When I first started talking about moving abroad the reactions I got told me everything I needed to know about the people around me.
Not all of it was bad. My father surprised me first. Instead of doubt or concern he looked at me and asked what I was waiting for. That kind of encouragement from a parent lands differently. It does not just validate the decision it accelerates it. His words were a push I did not know I needed and I have never forgotten it.
Then there was my sister. She thought it was a poor decision. Could not believe I was serious. And even after I packed up my life and actually moved to Mexico she still could not wrap her mind around it. Some people need to see it to believe it and even then the belief does not always come.
But the reactions that truly surprised me were not from my immediate family. They came from the extended circle. Friends. Cousins. People I had known for years. And what I noticed was fascinating and honestly a little unsettling.
A lot of people took on my identity.
My story to leave became their story to leave. People who had never once mentioned moving abroad, never discussed it, never brought it up in a single conversation, suddenly were talking about it like it had always been their dream too. Like my decision unlocked something in them that was apparently just sitting there waiting for someone else to go first.
I found that deeply interesting. And I will be honest, I also found it intrusive. Because there is a difference between being inspired by someone and absorbing their journey as your own. I was not a template. I was a person making a specific decision about my specific life. But I think what happens is that when someone in your circle does something bold and countercultural it forces everyone around them to reckon with their own unlived desires. And that reckoning can look a lot of different ways. Some people cheer you on. Some people pull away. Some people try to come along for the ride without ever actually moving.
I felt the ones who pulled away. I always feel things like that. And I understood it even when it hurt.
Then there were the promises.
When I first moved I got a larger home. Extra bedrooms. I was accommodating the people who said they were coming. Family members. Friends. People who swore they would visit. That was four years ago. Nobody came. Not one person showed up.
I stopped waiting a long time ago.
And I do not say that with bitterness. I say it because I think it is one of the most universal and least talked about experiences in expat life. You leave. You build something real. You open the door. And the people you thought would walk through it simply do not. Maybe they are afraid. Maybe life gets in the way. Maybe the gap between wanting to go somewhere and actually going somewhere is wider than most people ever close.
What I have noticed is that daughters visit mothers. I see that. Parents and adult children making the trip to be together across borders. But extended family? Old friends? Sisters and brothers and aunties and uncles? That is rare in my experience and in the experiences I have observed. The promises are plentiful. The follow through is not.
I think if people wanted to come they would come. Four years is enough time. A lifetime of waiting would not change it for some of them and I have made peace with that.
What I have not fully made peace with is the why. Why do people promise what they never intend to deliver? Why does someone else’s courage to leave trigger such complicated responses in the people who stay? Why do some people step away from you the moment you outgrow the version of yourself they were comfortable with?
I do not have all the answers. But I think it is time we talked about it.
Because if you are an expat or thinking about becoming one you need to know this going in. The journey changes you. And not everyone in your life will know what to do with the person you are becoming. Some will celebrate it. Some will disappear. And some will tell everyone they are coming to visit.
They probably are not coming. But you are already there. And that is everything.
Listen to the full conversation on the Tia Niki Travel Vault Podcast.