How to handle reluctant kids!!!!

[Gbye grey sky]

i relate to this. I was 11 when we came to australia. My family had a vote and I lost 5 to 1. Looking back I'm sure my parents were doing the best for their family at the time. Australia has been good to me financially but it doesn't make up for the loss of my extended family and the life we would have had in England. I still feel English and can't wait for the day I can resume my life back in the UK.

 

Seriously, you cannot possibly know the life you would have had.

[foolboy]

I don't know what kind of life I would have had but it doesn't change the way I feel. I was born in England I'm very proud of where I come from. All I know is that I am very English. I miss the English countryside English chocolate the snow proper football. It's who I am. When a parent takes their child to another country they are taking a risk their kids won't like it. My dad made the decision to come here for him it as all worked out fine.The rest of the family haven't been as lucky. I've lived the life I was given but it won't change the fact I would have preferred to stay in England. I think the OP should be congratulated for thinking about her child. I wish my father had done the same before we came here.

[Celt Down Under]

I don't know what kind of life I would have had but it doesn't change the way I feel. I was born in England I'm very proud of where I come from. All I know is that I am very English. I miss the English countryside English chocolate the snow proper football. It's who I am. When a parent takes their child to another country they are taking a risk their kids won't like it. My dad made the decision to come here for him it as all worked out fine.The rest of the family haven't been as lucky. I've lived the life I was given but it won't change the fact I would have preferred to stay in England. I think the OP should be congratulated for thinking about her child. I wish my father had done the same before we came here.

 

So, why are you still here?

[vickyplum]

i relate to this. I was 11 when we came to australia. My family had a vote and I lost 5 to 1. Looking back I'm sure my parents were doing the best for their family at the time. Australia has been good to me financially but it doesn't make up for the loss of my extended family and the life we would have had in England. I still feel English and can't wait for the day I can resume my life back in the UK.

 

I see in one of your other posts that you have been in Australia since 1978. I don't doubt you are looking forward to returning to the UK and all it has to offer, but I don't think you can resume a life in UK, that has been "paused" for 36 years. Maybe looking at in a different way or labelling it differently would be more accurate!

 

A lot has changed in your absence and it will be exciting to explore old areas and find new ones, but at the same time, "the past is a different land".

[mattster155]

We were in the same position 20 months ago now. My son was 13 and seemed ok with the whole migration thing until his last day at school and then it all went down hill especially when we landed in Singapore. I think you may need to prepare yourself for some turbulent times ahead. We've had anger, tears and home sickness and its been a very unsettling journey for him. Those first few weeks starting High School were one of the real low points that stick in my mind, he found that not everybody was as nice and friendly as he was led to believe. I'd say it took a good six months to settle at school and find some good friends but he doesn't have the same connection as his friends that he grew up with in the UK. We went back to the UK in August and it probably wasn't the best decision however we had to return for a family wedding. Seeing him reunited with his friends bought a lump to my throat and did make me think what we'd put him through. However he is now doing brilliantly at school and has a good network of friends and he's busy out and about most of the time. Saying that we came back from our trip feeling very unsettled and have been discussing the pros and cons of living so far away from our family. My son now nearly 15 is adamant that he will return to the UK when he is 18. I know a lot can change between now and then but I'm not keen on the idea of being so far away if he did decide to return. My daughter however was 10 when we came and although she did suffer with occasional bouts of homesickness now loves living in Australia and has no desire to return. I think there are cultural differences between teenagers in Australia and teenagers in the UK some good some not so good. Schooling is very different and I find education here a bit behind the UK. All I can say is good luck and try and listen to how he's feeling and offer plenty of encouragement and understanding, it's a difficult age without having the extra stress of moving to a totally new country that just happens to be a long long way away from everything they have ever known.

[Guest]

My son was only 5 when we migrated but was adament he did not want to go. We took absolutely no notice of course and did what we thought was best for our family. We stayed for 5 years and he never changed his mind! I wouldn't say he was unhappy but his identity was firmly Scottish even when my OH and I were 'Possies'. At 7 he said he wanted to go to college in Scotland and he was so distraught when I rather flippantly said he better start saving his pocket money because we wouldn't be paying, that I had to backtrack and say 'if you still want to do that when you're 18, we'll find a way'. Secretly hoping of course he didn't!

 

It wasn't instrumental in our decision to return but it made it easy and he has never looked back. It was our 6 year anniversary of landing in Australia yesterday which we now celebrate as 'thanksgiving day' - a reminder to be thankful for what we have - and my OH asked our son if he was glad he had lived in Australia and his answer was a clear 'Yes' so not a wasted experience.

 

What I would say is it isn't about the reality, it is a mindset - if your son decides he isn't going to like it, you're going to have an uphill struggle and at 13 it will be difficult to untangle it from normal teen angst. There have been many people on this forum like foolboy who well into adulthood believe their lives have been blighted by their parents decision to migrate. Believe is the important word - the chances are their lives would have been little different, parents are far more important than place but it is the belief that damages them (& I saw that in my son).

 

I don't think Quoll is being 'anti-Australian' - the reality is, if you live in Australia your son would need to do his higher education there unless you're loaded and can afford international fees. At 18 he could choose to opt out of education and return to the UK and if that's a risk much better to enter the UK education system at 16 (if he's academically inclined). At 16 you can do GCSE's in a year and then A levels in two, giving the 3 years residency required for Uni.

 

For everyone that thinks their parents ruined their lives there are probably at least 4 others that thank them and there is no way to know which way it will go. Just don't kid yourself or try to convince them that it's for their benefit.

[Jacaranda]

To us it is important to do our best to make our daughter happy about the move. She has had wobbles and will have more no doubt nearer the time. It is vital to us though that she does not feel she has any influence over the decision itself as if you give kids that kind of power they will try to wield it. But then again we do not have much family anyway and have little to do with them so that is not a factor for us. I'm amazed that as parents you gave your kids power of veto over where you as a family should live but each to their own.

I did'nt give the kids total power.I did'nt say to them "Look you can actually decide where we live"What I did do was (1)Discuss it with them alot and (2)Actually kept an open mind because at the end of the day,moving/emigrating is'nt the be all and end all,and had they resisted,I would of gone to plan B.Maybe because I had actually gone through this myself as a kid,I was more sensitive to my kids happiness.I was'nt in the mind set of thinking "S*** we HAVE to move to the UK otherwise I will never be happy again"We agreed to give it 2 years and discuss?Which we did,and we were all happy to stay in the UK.I was brought up in a different era though,kids should be seen and not heard,which turned me very rebellious!

[Gbye grey sky]

I did'nt give the kids total power.I did'nt say to them "Look you can actually decide where we live"What I did do was (1)Discuss it with them alot and (2)Actually kept an open mind because at the end of the day,moving/emigrating is'nt the be all and end all,and had they resisted,I would of gone to plan B.Maybe because I had actually gone through this myself as a kid,I was more sensitive to my kids happiness.I was'nt in the mind set of thinking "S*** we HAVE to move to the UK otherwise I will never be happy again"We agreed to give it 2 years and discuss?Which we did,and we were all happy to stay in the UK.I was brought up in a different era though,kids should be seen and not heard,which turned me very rebellious!

 

Fair enough I suppose but if we had presented our daughter with a choice to stay in UK or go to Oz she would have chosen to stay. Issues like not seeing her UK friends again would have been paramount even though at age 10/11 we know she would most likely drift away from those friends anyway as they all end up in different Prep schools. We know that she would not have understood that or that she would make new friends quickly in Oz (she is good at making friends) and would prefer the familiar to the new (we have lived in the same house all her life).

 

So as parents we would either have to respect that decision and stay in the UK or over-ride her and tell her we are going anyway. It would have been the latter in our case so would have made the situation far worse as she would have an illusion of choice in the matter. If it had been the former then we would in effect given her the power of veto over what we wanted to do. If we had tried reasoning she would have dug her heels in.

 

As it is she has always known it is a fait accompli; children like and need certainty IMO. We were able to do a recce and she has chosen her preferred school which we were happy with. She is both excited and a little nervous about it now (same as us essentially though we don't let her know that we are a bit nervous too).

[Jacaranda]

Can I ask posters this?Ok,what if you were to wait for your kids to be say 18 and make up their own minds?Because basically from how I'm reading this,if your kids resisted,you're going to do it anyway right?So why not give them the choice as adults?I'm asking this in a curious way,not an angry way btw!lol

[Gbye grey sky]

Can I ask posters this?Ok,what if you were to wait for your kids to be say 18 and make up their own minds?Because basically from how I'm reading this,if your kids resisted,you're going to do it anyway right?So why not give them the choice as adults?I'm asking this in a curious way,not an angry way btw!lol

 

Because if she was 18 and said no then we could not go and leave her alone in the UK. We would also have to wait 8 years for her decision. It would in effect be giving our child a veto. As a parent we are responsible for your child's well-being but not beholden to her every wish.

Edited November 24, 2014 by Gbye grey sky
Typo

[Jacaranda]

I think I'll leave it there GGS,but I do respect your views,and I hope you respect mine!:cute:

[Gbye grey sky]

Certainly Melza. We both have our family's interests at heart. :wubclub:

[Guest]

Fair enough I suppose but if we had presented our daughter with a choice to stay in UK or go to Oz she would have chosen to stay. Issues like not seeing her UK friends again would have been paramount even though at age 10/11 we know she would most likely drift away from those friends anyway as they all end up in different Prep schools. We know that she would not have understood that or that she would make new friends quickly in Oz (she is good at making friends) and would prefer the familiar to the new (we have lived in the same house all her life).

 

So as parents we would either have to respect that decision and stay in the UK or over-ride her and tell her we are going anyway. It would have been the latter in our case so would have made the situation far worse as she would have an illusion of choice in the matter. If it had been the former then we would in effect given her the power of veto over what we wanted to do. If we had tried reasoning she would have dug her heels in.

 

As it is she has always known it is a fait accompli; children like and need certainty IMO. We were able to do a recce and she has chosen her preferred school which we were happy with. She is both excited and a little nervous about it now (same as us essentially though we don't let her know that we are a bit nervous too).

 

We moved back to the UK when our son was about the same age with a similar rational. As much as I loved his school in Australia, he would have been leaving next month anyway and his little class of 14 would have been pretty much going to 14 different schools.

 

I think knowing the school they are going to makes a big difference, even though my son very much wanted to move back changing schools is still a big thing. Once he had been accepted into the school, his teacher to be arranged for each of the children to write him a letter and send a photo. He then wrote one back, it was a lovely way to start - he felt like he knew them a little bit before he started.

 

FWIW I think it is perfectly okay, in fact advisable to let your kids know you're nervous and excited too. These are normal human feelings and admitting you have them too makes them feel you really do understand.

[Quoll]

Unusually you are letting your own anti-Oz sentiments cloud your judgement here. Would you advocate sending a 15 year old away from his parents to Australia to complete his education with extended family? I would never agree with giving a teenager that option. It seems an appalling suggestion to me advocating breaking up the family unit. Kids of that age and younger are notorious for wanting or threatening to leave home for the most spurious of reasons.

 

Not anti - Aus at all, I always aim for pragmatism. At 15 they'll be better prepared to say where they fancy their future and, pragmatically, if their aim in life is to go to UK then they're better doing it at that age than 2 or 3 years later. We were faced with an opportunity (which sadly didn't eventuate) when my lads were 16 and 13 and we were planning on leaving them to board because disrupting their education wasn't a go-er. I wouldn't have stopped doing what I wanted/needed to do and generally the kids would have gone along for the ride but not if their education was at risk. I'm not even saying that you promise a 13 yr old the choice to return and chances are that he may like it and not even think of his old life but quite a lot (it seems to me) of teenage kids do struggle to fit in and if they've given it a fair crack of the whip but it's obviously not working then with the advantage of a bit of maturity you can consider other options. Theres a better than even chance that the OP's lad will be just fine. What I don't get is the need to be inflexible and force a kid to stay in a place they don't like if there is a safe and rational choice to do something else. By moving to the other side of the world, you've already fragmented the family so why the imperative to stop your kids doing the same and fragmenting it further? If they don't do it at 15 then they may well do it at 18 anyway. I don't think this is about chucking a tanty and making the family change their minds and giving them that sort of power.

[Que Sera Sera]

I think between the ages of 15 and 18 is when they do their most socialising this is when friendships with the opposite sex starts and this in itself is more likely to keep them in one place. In an ideal world I wish I'd done it when my two eldest were much younger and actually had my son in Australia but we didn't take the plunge then ( annoyingly) but we did what we could and what we genuinely thought was best for our kids. You can't spend your life expecting your kids to stay in one place with you. One day they may well leave and emigrate anywhere in the world. You then are left wondering why you didn't live where you wanted to. My son is saying at the moment (13) that he wants to live in America when he's older, I'm sorry but Im not taking that as fact at the moment but if it happens well good for him. Nice place to have a holiday. My two eldest both now live in Brisbane and my Grandaughter, I've lost count of the people who've said ' Why don't you go over there to live? Well no I'm not following my children around the world, who knows where they could be living in 10 years. I know people who've lived in our old UK village for about 4 generations, cousins, aunties, uncles and shared friends. Personally I can't think of anything more claustrophobic but I respect that some like it that way.

Edited November 24, 2014 by Que Sera, Sera

[ramot]

Interesting QSS your point about socialising between the ages of 15/18 from my experience of 3 now grown up children, 42,40 and 34 I agree with you.

however at 18 ours plus most of their friends went to university, and I can't think of any of them that came back to live in the village that we had lived in.They all moved away, many stayed where they went to uni. and others moved for work.

sadly not many really kept in touch with each other, after they left for uni. long term they have mostly moved on with their lives away from the village.

 

i also agree with your point about not following your children, but on a lighter side, it's 2 of our children who have followed us to Oz, after we retired here. We joke we keep moving further away but they still find us!!!