Not been on here for a while because....

[I Love Oz]

Hi guys Not been on here for a while because after we got our visas in December we both didn't get the excitement i thought we would, we have both had a lot going on which I won't bore you all with. so anyway we are booked to come over to Perth in September for 3 weeks to activate our visa and do a reccie. My husband says he is 50/50 on if he wants to go now so I am trying not to stress or worry and have just come to the conclusion of what will be will be. I said we should just go on this trip with an open mind and make our minds up as soon as the trip is coming to an end as we might get back home and think oh well we will just stay here. plan b is to move away from the area we live in now and get a bigger house has anyone else been in this situation where now they have their visa they just don't know what to do for the best. I do believe we have done this for a reason though so that's why I'm am trying not to stress, I just want to know where my life is heading now now ​C x

[Jacaranda]

Well atleast you have made plans for the reccie which is a good start!I think as your OH is undecided,when you are over there,I would not be overly persuasive,but just see how things pan out,and let him make his own mind up.If he agree's to the move,all well and good,and if he does'nt,then a change of address in the UK might be a good option to start somewhere fresh.IMHO you can't lose either way!

[I Love Oz]

Well atleast you have made plans for the reccie which is a good start!I think as your OH is undecided,when you are over there,I would not be overly persuasive,but just see how things pan out,and let him make his own mind up.If he agree's to the move,all well and good,and if he does'nt,then a change of address in the UK might be a good option to start somewhere fresh.IMHO you can't lose either way!

 

yeah very true at least we have a plan b, I'm not worrying about it or trying to think about how much money we may have wasted, I just want to know where we will be now, from thinking about it to our first trip out there to applying for the visa it is a long time and I know a lot can change in a few years. Tbh I'm not 100% myself but it just the not knowing where we will end up, roll on sept

thanks for response

[Rupert]

yeah very true at least we have a plan b, I'm not worrying about it or trying to think about how much money we may have wasted, I just want to know where we will be now, from thinking about it to our first trip out there to applying for the visa it is a long time and I know a lot can change in a few years. Tbh I'm not 100% myself but it just the not knowing where we will end up, roll on sept

thanks for response

 

For it to really work you have to both want it, you don't have to be both 100% certain but I think you both need to be well over 50:50. You are right to try not to think about what has been spent already, I would do the same. I would apply the business thinking of it being a sunk cost, it is gone, keep it out of future decisions.

 

Are you going to spend all your time in Perth? It might be worth mixing that up with somewhere on the East, many people would find Perth a bit slow and would prefer the East were there is a bit more activity. A lot like Perth too, but it can divide opinion.

[I Love Oz]

For it to really work you have to both want it, you don't have to be both 100% certain but I think you both need to be well over 50:50. You are right to try not to think about what has been spent already, I would do the same. I would apply the business thinking of it being a sunk cost, it is gone, keep it out of future decisions.

 

Are you going to spend all your time in Perth? It might be worth mixing that up with somewhere on the East, many people would find Perth a bit slow and would prefer the East were there is a bit more activity. A lot like Perth too, but it can divide opinion.

 

I think this trip should help, yes I have been perth twice and our last trip we also visited Sydney, I know what you mean about Perth being slow but we have been drawn there for some reason apart from some of my family living there. I'd say I'm 70/30 at the moment, I am just probably having the same worries everyone has but like I said I think the trip out there will help, I also think its that fact it's so much different talking about it like should we give oz a go to getting the visa and having to make that life changing decision.

 

How did you feel when you got your visa and then had to book flights? Did lots of doubts start creeping in?

 

I also think this is why I havent been on here for a while to post or to read any posts as i didn't want to start over thinking things again and just thought will just wait till sept and see what happens.

[Guest scrumpy]

Pssssst , Have a look at your avitar :0 )

[Guest The Pom Queen]

yeah very true at least we have a plan b, I'm not worrying about it or trying to think about how much money we may have wasted,

At this moment in time you shouldn't have wasted too much money especially if you class your reccie has a holiday. It's better than making the move, buying cars and furniture then realising you are not 100%.

It is normal to have doubts and question ourselves I think we have all been there

[I Love Oz]

Pssssst , Have a look at your avitar :0 )

 

haha says it all them mind made up

[I Love Oz]

At this moment in time you shouldn't have wasted too much money especially if you class your reccie has a holiday. It's better than making the move, buying cars and furniture then realising you are not 100%.

It is normal to have doubts and question ourselves I think we have all been there

 

 

Thanks I just think I'm worrying as we both have to want to same thing and what if we don't? I guess only time will tell

[Guest guest30085]

Hi I Love Oz

 

At least if you validate, you then have time to weigh everything up. Enjoy your validation trip and maybe just treat it as a holiday, take the pressure of yourselves a bit and hopefully you can come to a decision together rather than feeling something has to be decided there and then.

 

Best of luck

[I Love Oz]

Hi I Love Oz

 

At least if you validate, you then have time to weigh everything up. Enjoy your validation trip and maybe just treat it as a holiday, take the pressure of yourselves a bit and hopefully you can come to a decision together rather than feeling something has to be decided there and then.

 

Best of luck

 

Hi adonna, thanks i think that is what I am going to try and do, like you said takes the pressure off and I want to start coming back on PIO more often i mean where else would someone ask how the get their goat to oz and try and sound serious, ha ha fun times on here when you get a wind up on

[Guest guest30085]

Hi adonna, thanks i think that is what I am going to try and do, like you said takes the pressure off and I want to start coming back on PIO more often i mean where else would someone ask how the get their goat to oz and try and sound serious, ha ha fun times on here when you get a wind up on

 

:wink: well remembered, that was one of the funnier threads.

 

I hope things all come together for you, I would barely mention it but just drop subtle hints to your OH every so often, let it slowly sink in . . I mean about moving to Oz not about buying a goat x

[Rupert]

How did you feel when you got your visa and then had to book flights? Did lots of doubts start creeping in?

 

I also think this is why I havent been on here for a while to post or to read any posts as i didn't want to start over thinking things again and just thought will just wait till sept and see what happens.

 

I often wondered why on earth I had every applied for a visa and sometimes I wished that I had not started it. Because once you have started it, it takes a lot of bravery to stop and say, "No this is not right for me".

 

For us, I think once we got the visa, it was more a case of when we do it than if we do it. We moved within 7 months in the end, although I think if we had not done it quickly and the visa has been lying around for a few years, it might have been easy to just let it expire.

 

We made our minds up to go for it whilst on our validation trip, not really because we were blown away, more that we both got job offers and then we went back to our pros and cons list and we said, well if we are ever going to do this, there will never be a better time than when we both have jobs lined up. So we were both committed to the move, my OH would always have moved in a heartbeat, for me it took longer, but we were aligned and united by the time we got on the plane (figure of speech, we actually were on different planes :biggrin:).

[Guest]

I think anyone moving from the UK that's 100% sure is delusional, neither country is likely to offer everything a person wants (& when you're talking a couple or family no way will either place 100% meet what everybody wants).

 

Validating the visa is definitely the right thing, but I don't know whether the reccie will make a lot of difference to the decision or long-term outcome. There is lots to like when you don't have to go to work and you're staying in a holiday rental!

 

What I would say is be very careful if you are not both equally committed to the move, I have seen too many marriages ripped apart as a result of one person wanting to stay and the other wanting to leave.

 

Four years on and about to head back to the UK, I'd say if it ain't broke don't fix it - if your life needs adventure, have one but don't make it 'forever'. If it does need fixing consider all the ways to do it. Most people wouldn't sell their house, cars etc. quit there jobs and head off to another part of the UK and hope for the best and yet hundreds of thousands do exactly the same thing AND head to a foreign country. There are far less risky ways to make a change in your life.

 

​Good luck whatever you decide.

[Quoll]

Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans. Your next best opportunity might pop up in Australia or it might not and all the way through you have to weigh up the reality rather than the dream and see what is best at the time. Enjoy the holiday!

[lara24]

I think the anti-climax of the visa grant can be a common reaction. It took us 3 years to get to that stage that when it actually happened it felt strangely underwhelming. We didn't really know what to say or do with ourselves. This does not me you don't or do want to make the move maybe just your brain getting used to this enormous change that you are planning. We were slightly different to you in that hubbies employer were willing to transfer him and we were all just waiting on the visa grant so I think we missed out the stage you are at as the wheels were in motion so to speak and stopping that train would have been a very difficult thing and would almost certainly have meant we would never have had the opportunity to move to Oz again.

 

We are now 3 weeks away from flying out, house is sold, cars are sold but not yet gone and container is on it's way with all our stuff. I would say we are now excited and enjoying making plans for our new life but it has taken a while to get our heads in gear. Enjoy your reccie and what will be will be. You are in an enviable position, new life in the UK, new life in Oz or stay put. Perhaps do some research on where you might move to in the UK so you can make a clear comparison of pro's and con's once you have been to Perth.

 

All the best.

[starlight7]

Maybe you are overthinking things a bit. Just do it- you could return after a specified time if you have not settled. Maybe 2-3 years- any less and it is all too easy to just give up.

[I Love Oz]

Thanks for all the advice guys, we are not planning on selling the house due to house prices atm so will be renting it so at least we will have some security here.

 

I am over thinking it but can help it, that's why I've not been on here for a bit just wanted to push it to the back of my mind until sept is here.

 

glad it's not just us who felt underwhelmed when the visa came, this is why this PIO helps so much when people can relate and have already been through the same things and on the other hand you can have family members who just don't get it!

 

I don't want to ever have to say what if.....

[Incata]

I was very excited when our visas came through - now we could tell everyone! We'd planned it an absolute secrecy and I had not been able to tell anyone (other than the in-laws who hit the roof!) It was hard going through the planning alone, but once the visa came in and my husband handed in his notice (thus ending his military career) I could talk about it with other military families and they could share in our excitement.

 

However, it kicked in when I booked our flights, that feeling of "What on earth are we doing? Why are we moving to the other side of the world? What is it that we think we can find there that we can't find here? Why am I taking my two young sons so far away from their loving grandparents? Is this the right thing? Could we make it in the UK? Could my husband make a successful career outside of the armed forces? What happens if he doesn't like being a civilian? What happens if we don't like it? How am I going to fly to Australia with two toddlers on my own? Why did I suggest it? What was I thinking?"

 

As the time came to fly I felt sicker and sicker and sicker. I was terrified about the flights due to the previous flight back from Perth being awful (cue frightened messages on PIO and a lot of reassurance!) I spent the day before getting on the flight in mental anguish about what we were doing, absolutely positive we were making a mistake and I was responsible for messing up 4 lives (those of my children and their grandparents). My life is an irrelevance, I can easily put that right, but I was worried about the lives of those who would be affected who had no control over the decision.

 

I did it though. I got on the plane and got here in one physical piece (although an emotional wreck after the flight).

 

It's been an interesting experience. I see it as a journey with new things to experience and new things to explore. Some things have been difficult to adjust to, some things easy.

 

I got the answers to my questions and I found what I was looking for. We're still moving along the pathway to being settled, but we always knew it would take us 18 months - 2 years before we felt we could call it home, so we aren't there yet but we are on our way. Sometimes we race, sometimes we pause for breath but as someone told me once, sometimes you have to look back, just to see how far you have come. We have mountains to climb but we have climbed many to get this far. Sometimes we stumble, sometimes we fall but we still pick ourselves up, brush ourselves off and take the next step along the path.

 

What I guess I am trying to say is that how you feel now is not necessarily how you will feel a couple of months down the line. Feelings change, what seems like an anti-climax now may well be viewed in the future as being a calm and rational approach to a potential change in circumstances. It could just be, that unlike me, you have it all in perspective and are therefore less likely to make it too big of a deal, or too small of a deal either.

[fifi69]

Oh if we could have it all

all blue skies and sunshine but with our family and friends enjoying it with us.

 

Not until you move will you understand the term ping pong poms. We move, we get the sunshine we crave, but we miss certain things we left. It's hard there is no denying it. It's also the best thing ever to wake up in this gorgeous land.

 

I mean c'mon, in the UK I had a decent job which inloved, lived in a run of the mill semi. Here I have a job that I hate but is bearable, earn more in one week than I did in a month in th UK, live in a gorgeous huge house with pool, minutes from beach and river.

 

​its scary moving, of course it is, but so much better living here

[I Love Oz]

Thanks again for your replies, anyone who would be free to meet up in sept for a chat would appreciate it, me and my husband and daughter will be coming (she will be 21 mo when we come)

 

A few months before we come plan to email some companies to see what works like if they would like cv or to meet up when were out there and try and make some contacts re work, any tips would be welcome, my hubby is a site manager (residential not civil construction)