[migratory birds]

We've got PR (skilled migrant but haven't submitted any CVs yet) and I know many don't hesitate a moment before jumping on the plane after recieving PR...but I'm having a hard time pulling up roots from our lovely cottage-like home with maturing gardens (planted by my own sweat and hands) in the midst of a friendly, community-minded neighborhood. Occasional coyotes, deer, great-horned owls can be heard and seen in the evenings. Quiet/silent nights great for sleeping.

Wondering if any of you who have moved or have wheels in well-in-motion experienced similar feelings and had difficulty pulling up roots and leaving a sweet home to move forward into the unknown?

I was planning to move without job offer lined up and seek work on arrival but am now wondering if I submit CVs in several of our desired communities and rec'd offer if it'd make pulling up more easy...

Thanks...

[icemaiden]

The last comment on your timeline seems to answer your feelings at present. I would imagine that you need to consider why you made the application in the first place. It was a long time ago that you started the process and feelings do change. Why did you want to move originally? Before you answer that question you need to be away from your home (house) in order to truly answer that one. All the major decisions I have ever taken in my life have been made somewhere neutral. We have ties binding us to so many 'things' that sometimes it can be difficult to see past them.

Go out for a long walk or go sit on a beach/in a field/anywhere really where nothing can interfere with your thought processes. Talk it over with your OH there and see how you feel.

If NZ is still the right decision for you then go for it. If you believe in your heart that things have changed since you first applied then go with your gut instinct and stay - it could be a very costly mistake for you. Maybe you could go at a later date?

The homes and possessions that we have are meant to root us but you can always recreate them somewhere else. I know that my house is bricks and mortar, my home is with my husband wherever we are, but that's a very personal viewpoint.

Good luck with working through your decision.

[JandM]

The homes and possessions that we have are meant to root us but you can always recreate them somewhere else. I know that my house is bricks and mortar, my home is with my husband wherever we are, but that's a very personal viewpoint.I think the same as icemaiden about this, while having the extra pull in NZ of my son and his family. I know when it comes the time to walk for the last time out of our family home here in the UK, I'll shed tears - until we'd been to NZ last year, I'd never imagined leaving here except carried out feet first. However, I know that in NZ there is beauty of different kinds - places to love, people to meet, things to be interested in, more of my life to make. And the memories of this home here will be with me life-long.

[calixfornia]

Not an easy decision and what's been said above sounds good. All I can add is: Listen to your gut. Not your logic, not your mind. Your gut.

[Andy-Dee]

This is a wonderful thread and has been approached with such sensitivity. I think we all have moments when we wonder if we are doing the right thing, but places don't move or disapear - if you start out on this journey and its not for you there is no shame in admitting it - in fact it takes real courage.

Good luck on whatever you decide.

[aberdian]

We all have moments like that, and the house thing strikes a chord. One of the biggest hurdles here for us is the general all round awfulness of kiwi house design (controversial statement I know, but bear in mind it's a personal thought) and our inability to find a house we'd love to live in. One day we will no doubt........

[dbonnett]

Wondering if any of you who have moved or have wheels in well-in-motion experienced similar feelings and had difficulty pulling up roots and leaving a sweet home to move forward into the unknown?


You have captured one part of our situation.. we live in a neighborhood we love in a town we have enjoyed for almost 15 years - our lives are far from difficult or unpleasant. Looking at the day to day, moving somewhere "better" seems like an exercise in futility. Now that our house is under contract for sale - we are seeing it in a new light and recognizing what a nice job we have done with improving it and how much it is home. :)

Our shift to New Zealand is driven by long-term desires - where we live now is not the same as it was in 1994 and we don't like where it seems to be headed (crowding, commercialization and callousness). We want to take our daughter somewhere different as she grows and we want to try life outside of our safe little cocoon. If we don't move now, we will miss a once in a lifetime opportunity - the factors in our favor now are not likely to come back around. My wife has equated it to being a crab in a warming pot of water, by the time you realize it is boiling, you are almost dead.

It might help to think of this as a "debate" - pretend you have to convince someone else to make the move to NZ - what are the reasons you started the process and why are they important to you? If nothing else, this can get everything out and on the table to be considered.

I think wobbles are a natural part of moving - it is a form of grieving for what we are leaving behind. Right now, my family and I are spending a week at our holiday house in the mountains of Colorado - every 4th of July for the last 10 years has been up here and we are having a hard time saying goodbye to Crested Butte. Each time we ride or hike a trail we know it is for the last time for a good while; many great memories will come with us to Nelson. However, if we didn't leave here, we would never get the chance to experience all of the joys that will hopefully come in NZ.

Good luck with however you decide to proceed. If we can help in any way, drop us a PM!

[thezorbster]

As others have said, your feelings are natural and many of us go through that period of doubt. We too left a beautiful village with lovely neighbours, beautiful walks straight from the house and many years of happy memories. We didn't move because we hated our lives or where we lived, we moved because of what we thought NZ could offer us and our daughter and to give her the childhood we wanted for her (and which we believe she is now getting). The hardest thing I find now is not having memories of where we currently live and friends to say 'do you remember doing this' to, but we are already beginning to gather new memories and experience beautiful new places and making new friends. It is not always easy (and I have just gone through a bit of a wobbly patch) but try to keep your eye on why you were thinking about NZ to begin with.

I am an incredibly emotional person and I thought I would cry and cry when I left our home of 11 years but actually, once the packers had been and the house was empty, it was no longer my home, it became just a house and I felt incredibly unemotional about it. I shed a slight tear driving out of the village for the last time but very little - I was just so focused on the future and just knew that the time was right for me to go.

Best wishes in whatever your decision may be - it is no doubt an emotional time but only you can decide what is right for you and the enormity of what you are planning is hitting you big time now as it did for many of us. Just don't forget - you're not alone as you go through these feelings.

Take care
S

[Sam B]

Whenever I have moved, the hardest thing for me has always been leaving behind a garden which I have loved and created and watched and stared at and relaxed in. I get so attached to my gardens! And the wildlife that comes with it. When I think about the call of a British woodpigeon, I still fill up with tears. Apart from friends, leaving my garden in Cornwall was the hardest thing about emigrating, and I still wish I could have somehow stuck my greenhouse in the container...

But here we are with a wonderful patch of land in NZ, building a house, with 4 hectares of native bush that we could never have afforded in the UK, and I'm excitedly planning my new gardens and swearing I'll never move again (I've heard that one before). I know where you're coming from, but there is life and wildlfe after moving.

[Carey]

Agree with all sentiments above as I gaze out of our window over the totally organic garden, wild-flower meadow, pond and orchard that we have created over the last 16 years. We have transformed a blank canvass of a 2/3 acre grass paddock into a maze of paths, bridges, tree-circles, woven willows, wooden sculptures and veggie patches but we know from a 6 month stint living abroad that once you've left it, it remains as a lovely memory but it fades into insignificance. We don't kid ourselves that we will have the same energy again to create so much and a patch of native bush would do more than nicely as to keep the meadow as a meadow etc requires high maintenance and we're actually looking forward to a break from that. But we love our garden and the kids are more worried about missing that, than the house. Time will tell how we will view it once in NZ!?