A move overseas for an accompanying partner can mean professional disruptions, identity crisis and loss of self-confidence when your CAREER is put on hold, and a power shift in your relationship to favor the primary earner.
After being overseas for over twenty years, I have realized that short-term it created an identity crisis and a lot of challenges, but long-term moving turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to my CAREER. It has certainly made my life a lot more interesting. The lack of a straightforward CAREER path forced me to think outside my comfort zone, get creative, and take more risks. I’ve also been forced to network a lot and have created supportive friendships with women around the world.
According to A Wife’s Guide by Robin Pascoe, “CAREER” is a man’s word driven by male values. “When CAREER is viewed instead as ‘a path through life,’ it allows women to incorporate all that is important to them, whether it’s raising children, volunteering in their communities, looking after home and family, or pursuing a vocation.”
Using that definition of CAREER as a lens, it is clear to me that I did not flush my life down the toilet when I moved overseas to be with my husband. There is nothing else I’d rather be doing at this point in my life. Instead it was an opportunity to learn new skills and grow as a person. That just may not be obvious in the short term.
When one partner technically doesn’t do anything outside of the home but did something before the move, there’s bound to be a crisis. We define ourselves by our work, and our work nourishes our self-esteem and self-confidence. Since a woman thrives on relationships and connections and on the work that identified her place in the world, when those have been lost, even temporarily, she can feel invisible.
You may be freaking out about who you were and apparently are no longer, and your partner is not getting it one little bit. He thinks he knows who you are: you are his wife and the mother of his children. He also knows who you used to be, but he’s not advertising it because he feels guilty for yanking you away from it.
Dr. Barbara Cummings’ research indicates, “The move acts as a catalyst and brings problems in the marriage or family to the surface. Whatever balancing act the family had been able to maintain before could no longer be sustained during the move.”
Men and women communicate differently. Men usually can’t listen without offering advice. You just want to discuss how you feel about abandoning your CAREER. He’s got a list of ideas for you to try and do. You just want him to shut up and listen.
Most of us as accompanying partners are stuck in a state of inertia, paralyzed by the fact that we have given up something.
The challenge is really to figure out what will make you happy, to know yourself. That’s a tough exercise. Maybe it’s time to switch from the accepted system of recognizable success to something more individually rewarding,
It’s true that someone, usually the partner whose CAREER has not precipitated the move, must learn to adapt, be flexible, compromise, and reinvent themselves. Actually those are wonderful life skills to develop. I have found that reinvention can be the best thing that ever happened to you.