I thoroughly scan my favorite Expat Resources links - apart from occasional visits - as is my wont when getting ready to relocate to read up on relevant and up-to-date information. Yes, the 3 years we have given ourselves is up this September. Although the option to stay 1 more year seems appealing, we have opted to move on.In one of these forays, I stumbled on this old question in one of my favorite sites about expat spouses' desperation of....being just that, an expat spouse, bringing to mind a recent unpleasant experience.
To deliberately digress, I found myself looking back into all the years I have been an expat spouse, what it meant to me, the person I was and the person I have become because of my situation. A situation I have bought into, afterall, no one put a gun to my head. This is going to be a long one (headache). In examining the past, I was brought back further than the 7 years I have been an expat spouse. Do I miss that life? Did I lose my identity in the process? Am I now less the person I was then? Am I now just a rat mooching off my husband whom I have vowed to be with for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, 'til death do us part? Okay that last bit was an attempt at melodramatic.
Part of that past is why I have turned to blogging about my life. More than wanting to help new expat spouses get a grip about their own situation, it was to help me understand mine by putting my activities and thoughts into words. I'm glad that people bother to visit at all but this is more for me to look back on and see what have transpired and enhanced my life.
As to the allusion to an unpleasant event, it refers to a perfect example of a state of mind of a new expat spouse. I am not one to give unsolicited advise (or so I hope), I am just too lazy for that. How do you cope? I was asked and in relaying exactly how I cope, I was projected to be supercilious. Not her exact words but close. As I never thought of myself as such (duh), I got into thinking? Am I?
Okay, more flashbacks. The biggest thing to discuss which also happens to be the hardest not to mention ugliest, are finances. I, afterall, used to earn a decent income and the way we divided our bills back in Manila was...he pays the rent (paid for by his company, anyway) and I pay the rest (utilities were split), school, groceries, maintenance, household help, (2 maids and a driver - hey we're in the Philippines, remember?) etc, except for our respective vehicles that we had to pay ourselves (company issued - his, although I opted to drive my own - we get free gas, therefore, not much there to spend on). We pooled our savings, a certain dictated percentage of our salaries.
I did more work related travel as our company covered Southeast Asia and my job as Business Development Manager required the rigors of it, while his position did not entail such (VP for Finance). Let's just say I was used to a certain lifestyle and thought process. When hubby first mentioned the desire to diversify and spread his wings and seeing him so unhappy, I weighed my options, when life played one of its many practical jokes. I was pirated. A bigger salary, a position hard to refuse and very tempting perks. That one was actually easy to hurdle, or so we thought. In tempting fate, we (he's the finance guy not me) negotiated the contract to almost unbearable (for the company, that is) and by golly we got it. I saw no reason to say no, anymore. In fairness to hubby, he saw the opportunity for me and without much ado, relented, I signed a 2 year renewable contract with the company (a subsidiary of Sun Microsystems). I, of course, had to work my a*s off for that negotiated deal. The company did squeeze what they can out of me. In return, I hardly took a vacation, worked until 5 in the morning to finish a presentation only to present it 3 hours later. I brought home work, my family can hardly talk to me and if in their audacity, they try, I can only talk about my job. I was never 'there', not for birthdays, reunions, outings, family planned vacations, school meetings, holidays and sometimes our own anniversary. Still, I loved my job. I was 33 and on a roll!
I was tired but happy or so I thought...T, he was miserable, which by the way, I tried to ignore. When my 2 years was up, I was offered an extension, I declined (I was exhausted and thought I needed the break) and was kept on as a consultant with a 6 months renewable contract. In slowing down, I begin to notice a lot of things. I hardly see my son and my beloved hubby is very unhappy. It was difficult not having the same to preoccupy me 24/7...I, this time, felt how unhappy he was and all that I have been missing. Immediately after came the realization...what is important to me?
I decided to give T his due, and my son, the mother he sorely needed. I was then 36 years old. I prepared myself by putting up a consulting firm and getting more clients in that capacity. That was when the offer to run a start-up company came, twice the salary and 10 times the responsibility...another cruel joke life has decided to throw at me. This time I was steadfast in my decision and firmly said no, on my own accord. I left the Philippines as a Marketing consultant and carried with me clients up until I was in Kenya.
The 6 months we stayed in Denmark was not an easy time for me. I was just grateful to work and derive income as a consultant overseas in a country where I first had to learn the language before I can find work, hurdle the intimidating but mostly humiliating immigration process, tackle the pre-conceived notion of East and West marriages and where, as a professional, I also had to start over. It was daunting, overwhelming and exhausting all at once. Before the most challenging 6 months of my life came to an end, T has already secured a job for posting to Kenya and there began my adventure as an expat spouse. I trailed.
To be continued...
