Our Experience of Moving from the UK to Australia with Kids

Dear daughters,

This week we watched ducklings hatch from eggs at Scarlett’s preschool, didn’t we? It struck me it was the first time I had ever witnessed this fascinating and beautiful miracle. How precious and delicate is new life?

Watching these babies enter the world coincided with the two year anniversary of our arrival in Australia. I have been recalling how difficult that first year was as we settled into our new life here. We continued on through shear instinct but, much like the first year of a human baby’s life, everything was new, overwhelming and scary.

Adjusting to life in a new country with two toddlers (and a dog!) was taxing enough so imagine my surprise when we discovered another baby was on its way? She was to be our extra-special blessing, Thea. There was new life all around us but, I must admit, I was clinging to the old one. I consider it now as my own adult version of a “fourth trimester”…which lasted about 18 months.

It is odd the things I recall from those first few months after we arrived; the things which define our first year living in Australia. Most of it is a blur but I distinctly remember how you, Scarlett, had developed a fear of dogs shortly after our arrival in Sydney. This was terribly odd behaviour as you had always loved them and now you screamed every time we visited the dog park.

This continued until the week our shipping arrived from the UK and you laid eyes on your beloved toy kitchen. Within the week you were no longer scared of dogs. I realise now how great an impact the move had on your two-year old emotional wellbeing. You are a sensitive and perceptive child and carried the weight of my and Daddy’s anxieties as well as your own. Like me, it was only when our home began to take shape I noticed your angst begin to subside.

I also remember the moment when I discovered I was pregnant with you, Thea. I recall staring at the pregnancy test in disbelief. We had just moved house, we had minimal furniture and merely the belongings which fitted into our suitcases. Our lives felt completely uprooted and uncertain and yet, here I was, facing the reality there would be another little person who would need me to have it all together. And I truly did not have it all together.

Then there was the unexpected house move three days before Christmas, while I was seven months pregnant. We didn’t have a Christmas tree so Daddy went out to find one the day before Christmas eve and returned with one too small to hold any decorations. He told me to pretend it was the best tree I’d ever laid eyes on; I was to make a fuss about how awesome it was. Except I didn’t have it in me. It was a quiet Christmas, surrounded by boxes and a tree that probably tripped Santa after he had broken through the boarded up chimney.

Quite clear in my memory are the times when I had unexplained bleeding and bruising during pregnancy and I thought I was losing the baby I didn’t know I wanted until she was on her way. There was just too much stress on my body and on my mind.

It feels a little bit precious reminiscing about the stress of it all when I know there are people leaving their countries by unsafe boats or walking hundreds of miles. Our move was so undemanding in comparison. Yet, we all have different life experience and thresholds and this is our story.

I genuinely struggle to summon much good from that first year, but there were definitely special moments such as Kyla’s first steps, Thea’s birth as the sun rose over the ocean and answered prayers when life otherwise felt bleak.

This second year has been far more favourable. Just as those ducklings are moved from the hatching box incubator into their comfy little cage so we seem to have moved from a state of mere survival to becoming settled into our new habitat.

We have started to make friends, find ourselves in a bit of a community and recognise people when we manage to get all of us out of the house. We enjoy the many wonderful playgrounds, the luxury of the beach a mere stones-throw away (if you have a really good arm) and everything has begun to feel safe and familiar.

When people ask me why we decided to move to Australia I still haven’t shaped a good answer, because I am still not entirely sure why we did. I could say it was for the nice weather or the promise of a more relaxed lifestyle (jokes on us!). Perhaps it was the appeal of getting out of a rut and doing something a bit exciting and adventurous. But I think, deep down, I feel we did it for you.

I am not sure what our new country offers that is preferential to the one we all called home but it feels like this is where you should be, at least for this stage of your lives. You should be playing in the sand, splashing in the waves, marveling at beautiful sunsets and breathing in the fresh sea air; all of which you do so regularly.

To Daddy and I this is a new life but to you it is mostly all you have ever known. So for your sake I now choose to walk rather than crawl, wean myself from the familiarity of my previous home and engage in all this new world has to offer.

You are growing up each day. And it seems, so am I.

Love,
Mum