Anyone relocated back?

BlueBelle

I think as others have said your negative views are all connected with your family disappointment You had nurtured the idea of an 80 s style town/country waiting for you and a son who would be there to support you in your old age, and that hasn’t happened as he has his own life firmly established

Because this has thrown you and not turned out as you had imagined, everything now has a negative hue to it and you are seeing the country through very ‘grey’ eyes looking for the bad and missing the good
Your negativity is probably misplaced but is very, very real

You came back to your roots to get support and help that you didn’t trust your newer country to give you and it will take time

Now the only way forward is to
A) return to the country of your dreams
B) dig in and make your new life work for you two, looking for some good instead of bad, doing some volunteering ( if you’re of the age) joining some groups, looking at the beauty around you seeing the good teenagers around, don’t dwell on all the negatives in life
NO country is a utopia
Remember
Your country of choice couldn’t have been perfect or you wouldn’t have moved away from it

Really good comments BlueBelle👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Marydoll

^One heard me speaking French and asked "how many languages do you speak then"? When told five, she said "oooooooohh, get her".^
Countess F are you sure she was being rude, but may instead have been impressed by your linguistic skills? It is a rare occurance to find someone, who can speak five languages. (apart from myself that is. 😉)

I would have offered the neighbour some free conversation lessons, if she brought the cake!

Marydoll

^One heard me speaking French and asked "how many languages do you speak then"? When told five, she said "oooooooohh, get her".^
Countess F are you sure she was being rude, but may instead have been impressed by your linguistic skills? It is a rare occurance to find someone, who can speak five languages. (apart from myself that is. 😉)

Being the old person volunteering in our charity shop I’ve picked up a bit of knowledge over the years.
I’m always having that said to me when a donation comes in that the girls😄 don’t know what it is. The same with certain clothing labels.
With respect CountessFosco I think you lost your British sense of humour all those years away.

*nana8 The Lake District would be full of tourists, that is how the inhabitants make their living, without them they would be in dire economic straits.

I have known two couples who spent a lot of their lives in foreign countries, Switzerland and France respectively. They went to those countries initially because their employer sent them there and having lived and worked in these countries they stayed there among their friends in the early years of retirement, but their children had gone to English or international schools and English universities and settled back in Britain and as they reached 80 and began to have more health problems, and travel became more difficult, they wanted to be within easy reach of their children, so moved back to the UK.

I know one half of one of the couples yearns to be back in France, but all agree that moving back to be near family was the sensible decision.

Also it depends where you live. Any country has internal differences . I wouldn’t live in West Australia if you paid me but many love it and wouldn’t live in the East. Horses for courses, as they say

Are you possibly a bit oversensitive? Your neighbour might have been trying to be funny. Also the forum comment could have been coming from anywhere not necessarily UK at all.

Two things, I would also likely have loaned the computer equipment because always happy to help and generally trust people.
Also I would have been impressed and said the same if you told me you spoke five languages, the response from me would have been flippant banter and meant to offend.
Maybe you need to relax into the culture around you 🤷‍♀️

We lived abroad (Spain) for 15 years and, six years ago, for various reasons decided to return to England.

We bought a house in an area (Oxfordshire) that we had never lived in before and settled in a small village. We were made very welcome but it was difficult to adjust.

We thought we had made a mistake by returning and forgot about the things that we had found difficult in Spain only remembering the many things we had loved. We also missed the beautiful villa and very large garden we had, again forgetting the hard work of the house and the endless gardening.

We have now settled in the UK. Yes, many thing had changed but overall we are glad we returned. We are lucky that we still have a holiday home in Spain and spend several months each year there but are still glad to return to our home in the UK. Unless you are completely fluent in the local language it is very hard to be old and ill in another country.

I think you need to give yourself more time to settle and try to look for the positives. There are still plenty.

Marydoll

^One heard me speaking French and asked "how many languages do you speak then"? When told five, she said "oooooooohh, get her".^
Countess F are you sure she was being rude, but may instead have been impressed by your linguistic skills? It is a rare occurance to find someone, who can speak five languages. (apart from myself that is. 😉)

My French is rusty, my Latin too, German not as good and my Welsh is work in progress. I can speak a bit of Strine but at least my English is fairly good, although DH doesn't always understand me 😁

CountessFosco as you have moved around a lot, presumably with work, where did you feel happiest?

Our cousin, who live in France but kept a flat here, have found the French healthcare system perfectly good.

You said you'd had problems with your DIL, I hope that is resolved. However, I don't think we should rely on our children for our happiness. I keep suggesting U3A - they might be looking for volunteers for conversational French groups or another language, for older people who have a knowledge but are rusty like me.
You might find more in common with such groups than with your neighbours.

I see a lot of people on FB nostalgia groups who have moved maybe 50 miles from where they grew up, complaining that the area has changed and it's much worse now. It's not England or the area you grew up in - it's the world that has changed.

I think that things have changed for the better. I don't see the litter Countess talked about, in fact, I think everywhere is much cleaner. People are friendly and most teens work very hard.

On a bigger scale, social attitudes have improved vastly with racism, sexism and homophobia now considered unacceptable.

Where on earth do you live not to see the litter??? It is everywhere along roadsides, MWays, lay-bys, and also fly tipping in loads of gates into fields, etc.

It is shocking. And I am talking about many many counties.

Where, Fleurpepper? In the UK? I thought you lived abroad somewhere?

Countess,, ah! I have lived in England all my long life, and I feel bad about it.. I think life has changed everywhere, but England, where is the "green and pleasant land" I grew up in, well for starters there are a lot more people living here, and that surely makes a huge difference.. nuff said... life changes so I am told

I moved back here after 13 years in Turkey, a beautiful country with gorgeous scenery, beautiful food and lovely people. I moved to a small village in Essex and have been very happy here, it took some adjusting, especially to the weather! But I am glad I am here, perhaps you have not moved to a location that suits you?

There’s this:

The Pollyanna principle … [uses] the archetype of Pollyanna as a psychological principle which portrays the positive bias people have when thinking of the past. According to the Pollyanna principle, the brain processes information that is pleasing and agreeable in a more precise and exact manner as compared to unpleasant information. We actually tend to remember past experiences as more rosy than they actually occurred. (Wiki)

Then there’s this. The UK 44 years ago in 1979.

5 January – Lorry drivers go on strike, causing new shortages of heating oil and fresh food.

15 January – Rail workers begin a 24-hour strike.

22 January – Tens of thousands of public-workers strike in the beginning of what becomes known as the "Winter of Discontent".

1 March National Health Service workers in the West Midlands threaten to go on strike in their bid to win a nine per cent pay rise.

30 March – Airey Neave, World War Two veteran and Conservative Northern Ireland spokesman, is killed by an Irish National Liberation Army bomb in the House of Commons car park.

23 April – Anti-Nazi League protester Blair Peach is fatally injured after being struck on the head probably by a member of the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group.

4 May – The Conservatives win the General Election by a 44-seat majority and Margaret Thatcher becomes the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.

21 May Conservative MPs back Margaret Thatcher's proposals to sell off parts of nationalised industries.

23 July – The government announces £4 billion worth of public spending cuts.

10 August–23 October – The entire ITV network in the UK is shut down by a technicians' strike.

27 August Lord Mountbatten of Burma and two 15-year-olds, his nephew and a boatboy, are assassinated by a Provisional IRA bomb while holidaying in the Republic of Ireland. The Dowager Lady Brabourne died the following day in hospital of injuries received.

1 October – Statistics show a 2.3% contraction in the economy for the third quarter of the year, sparking fresh fears of another recession.

30 October – Martin Webster of the National Front is found guilty of inciting racial hatred.

1 November – The government announces £3.5 billion in public spending cuts and an increase in prescription charges.

15 November Minimum Lending Rate reaches an all-time high of 17%. Inflation rises to 13.4%.

We are all aware that the diplomatic deadlock over Northern Ireland’s post-Brexit trade protocol was undermining local efforts to suppress paramilitary outlaws and fanning fears of a potential spike in violence.

Do you not think that the more things seem to change the more they stay the same?

I have recently moved to a large village in Gloucestershire from West Yorkshire to be nearer my daughter. I love it here. There is so much going on.

I think since Nigel Farage & Brexit started getting a lot of air time it has given a voice to those who feel overwhelmed by people of different nationalities and its led to a gov't who are very far right and whose policies towards those of different nationalities who are here are awful, very vindictive. Tories always have been about promoting individual wealth rather than collective good and that does filter down to how the country feels to live in, ie you can't get a GP appointment, ambulances are overwhelmed as NHS hospitals are full because the gov't wants to push people to go private. Tories don't see that they should contribute to someone else's health care they want private care to avoid that. But a socialist health care, access for all based on need rather than pay, is one of the things that make this country great. I'm planning for a change of gov't next year to install a more compassionate gov't

Things have changed a lot here in Australia ,too. Not always for the better,either. When we came, 50 years ago, it was full of beautiful trees and many unsurfaced roads, even a few kangaroos hopping around. No one had to lock their doors and dogs were allowed to roam free. Funny thing is, the dogs were happy then - no one got bitten. Meat was so cheap you could live on prime steak everyday if you wanted. Sometimes when you have been away from a country for a long time you keep a kind of snapshot in your mind of how it used to be, only to find everything is more crowded,buildings have taken over from open land and everyone seems to be a lot less relaxed.

I wonder Caravansera if, when we are sad, we just look back wearing rose tinted spex? ‘everything was better then and I was happier’. Possibly at times we weren’t. Our memories probably skew - as the late Queen reminded us “recollections may vary”.

I also wonder if, tied in with all this, we just feel sad because we are getting older and don’t like it? Not in a vain way, but as in “life was SO different for me back then and I really miss those times/that life/that house”.

StacyAnna

Where, Fleurpepper? In the UK? I thought you lived abroad somewhere?

Yes, in the UK- where we visit very often and so many counties. Where our ACs and GCs live, as well as no many friends, where we still owe property. It hits us like a bomb each time- and we think, ah well, it's only the M20, and then we travel on the M25, M11, M40, A3, M1 and lots and lots of roads, country lanes too. And it is the same everywhere. The litter is abominable.

We've lived in France for 15 years having wanted an adventure.
We've both very happy here but I do sometimes wonder what (when the time comes) will happen to whichever is the survivor. The thing that bothers me most is the loss of language having read that no matter how good one's second language is, that language will disappear before one's native language.

My friends and I have often thought of moving back but we then know it would not be possible because we are looking back through rose tinted glasses. The UK has changed, we are older and not in the health we were, therefore we stay in France.

Countess Fosco, I heartily agree with most of your comments, I was only out of the country for 10 years and DH and I returned on his retirement mainly because of health care costs and family in the UK. We both thought the country and the attitudes of many people had really gone downhill. So much bad behaviour and selfish attitudes in public places and very dirty streets etc. Poor health service and unreliable public transport. Another thing we really noticed is how much people moan about things. Been back over 10 years now and I suppose I've got used to it and unfortunately I probably moan as much as many others but it's a poor state of affairs when children aren't brought up to be polite and respect others whatever their age.

Elusivebutterfly

I see a lot of people on FB nostalgia groups who have moved maybe 50 miles from where they grew up, complaining that the area has changed and it's much worse now. It's not England or the area you grew up in - it's the world that has changed.

I think that things have changed for the better. I don't see the litter Countess talked about, in fact, I think everywhere is much cleaner. People are friendly and most teens work very hard.

On a bigger scale, social attitudes have improved vastly with racism, sexism and homophobia now considered unacceptable.

Whenever we've driven up the A12 the roadsides have been covered with litter. Lots of rubbish dumped in rural areas, especially large items.

The UK has changed (mainly due to the Tories and Labour making a mess of things) and it's obvious when you return after so many years but the countries you lived in probably changed too and you didn't notice the change so much because it was incremental, day by day, rather than one big leap. We lived part of the time for years in rural France and things changed - restaurants closed, young people migrated to the cities for work, rural transport atrophied, small shops closed in villages and small towns. A new pig farm opened near us and a new noisy TGV line too.