Maintaining relationships once you've made the move...

My husband & I have been in Australia for around 18 months now & are curious as to how other people have got on with maintaining relationships back home?

Our 'closest' friends we have remained in regular contact with but A LOT of other friends, including relatively good ones, seem to be slowly dropping off the radar...it was always us having to ring/text/email them first so we decided to wait for them to contact us & sadly quite a few haven't!

We've found this with family a little bit too! Unless we make the effort we don't hear off them very often. I think it's inevitable when you move so far away it's going to be hard to sustain relationships but having had the shoe on the other foot with friends & family moving overseas when I was still in the UK i personally always made equal amounts of effort to stay in touch with them!

Somebody said perhaps it's jealousy...perhaps they're jealous you live in a warm sunny climate with beaches on your doorstep & endless opportunities...but really? Friends & family being jealous? I struggle to comprehend that.

Looking forward to hearing other people's experiences

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It's not jealousy, you're just not a part of their daily life any more. That's what happens when you live overseas. They've got their own stuff going on, just as you have over here

We have done OK with maintaining relationships, we make an effort with birthday cards and christmas greetings (presents for some) and Facebook does a really good job of filling in the gap in terms of "just keeping in touch". We have gone back twice now (in 5 and a bit years) and planned each trip in a fair bit of detail to see some really good friends for some real quality time - like 3 or 4 days, not just a flying visit.

Actually the last time we were back, lots of people were making vague plans (some of which have become more concrete) to come out and see us. Quite a few of our friends' kids are in their mid teens now and don't really want to go on holiday with their olds any more, so I think some of them feel a bit of freedom to go and do a "big trip" that's so much more manageable and affordable when you're a couple rather than a whole family

I've been here 35 years and still maintain friendship with my old pals. A few now live overseas themselves. I am in frequent touch with my best friend from school days who is in Scotland and friends from my teenage years, some who are still in the UK and some abroad. I was never close to cousins, aunts and uncles but we have always sent cards at Christmas to each other.

Some of my friends have been to visit over the years. There are 5 of us who were very close during our teenage years and we are hoping for a get together in the next couple of years sometime. One is in Swaziland, one in Texas, one in Yorkshire and another in Lancashire. We haven't all been together since 1971.

It's a very normal expat situation, Facebook helps to some extent, but you quickly learn as an expat that you are almost exclusively reliant on your immediate family which can be a good thing as it brings you closer. Friendships take a lot of effort to keep going and eventually you make new friends. Most of our good friends are people who have been expats, are expats or have travelled extensively so we are all familiar with each other's challenges.

We found the same happened when we moved. A few keep in touch via facebook but other than family only 1 ever rings us. I think the out of sight, out of mind statement is quite apt for migrants.

Cal x

More or less dropped the lot over the years- a slow process but attitudes and interests change. I still send a few Christmas cards to very close friends ( ex) but really, that is about the extent of it now. Takes a few years to let go of the past though.

It's not jealousy, you're just not a part of their daily life any more. That's what happens when you live overseas. They've got their own stuff going on, just as you have over here

 

We have done OK with maintaining relationships, we make an effort with birthday cards and christmas greetings (presents for some) and Facebook does a really good job of filling in the gap in terms of "just keeping in touch". We have gone back twice now (in 5 and a bit years) and planned each trip in a fair bit of detail to see some really good friends for some real quality time - like 3 or 4 days, not just a flying visit.

 

Actually the last time we were back, lots of people were making vague plans (some of which have become more concrete) to come out and see us. Quite a few of our friends' kids are in their mid teens now and don't really want to go on holiday with their olds any more, so I think some of them feel a bit of freedom to go and do a "big trip" that's so much more manageable and affordable when you're a couple rather than a whole family

Pleased to hear you've managed to keep things going so well with friends! We're at a stage where most of our friends aren't having children yet & I guess that plays a part in it too! We've some friends who emigrated a few months ago & they seem to be in good regular contact with friends / family as they want to see the kids on Skype etc

We went back at Xmas ourselves & had a wonderful time seeing everybody but have found it's not helped much in regards to keeping up with the contact!

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We found the same happened when we moved. A few keep in touch via facebook but other than family only 1 ever rings us. I think the out of sight, out of mind statement is quite apt for migrants.

 

Cal x

It's a real shame isn't it! There's a group of ladies who I worked with for the 5 years prior to moving here who I was really close to. I don't hear from any of them anymore. They're all actively on Facebook yet none of them interact with me. Yes they respond to msgs but I always initiate them & to be honest they show no interest in our lives etc. Sad but I guess making the move here indicates who your friends really are

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Basically, people get on with their own lives, don't take it personally.

I keep in touch with most via facebook. Speak/message with my immediate family every week or 2, skype when I have my daughter. Phone call with my closest mate every 3 weeks or so, Both of us have intl calls on our phones which helps. He's not on facebook so we normally have a bit to chat about. Been a fair bit of turmoil in my life in recent years and he called me fairly regularly to check I was doing ok, which helped greatly. Our kids are the same age too.

Catch up with all the lads when I go home for a visit though, normally join in their weekly game of footie and of course a few nights out (I'm their excuse ). TBH, most of them have small kids and apart fom Weds night footie, they don't really get to catch up with each other that often. I have a mate at home with no kids and he sees the others about as often as I do. No falling out just different priorities at this stage in life.

It's time to make a social circle locally, your friends at home are still friends but you are just not as relevant in each other's lives anymore.

Sounds par for the course tbh. Having moved around a great deal, including within the UK I didn't for one second expect friends and some in my family to keep in regular touch or visit or anything. Same from my side for many friends.

I use FB a fair bit to follow what is going on (where possible) and make an effort to keep in touch with a handful of friends from over the years who I know don't fade away even if we are not in regular contact.

I had a trip back to the UK about 18 months after arriving here and hardly anyone bothered to get in touch or arrange to meet up. Even with me saying to them I would be in their area for X amount of days and so on. The few that did make the effort are the ones I thought would do so and so since I returned I've focused on those and let the others slide a lot more.

Two of those friends that made the effort are friends from school over 30 years ago, one is a friend I met when living overseas in my 20's and we've kept in touch ever since and the other is someone who I met more recently since having a child. Sure there are a few others who I keep in touch with but I do expect over the coming years to lose touch with them more. Or it to be FB only.

I don't really mind it tbh. I am well used to living away from my loved ones and have been doing so since my early 20's and have had over 20 years to get to grips with it and cope just fine. I also agree with you end up making new friends as you move around and some stick around.

What the eyes don't see the heart can't grieve over. Slowing distancing oneself can be a coping mechanism. I don't Skype al call even very close family. We stay in touch through Facebook, Instagram, email & text but, my life is here now, theirs is there. A chapter over.

You can expect to stay in contact with a very tight group of close friends.

Anything more is a rare bonus.

It's bye bye time for a lot, I'm afraid.

But then again, if you're sensitive to this, and you need that cosy blanket of being around your broad group of old buddies, then a move abroad if not advised....

B

I always follow the idea that wherever you go you make new friends. Really close friendships take a bit of time to develop but these days I tend to just have lots of fairly casual friends and only a couple of the close variety. Sometimes when you get to know people well you find you don't actually like them that much and then you need to disengage with them- maybe easier to be cautious and keep it light in the first place!

I always follow the idea that wherever you go you make new friends. Really close friendships take a bit of time to develop but these days I tend to just have lots of fairly casual friends and only a couple of the close variety. Sometimes when you get to know people well you find you don't actually like them that much and then you need to disengage with them- maybe easier to be cautious and keep it light in the first place!

*like*

B

My husband & I have been in Australia for around 18 months now & are curious as to how other people have got on with maintaining relationships back home?

 

Our 'closest' friends we have remained in regular contact with but A LOT of other friends, including relatively good ones, seem to be slowly dropping off the radar...it was always us having to ring/text/email them first so we decided to wait for them to contact us & sadly quite a few haven't!

 

We've found this with family a little bit too! Unless we make the effort we don't hear off them very often. I think it's inevitable when you move so far away it's going to be hard to sustain relationships but having had the shoe on the other foot with friends & family moving overseas when I was still in the UK i personally always made equal amounts of effort to stay in touch with them!

 

Somebody said perhaps it's jealousy...perhaps they're jealous you live in a warm sunny climate with beaches on your doorstep & endless opportunities...but really? Friends & family being jealous? I struggle to comprehend that.

 

Looking forward to hearing other people's experiences

 

 

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Out sight out of mind iam afraid ...people have busy lives now .

Sad to say ,but some will have forgotten you the moment you boarded the plane .

People are becoming more self absorbed ,and in an era where communication is instant ,people are communicating less and less

I'm an out of sight out of mind gal myself - it's a protective mechanism and saves you picking at the scab of the life you've left behind. That said, I have half a dozen friends here in UK who stood the test of a 32 year absence. Sometimes it was just the yearly letter but when we get together it's like the intervening years never happened- we chat on like the conversation has been going all the time. I've been friends with one for 50 years now.