Telling Family and Friends

This bit was never going to be a breeze. It comes with trepidation, fear (and expectation) of judgment, and a shed load of guilt. It depends on who you are breaking the news to about your grand relocation plans, but this will go some way to dictating the manner in which you go for it. In other words, will we need coffee, a bottle of wine, or will it be a social media status update? (I did all three).

This is perhaps one of the more difficult aspects of moving far, far away. Breaking the news and managing the emotional responses of the people you care about, particularly those who will suddenly not be in such close geographical proximity. Some responses are wholeheartedly positive, with just the right hint of nostalgia and reflection to be deeply meaningful. Longstanding friends with whom you shared toddler group, countless school runs, social events, childcare, illness, recovery, tears and so much laughter. The announcement of your forthcoming departure draws a line in the sand, demarcating that you won’t share those experiences anymore and you’re moving on. Their responses in many ways create the skeleton of the permission you give yourself to move on. They really matter and you take them with you.

Telling our neighbours was hard. We live in a very small development of homes on a private road, the existence of which eludes most people who don’t live on it, and are a close, mutually supportive community. The children wander in and out of each other’s houses, we exchange spare paving slabs and odd jobs for flowers, wine and childcare. The neighbourhood children use our front garden as a playground (whether our children are out there or not) and knock on the door to ask if our dog would like to come out and play. The kids have dinner together, sleepovers and we park our cars on each others’ drives when they’re on holiday, put out their bins and generally make it look like someone is permanently resident in their absence. In short, it is a wonderful little community where our neighbours are also our friends. I was gutted telling them we were moving away, as if I were delivering a personal rejection. It wasn’t, it isn’t, and wasn’t received as such, although there has been much reflection and a little sadness. There will be farewell dinners and wine will flow. Besides the open invitation for them to come and stay with us in our new home, we will always consider ourselves immensely blessed to have had six years living this way in the middle of a busy and often troubled town. If the blessing of longstanding friends is the bones of self-permission to move on with peace of mind, then the blessing and kindness of neighbours is the marrow.

Then comes the muscle and meat; telling close family. Be ready for the shock, judgment, occasionally unhelpful comment which comes from a place of self-preservation, encouragement, fascination and ultimately, love and support. Our only close relative geographically, is my Mum. We have family all over the country, indeed the world. But moving away from my Mum is a big deal. She adores her Grandchildren and we see each other weekly. Telling my Mum was a bottle of wine job. Since then, I know Mum has confided in her friends and that is as it should be. We have talked about it to an extent, but the day to day reality of being 300 miles apart is, frankly, not something we can quantify in conversation. It will be something we work through when the time comes. Throughout my life I have lived away from her of course, sometimes internationally, but never with the children. Mum’s lived in her house for 38 years and can’t fathom our galivanting, though there is some degree of acceptance. Life in Cumbria, on the face of it, offers a wholly better quality of life and she supports that. But Mum feels bereaved and I feel guilty. That is the nature of it.

The reality is, everyone will have an opinion and managing some of those opinions will be part of the process you have signed up for. Balancing this whilst working through your own feelings of guilt and the countless practicalities can be a monster ride, so strap yourself in and don’t lose your head. Stay focused on the path that you are working so exhaustively to forge and remember why. It is not easy. But I really think you have to be brave when closing one chapter and preparing to write the next. So I’ve got my big girl knickers on, pen in hand and I’m ready to write.