Germany, the short stint on his cv and his relocation may be hard to explain away.

If you're planning to come back In eighteen months, I'd come back now, it will be much harder for your kids if you wait, and if your husband is employed again what's the likely hood of him wishing to quit.

So I'd make a decision long term, where do you wish to be long term, not short term. Long term, and then make that move.

If you are worried about living in London, why not live elsewhere in the UK? Some lovely places for children to grow up with plenty of space to run around if that's what you're after.

On the other hand Germany is one of the most straightforward countries in which to get citizenship, and allows UK citizens duel nationality. 8 years, a job, a rental contract or home ownership, and a B1 speaking test and multiple choice citizenship test...

Dual nationality and bilingualism would be useful things to give your kids...

School moves faster than in the UK, so they'd have closed the gap caused by starting later and pulled ahead by year 7 and 8...

Obviously it would be hard to leave by then!

Children are very adaptive. Returning to the UK is hardly going to cause irreparable damage to their education. Whilst you are assuming you couldnt get them back into their school, have you actually enquired? It's worth a phonecall or email to the school to start the conversation if you haven't already done so.

A blip on your DHs CV doesn't have to be a showstopper. It entirely depends how he positions the way he initially secured the job (as a new opportunity), how he left it (if you're saying it's definitely not gross misconduct then he could just say his skill set and the organisational culture weren't as good a fit as he had expected), and how he responds (positively) to the new altered circumstances.

The gap in his CV could easily be explained by the need to relocate back to the UK and resettle the DC in schooling again.

For some reason people on here become so fixated on CV gaps as a negative to hold them back, rather than placing priority on showcasing skills, experience and unique value-add.

From that perspective, UK needs to take a leaf from the US book, where plans not working out are not perceived as a failure but reflective of being a great risk-taker and a go- getter, "feel the fear and do it anyway".

If people like Richard Branson and Alan Sugar had taken the "I darent get it wrong" approach they'd never have got out of bed in the morning

It's a lovely place, the air is clean, people are nice, life is orderly, the children have loads more freedom than they did in London, they seem to stay children for longer, there isn't the pressure on them to perform academically - it's very wholesome and fun, and I personally am way happier than I thought I would be. If it wasn't for the job situation, we'd definitely be staying 3 years and probably longer.

Are you/your DH willing and able to take a pay cut to maintain this?

Seems like jobs come and go, another will roll around soon enough. If not at the same level then there will be something your DH can do to keep food on the table, right? Maybe if you pick up some reciprocal kitchen-table teaching of English to local students to begin with i.e. you teach them English, they teach you the same things in German, that would help to get your language skills up and also offer some informal work you could do for a few hours per week to pay for a couple of domestic bills?

I'm a huge fan of quality of life over fat paycheques, and given how much of your pay would be blown in London just meeting living costs, is it really worth it to go back there? I'm pretty biased cos I'm an EFL teacher living in Europe, but my perspective is that the UK is a bit of a shithole that just shot itself in the foot and is now leaking, leaving a trail of crap everywhere, and it's just a matter of time before the hole gets bigger and wider and we start to see some real problems happening.

I'd suggest staying where your kids are happy, healthy, and you have joy in your life, even if it means you earn as a family a bit less money than otherwise. Without knowing your DHs industry I can't comment on where else he might like to work or go, but Germany isn't short of hiring opportunities.

fairenuff I'm not worried about living in London, I love London. I don't need to move elsewhere in the UK. Here, my 5yo walks to school with our 7yo neighbour, climbs trees, will ski, and swims outdoors in the summer.

We know from babyhood that routine is important - regular sleep, food, familiar environment and people - and IME, small DCs don't really even like holidays for those reasons. And yet people go around saying how flexible and adaptable they are.

Please don't bring up your DC to be precious snowflakes where everything in life has to be lined up perfectly and predictably. That just isn't real life. There are billions of people worldwide who have to bring up children in massively challenging circumstances and it gives those kids resilience and resourcefulness to cope with any adversity. The only magic ingredient they really need is love and daily hugs! Everything else is a nice to have in reality.

It seems that you both like it there and want to stay longer so I would suggest looking for a job there first and put a deadline for it; if that fails then you should try getting a job in the U.K. At the end of the day if you need to work for a living you/your family need to be where the job is.

Children are very adaptive. Returning to the UK is hardly going to cause irreparable damage to their education. Whilst you are assuming you couldnt get them back into their school, have you actually enquired? It's worth a phonecall or email to the school to start the conversation if you haven't already done so.

Children are very much not necessarily adaptable, as I have said upthread. I'm also not at all worried about their education - they have learned other stuff here - perhaps not as much reading and maths as I would like - but other useful skills - and I'm sure they would catch up (now. Ask me again when they're 10...)

I have checked with the council about the school. There is no space, and they would be allocated any school that had space, possibly 2 different ones, and when a space came up at their old school they could take it (likely not at the same time, IYSWIM.) It's so far from ideal. However, because it's a London school, there's quite a lot of movement in all year groups, so places would probably come up eventually. But how long it would be, and where they would be in the meantime, no-one can tell me until we physically move back. So it's a question of saying to them, we're moving home! But you can't go back to your old school with all your old friends - you'll have to go to a different one, but probably not forever etc etc.

So academically I'm not worried - but I am worried about the psychological impact on them, no matter how much I try to mitigate it.

I think I would be location neutral and just go for wherever he found a job tbh.

And I agree with the others above that he does need to be seen to be doing something in the meantime. You mention that he can freelance, I’d suggest he cracks on with that ASAP even if only v part time.

Re Brexit, London is in a weird limbo land at the moment. Jobs are going and the housing market is screwed but there’s no sense of panic. I suspect that will change in the next few months as the deadline approaches. For that reason, if he can pick up enough work in Germany enough to pay the bills, I would stay put in Germany and give it six months and see what life looks like then.

If I were you, I would stay. I would jump at the chance to live in another European country for 2-3 years and let dd go to school there.

Could either of you do a job which is not location specific, i.e. something internet based where you work from home? I have a friend, for example, who is a legal PA and works remotely from abroad. And another friend who is a journalist who does the same. Both live in countries where they couldn't get employment locally but they are employed by UK companies and live elsewhere in Europe.

Please don't bring up your DC to be precious snowflakes where everything in life has to be lined up perfectly and predictably. That just isn't real life.
daisychain not at all - I was giving the example of babies liking routine to illustrate why I don't understand this constant assertion that children are adaptable.

I have taken my children away from everything they knew and thrown them into a foreign language enviroment. They're not unusual or special, I'm very aware. Lots of their classmates in London had done exactly that, so my DCs weren't strangers to the concept of people speaking other languages, and now they are children who speak other languages. Part of the justification for doing that was so they could experience a different kind of life - and their horizons and experiences have definitely been enriched by it - permanently, I hope. I also hope that learning to adapt (and feeling they COULD adapt) to a foreign language environment will help them be resourceful and resilient - exactly what I want for them. But they HAVE found it hard, there's no getting away from it. Am I supposed to just ignore that, and tell them to buck up?

Sigh, it's lunchtime, so I have to go and collect the DCs from school (major downside of here - they'd both be at school till 3 in the UK now). Thank you so much to each of you for taking the time to respond. I can't tell you what we'll decide, but you've really given me a lot to think about, and a sounding board for my own ideas, which is so helpful. You really are amazing, and MN is a wonderful resource. I will check back later.

sethis quality of life was a big factor in our decision. And yes, if we restructured our lives, we could definitely earn in a different way. We would just have to decide to do that!