Moving to another country is usually sold as the adventure of a lifetime. Instagram does the rest, the harbour photo, the new car keys, the kids’ first school day. All of that is real. So is the rest.

This is the honest version. Not because anyone needs to be talked out of moving, most days I’d talk you into it, but because knowing the shape of the next two years makes them easier to walk through.

The first year is a restart

The polite word is “fresh start”. The more accurate one is restart. You’re not picking up where you left off in a slightly nicer postcode. You’re rebuilding the small mechanics of daily life, the grocery shop, the school run, the GP, the dentist, the local cafe, the friend you text when something goes sideways. None of those things travelled with you.

You’ll spend the first few months asking dumb questions. You’ll google things you used to know in your sleep. Where do I find decent bread? Where do I take the kid for a vaccination? Why is the electricity bill quarterly? It’s not stupid, it’s just that one whole layer of competence that used to be invisible is suddenly missing, and you have to rebuild it consciously.

This is exhausting. It’s also temporary. Most people start to feel local somewhere in months 8 to 14. I tell my clients to plan for a year of rebuild and to budget the energy accordingly.

The “accompanying partner” trap

If you moved for someone else’s job, you are in a specific kind of valley. Your partner has a building, colleagues, a calendar, a structure. You have a country.

This isn’t romantic to write about and it’s worse to live through. The fix isn’t grit, it’s having your own thing on the calendar before you arrive, even something small. A course you’ll start in month one. A volunteer day that gets you out of the house. A coach. A book club, if you have to. The structure has to come from somewhere, and it won’t come from waiting.

If you’re moving with a partner, please talk about this before you board the plane. The most painful conversations I’ve had with families are usually the ones that should have happened six months earlier.

Your savings are about to mean less

If you’re coming from a less expensive country, the number in your bank account isn’t going to feel the same on day one. Rent looks bigger. The supermarket is brutal. The petrol pump is unkind.

This is normal. I used to call our first two years an investment, both emotional and financial. We were buying our future life in installments and the installments were larger than the brochure said.

A few honest planning notes:

  • Three to six months of cash, in the new currency, before you start interviewing. This is the most freeing single thing you can do for the first months.
  • Assume your first job will pay less than you’d take at home. A foothold is worth more than a salary in year one.
  • Healthcare differs. Look up the rules for your visa before you land. Some visa types include public healthcare access from day one; others don’t.

If you want the parts of this in more depth, I have written about the isolation and loneliness of moving abroad with family, about the emotional and psychological impact of moving to a new country, about identity and self-esteem in the expat journey, and about what actually makes migrants happy once the novelty wears off.

The rollercoaster is the work

I borrow the rollercoaster image from clients because it keeps proving itself. There’s the high of arriving. The dip of the third month when the novelty thins. The climb of the first real friendship in the new place. The drop of a parent getting unwell while you’re far away. The peak of the first time someone uses your full name without asking how to spell it.

None of this is failure. The rollercoaster is the move. The cars don’t fall off the rails because you went through a low bit.

What helps is having one or two people on the same ride, in the same country, who already know the next dip is coming. Sometimes that’s an in-person friend. Sometimes it’s a coach. Sometimes it’s a stranger from a Facebook group at 11pm.

If you ever want to talk about the shape of your own move with someone who’s actually been through it, not just sold the visa, I’m here. I’ll listen first and tell you what I’d plan for. Honestly, even when it’s not what you hoped to hear.

Suzanne