If you google most travel blogs, most of them created by expats or travels, most have a common theme. Happiness. Perfectness. #livingmybestlife. An Instagram search of that hashtag alone is enough to make give my facial muscles a good workout.  Lately, thankfully, there has been a bit of a shift, and people are starting to get a bit more real on the interwebs. Calling out celebrities for using photoshop, requiring sponsored posts to be labelled and realising that Instagram/Facebook/Social Media/name inserted here are all a bit fake. People post photos that capture the ‘highlight’ of their trip, but is that real? Sure, the photo of you in front of the Trevi Fountain throwing a coin in smiling is great but how long did you have to wait to have no other tourists around? Where is the photo of you being flustered/almost in tears because you are lost in a foreign country? Do we do it for the likes? Want to brag about our holiday? Share our lives? That’s a topic for my brain another day.

There is this notion that as an expat, you are supposed to be living the high life. That you moved abroad for a better life, whatever that means. Somedays I guess that’s true, we’ve done things here that we could have never done in Australia, met incredible people and discovered so much more about ourselves. But is that the whole truth? While we still count moving abroad as one of the best things we could have done, it hasn’t been without some pretty low moments.

The notion that is all just clicks straight away, is the biggest load of bullshit I have ever read. I have never felt so lonely in my entire life, than when we moved to Germany. Not when we first moved, that is filled with excitement and wonder as everything is new. But once that wears off? Shit. That is lonely. It feels like the first day of high school, where you don’t know anyone and you’re trying to fit in and be cool, not be too overeager but also not come across a snob. Expect in high school, that goes away. You find a group/s that suit you and that first day fear disappears. But here? It’s like the first day fear just keeps going. Day after day. I honestly have no idea how people do this shit solo. I have never felt such loneliness as I have here, that complete and overwhelming feeling of isolation. Being an outcast. Feeling left out. Being just on the edge of finding friends and fitting in and then, nothing. This indescribable feeling of not being good enough. Of self doubt. Self consciousness. I doubt there is anyone who at some point in their life has not felt that to a degree.

Moving abroad allows/forces you to rediscover yourself. For those that move on the fixed work contract, maybe it’s different. Maybe if you know it’s only for a year you don’t have to integrate and set up a new life. You just handle the year contract and then move back to your real life. Lots of people do this. A year of valuable experience and being able to return to a life you have already set up. Why not? For those that make the move with no real fixed date, fuck it’s hard. We’ve passed the two year mark and we both still have moments of self discovery. Testing what we are capable of, pushing ourselves to the absolute limit and then having no option but to continue on. I have to had to fall apart and put myself together countless times since we moved and it is fucking exhausting having to do it. Husband tells me my face is aging from wisdom. I think from pure exhaustion. (Husband: isn’t that the same thing?)

‘I understood myself only after I destroyed myself. And only in the process of fixing myself, did I know who I really was’ – Sade Andria Zabala

Recently, I got to see people that are so important in my life. People that I have not seen for 18 months. And it was the best. Easily the best visit we have had since we moved (sorry fam) It did hit on another thought that has been floating around in the brain. I thought this was fairly obvious but after reading some blogs and Facebook posts about people upset when returning/re-expatriating, apparently not. Other people continue with their life. With or without you in the country. You are not that important, that they stop their life for you. They will continue to have their hobbies, see their friends and live, just without you. Harsh? Probably. But true nonetheless. I guess anytime you leave a part of your life you lose contact with people. Sometimes intentionally, you have for lack of a better term, outgrown each other (it’s late, I’m tired and coming off a week and a half bender) and the relationship comes to a natural end. *I will find some more eloquent way to write that as reading it back makes me cringe but I’m also hungry.* Other times, it’s intentional. What better way to get yourself out of a shitty friendship that is toxic and stressful than move away? For the record, almost all have occurred unintentionally. That’s not to say that the friendship is irreparable. I’m a pretty shit friend when I live across the road let alone across the world. I have an awful habit of reading messages, walking away and forgetting to reply for days on end. My phone is almost always on silent and I still have no idea how to get my emails to come through on push notifications. I’m also known to cancel plans with minimal notice (thanks anxiety) and still haven’t work out how to express that to people so eventually I end up in a ball in tears because I’ve disappointed them/frustrated them etc. (It is a lot easier to write that and explain the reason for cancelling after the fact. Not the easiest thing to explain to someone while you are having a panic and thankfully most people have been understanding afterwards) Regardless of the reason, it fucking sucks to wake up one day and realize that people that were so important in your life are no longer there.

I’ve rambled enough for the night,  I’m hungry and my brain is fried more than my husbands attempt at halloumi.

Much love,

J x