Our flat has sold, we're about to leave London and suddenly I've got the Fear. Positive stories needed!

[LadyBiscuit]

Is this plan sensible?

I am going to hand in my notice in a few weeks and hopefully freelance and have a better work/life balance living in a cheaper area of the country by the sea (buying house mortgage free). I am fairly sure I can get enough work to keep going - I have some promised - but obviously nothing is certain. But I have savings so we can live for a couple of years off those if needs be.

The schools are much better where we're going, I will be around for the school gate and assemblies which I can't be if I stay here and I think our quality of life will be better.

So why am I feeling all wobbly?? I need reassurance that this is a very good idea and we will live happily ever after please

yes I see if it all depends on you financially, soically (getting the ball rolling) and all the rest it is soemthing different to two adults moving and setting up home elsewhere.

I think it sounds a lovely place to live. I've been round there (many moons ago) doing the rounds of little bric-a-brac type antique shops and stopping for tea and scones here and there. It was really nice. Seemed very friendly, nice chatty people as I recall. Hard to say how it is when you are resident as opposed to someone to sell things to.

I could imagine it is a nice place for a boy to grow up. Teenagers don't need to be difficult (this is my mantra- I am trying to convince myself of the truth of it!).

We have just moved out of London. 2 months down the line I think it has been a great move. The children are really happy and everyone is very friendly, far more so that in London. Have also found loads of people who mave made a similar move out, so there are lots of similar people around. You will be fine.

I moved out of London and to the deepest countryside and went freelance.

I do feel out of touch with modern technology now - ipods etc totally passed me by. My friend recently said she'd misplaced her eyepencil, but in my head i heard 'i-pencil' and thought it was just another piece of technology that i'd missed. Pondered for ages about what it must be for.

But apart from that it's fine. Today I spoke to a man called Ray who plays the hurdy-gurdy at barn dances.

Thank you all - you are really helping me to get over the wobble

I appreciate that you are having an entirely understandable wobble about a major change in your life but honestly, we are all still humans in the country you know.

All different kinds, shapes, political persuasion, religions.

We have the internet. Newspapers. Television. Theatre. Music. Art. Restaurants.

When I go to London I am constantly amazed at how people are suprised that I have never actually lived in London. I think they are surprised that I look and sound quite like they do actually.

Anyway, everyone you meet will have recently moved out from there anyway, I live in Wales and the last three people I have made friends will used to live in Dulwich.

I'm sure you are HC I'm more worried that people will think I'm weird than the other way round if I'm honest

at i-pencil!

No no, they will think you are nice.

Sorry I was a bit chippy. It is a sore point with me. I visit London a lot and am often patronised talked to at parties as some kind of curiosity for never having lived in London. I described where I lived (beautiful and ten miles from a shop) to one bloke and he stared and asked if I lived there by choice

Don't worry about it HC I grew up in the back end of beyond so I don't have the 'I'm-from-London-and-am-cooler-than-you' thing I promise. Plus being from overseas and that. But yes I can imagine that's very annoying. (I am moving somewhere with shops. I don't think I could cope without that yet )

give you ten years and you will be generating your own electricity by windmill and making clothes by spinning wool from your own goat

HC, it is a bug bear of mine too! I have a friend who lives in London who thinks herself to be wonderfully cool and cosmopolitan yet her total disregard of anything beyond the city walls is more blinkered, closed minded and intolerant than the attitudes she so sneeringly believes are held by all non-London bumpkins!

Gosh I am dying to know what Rube said

oooo-ar get ye buggery arse orf moi land you feckin lunnun caaahhh

Probably something like that. As long as some of the natives are welcoming, I'm sure I'll survive. And they're nice to DS more importantly!

Ok, I did this a couple of years ago. For me the freelance work completely snowballed... then tailed off... then is building up again. So, based on that, here are my words of wisdom!

• don't panic when you don't have work, because it will come. Use that time to get out and do stuff/meet people, rather than endlessly searching for work, because you need to make connections in your new town/village.
• don't panic when you have too much work. it will ease, and you will have the seaside to chill out by.
• go back to london to see friends, get a decent haircut, buy nice shoes etc etc...
• but don't hanker after it too much. Do things you can only do where you live NOW - fly kites, paddle, take up a new sport or hobby.
• make a lot of effort to meet people. It takes a surprisingly long time to make new genuine friends, but they will come.
• expect a flurry of interest from family/friends wanting to stay when you first move. Then expect it to become increasingly difficult to arrange weekends etc for them to visit. See point 4.
• shop locally for food, shop online for clothes (whistles, kurt geiger, hush, we love you....!)
• buy wellies. carry a cheque book.
• never slag anyone off until you're sure they don't know the person you're talking to. EVERYONE knows everyone where i live.

30andMerkin - thank you so much for that list. Extremely useful. I shall pin it above my desk

Have me over to visit, that will help

I am who you think I am cyteen - blown my cover You are welcome any time - please come and visit us. Please!

Not moved out of London,but have moved around a lot and had to start again - it will all be fine - you're only an hour away for visits but so many other benefits - good luck

We relocated from the outskirts of London to W Sussex 9 days ago - and we LOVE it here! Just wish we had done it years ago. Better choice of schools, more relaxed ambiance, it's quiet, great infrastructure in the town, really friendly folks, lovely parks, I could go on ....! We swapped a bigger house for a smaller house in our preferred location and are much happier. I did, like you, feel terrified beforehand, especially in the week leading up to "the move" - lots of wobbly moments, tears etc. All of which was unfounded in the end. Good luck - go for it!!

Wow - we put ourselves in a far worse financial position by moving (now paying rent AND mortgage ) so jealous of your set-up. But despite financial woes (and the fact our income is a third what it was!) I am still grateful every single day that we are no longer in London I was there 13 years, DH only about two, moved two years ago while heavily pregnant.

Yesterday I paid for postage in the PO with an IOU because I forgot my purse Oh and all our neighbours sent us Christmas cards three months after we moved in. I never got a card from a neighbour in five years in London!

Do it do it do it and never look back

PS You don't have to go back to London for a decent haircut either

Depends where you live Dita - if I were a lamb I reckon I could get a good shearing around here, but layers... not so much!