3 June 2015
| Last updated on 3 June 2015How Do You Know?
Writer SaltyBug talks about her experience as an expat mother. She shares her journey of always trying to do the right thing for her children.
I’m not sure about you, whether you too are new at this expat thing or perhaps you have been doing it for years. Do you feel it? When you look at your children, when you watch them sleep at night? Perhaps when you lay in bed, you know that time just before sleep where you think about things, sometimes too deeply. Well I do.
I sit here now on the grass watching my children play, and I feel this weight on my shoulders. Some days it is worse than others. The days I feel less capable, less able to cope with the challenge of life in a new country. Those days I feel more guilt, more like a failure as a mother, as a wife, as a woman. Then something good will happen and the children will smile and it turns around again
A lot of thought went into this move. I had to make sure as a mother that this was okay for the children. Our boy needed support back home, would he have access to it in our new country? What are the schools like? What are the living conditions like? Did I think they would transition, how would they cope? The answer was ‘yes’ of course. So many people told me that children are resilient to change and transition, often better than we are. Really? I believed it and carried on worrying about the other stuff you need to worry about when you pack up four lives, and move the cat to a new home.
Now here I am sitting on the grass watching the children play.
From the moment we landed I was desperate for the children to find friends. FlutterBug my 3 year old was having a birthday so soon and all she wanted was a big party like her brother’s back home with all her friends and balloons. The big cake with candles to blow out and presents, FB loves her presents. The guilt engulfed me for weeks. It was hard to find friends so quickly, but we did. In this short time we found two friends, so we had a little party complete with a trip to see fireworks. My FB had a wonderful day. There was that one moment when we arrived though. A moment of sadness when FB realised her friends from home were not here with us, but it was fleeting as she ran off in her pretty new dress to eat Honey Joys. Now we have a broader circle of friends. It is so nice to see small faces light up when I say we are going for a play date.
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In the late afternoon as the weather starts to cool and the sun hides behind the mountains, here in our estate the children come out to play. Our back courtyard opens onto the common garden with the sandpit they all gather in. My children hear, they see and they desperately want to go outside and play. So I say ‘okay let’s go’. The group of girls here have known each other almost since birth. Well established they have their pecking order. You know how girls do. FB is desperate to be a part of this. The Filipino children are so curious about my fair skinned kin. FB begs me to help her ‘break in’ to play, ‘I’m shy’ she says. So I do. ‘Excuse me, may FB please play with you’, I ask politely as FB’s little fingers curl around my hand. A sensation I will never get enough of. ‘Sure’ they say and I turn to FB and quietly reassure her ‘off you go’. FB gets a nervous smile on her face and steps forwards into the fold. I feel relief and sit back down on the grass. I look up and the girls have moved leaving FB behind. Alone, my 3 year old has been excluded and she stands with devastation and loneliness written on her face. My heart crunches, breaks, twists and turns and I feel anger well up. Anger at those girls for their insensitivity. Anger at myself for bringing my babies to this strange place. For making them feel the pain of loneliness, of feeling homesick, at such a young age.
We try again, over and over for several weeks. One day I see the girls playing with their small toys and I give FB a tin of her toys similar in style. ‘Show these to the girls’ sweetheart’, I say tenderly. She does. She’s in. Now I sit on the grass and I watch them play. They seek out my FB when she is absent. They hold her hand and they run around playing games created in that moment. Giggles, squeals of delight fill the air and the guilt starts to fade. For now.
Do you worry about how your children will fit in? Did you give thought to how hard the move would be on them as well as on you? Did you find that the smallest difficulties for you became so much bigger in your new land? That your temper was shorter, that your tolerance was less? That you cried so much more in frustration? Did you feel bad that you felt this way? Guilty that you appeared ungrateful for this wonderful opportunity? Guilty that you were not being your best for your family in that moment? Were there times you asked yourself what this life will mean for your children as they grow? What if this is only the beginning of your life as an expat? I am ready to do this now. I want to travel, live in new places, experience life differently but is that selfish of me? My children need roots, a sense of identity, a sense of belonging. I’ve read the literature. I am aware of what life could become for them.
So what can we do? How can we make this experience so wonderful like I know it can be? The literature says (Third Culture Kids: Growing up Among Worlds. By David C. Pollock and Ruth E. Van Reken. ) to value your child, to help them feel special. Keep them safe and comfort them when they feel sad and confused. Isn’t that what being a mother is about?
I think about how we are all managing this transition. I think about how we are coping with the enormity of establishing new communities and building relationships. What I realise is that there are two things which have helped us the most. First is as parents, making sure we understand the process of transition so we can manage it in a way that is constructive and strength-based. It is allowing yourself and your children to feel what you are going through, talking about it and turning it into something positive.Second is the creation of new rituals which fit into our new world. Sleepovers with the children. The familiarity of special places we return to over and again. Reflecting on special memories from back home. Sending messages to our cat who we miss. Then we talk about the special memories we are making here. The places we have been, the things we have done. The friends we have made so far.
Sitting on the grass watching the children play again I am smiling. I feel we are finally getting through the transition and becoming part of our community. How do I know? I have been handed our first invitation to a new friend’s birthday party, and we have had our first play date at our new home. Life is starting to feel a little more normal.
SaltyBug is a blogger and a curious bug, an explorer if you like. She has moved from, Australia with her husband, son and daughter to take on an adventure in Manila.
