This is My Life

A friend of mine from high school recently wrote about homesickness. She is an American expat living in Chile, and her ideas about the topic really hit home to me because it is something I have been struggling with. I'm not an expat, but I do live 1500 miles away from my family and friends that are in a place I used to call home.

I never thought of myself as the homesick type. I figured that I wouldn't stay in my home state forever (as most Michiganders do). However, even though I thought that I wouldn't look back, I find myself often daydreaming about the scenario of moving back home. I think of all the people that I could see, the events I could attend, the babysitters I'd hire, and the playmates that Blake would have. Every time I miss a wedding, a birth, a funeral, a holiday, a family reunion, or even a simple night of games played by friends back home, the pain within me that longs for home deepens.

I often make the mistake of living my life in anticipation of the next trip back home; the next time I will be able to see my closest friends and family. I often choose not to form ties to people and places where I live now because I am still holding on to what is far behind me. I live vicariously through the stories and events of others that are living their lives back home, lives I am no longer apart of outside phone calls and email. I am no longer connected to these people like I once was. The hardest part about being away is that they're all still deeply connected to each other.

I don't want to live my life in anticipation of trips back home. The let down I experience when our trips are over and I come back to my real life is tremendous. It's not a healthy way to live and it's something I am working on. I realize that moving back home is not now, and probably never will be, a possibility. Every time I come back from a trip to my hometown, I have to remind myself that this is my life. While accepting the fact that life goes on without me when I'm not there to be a part of things kills me, I have to snap out of it and enjoy what I have here and now. It's difficult to realize that I'm never going to be as connected to my family and friends as I once was, but I have to accept my life as it is and move on.

What makes the "moving on" process difficult is that I have never really settled in to where we live now. As Troy puts it, "You have just never seemed to click here." I guess I have always viewed our time here as temporary, and haven't tried very hard to establish any real roots. Well, I don't know how temporary it will be anymore, and the disconnectedness is starting to wear on me. Aside from Troy, Blake, and my in-laws, (all of whom I absolutely adore and couldn't imagine my life without), I don't really have any friends. When I first moved out here, I was married soon after and was in the honeymoon stage. I wanted to spend every waking moment with Troy and didn't care that I had left my whole life behind me. I still love spending time with him above anyone else, but we are beyond the honeymoon stage. No matter how much I love my husband, every girl needs other girlfriends to talk to, laugh with, and share ideas and experiences.

I was blessed with the best friends in the world during college. Friends that I still talk to several times a week and that will remain my best friends forever. Troy says that these friends are both a blessing and a curse. It is not too often that you find people that you connect with so deeply, that you can completely confide in, and that sometimes know you better than you know yourself. Maybe I just found these friends earlier in my life because we needed each other during trying times of decision making, but they have forever impacted my views on friendship. Now, my opinions on friendship are jaded, because I don't think I can ever form friendships as wonderful as these. I do hope I'm wrong about that, not because I want to replace them, but because while phone calls are great, there is something to be said about having friends that you can see face-to-face. I feel bad that I have an attitude about starting from square one again. I already have my friends, right? But there is a void that I think every girl wants to fill with interaction with others (especially when your daytime companion can only say 10 words).

I feel childish even writing about my friendship dilemmas, but the truth is, this is one of the hardest trials I've ever had. I was what you would call a social butterfly when I was growing up. I was always hopping from one friend's house to the next, my best friend had her own bathroom drawer at my house because she stayed there so often, and I filled every minute of every weekend with social activities. I realize that I'm married and have a child now. So of course, that lifestyle isn't possible, nor do I want it back, but I've also changed a lot in the past five years or so. I know who I am and I know that I have worth, of course, but I am not the confident, bubbly person that I once was. I have grown more shy, more hesitant, more resistant towards new situations, more nervous to initiate activities, and more anxious when faced with new people that I have to create conversations with. The idea of making the first call or extending an invitation towards a friendship terrifies me. I can't pinpoint what it is I am afraid of, I just know that this is not the social girl I used to be. It's not that I'm suddenly unfriendly, I have just formed some boundaries that I haven't gotten past. It also doesn't help that there aren't many gals that are in a similar situations as me in our neighborhood or church (my only social outlets).

There is no grand solution for any of these things (although my husband often tries to think of one). What I do think is that my homesickness and lack of friendships are related to and are affecting each other. I am working on the insecurities that I have and am resolving to try my best to "settle in." No one should live their life only in anticipation of future events, and I just need to get over my own stubbornness and get on with it already. On the bright side, there is a certain sense of pride that comes from establishing your own life in a completely different surrounding than your upbringing.

The aforementioned friend that inspired this whole long, long thought train (which if you are still reading, I'm sorry for going on and on and on), put it better than I could:

"Eventually you'll start to appreciate your life as is again, instead of wishing you were somewhere else. Life goes on without you - accept it. Sooner or later, you'll plant your own roots wherever you are. You'll live through your own births and deaths and weddings and divorces and happiness and sadness. Those won't replace what's going on with your childhood and college friends and family back home. But, again, it comes back to living your life in the here and now, as corny as that may sound."