Switzerland: Before and After

There are two very different periods in my life: a “Before Switzerland” and an “After Switzerland.”

In stories, doorways may sometimes be used to symbolize transitions and change. Once a character walks through a particular doorway, there is no going back. Sometimes it is obvious to readers that a character has passed through a symbolic, transitional doorway, but sometimes it may take some reflection to understand.

In real life, we might cross a threshold so fundamental to our being that there is now a “before” and an “after” to life. But how can we tell? I’ve crossed a few thresholds in my life. A car accident (obvious threshold), a regrettable conversation (not so obvious), a kiss. Those were clear, but there are sneakier ones that you have to watch out for.

Repatriation is a sneaky one. It was July 2015, and three years had gone by since our move to Switzerland. Three years gone was both a blink of an eye and an eternity. I wondered what it would be like once we moved back to the US. I’d read the articles. I had talked to other expats that had done it. I thought I was ready. However, it turns out that three years can also be a big problem.

Three years was long enough for the kids to completely outgrow, both physically and emotionally, almost everything they’d left behind in our U.S. house. Three years was long enough for neighbors to have formed new friendships and for the new paint on the back porch to peel. It was long enough for the weeds to grow and the dog we’d left in the care of friends to become arthritic and his fur to turn gray on his sweet face.

Three years were also a blink. The girl across the street was learning to drive now. The boys down the street drove over to visit my son. The kids who had fairly recently played with Legos in my living room now had jobs.

Three years without working went by in a blink but not without consequences. My job wasn’t my job any more, and the high school I had worked at was in the throes of a complete renovation, leaving me slightly disoriented.

Three years meant that my daughter was entering high school. I took her to Freshman Orientation, intending to leave her to do her thing while I got to visit with former colleagues. We walked in and someone was giving out the schedules and welcoming parents – someone who was not me. That used to be my job.

Colleagues I’d spent my days with (days that had turned into years, that turned into a decade and then halfway into a second decade) were busy doing what we’d always done. Except that three years had passed and I was now on the outside looking in. Three years went from a blink to an eternity. Overwhelmed, I left. I made it about 100 feet away from the building, sat on the curb outside the school, and dissolved in a puddle of tears.

I started a new job and struggled to make new friends and enjoy what I was once pretty good at. I couldn’t sleep through the night. I was exhausted and blamed seasonal affective disorder, a vitamin D deficiency, going back to work too soon…and then finally sat up and thought, “I’m depressed.”

I missed the friends I’d left behind in Switzerland. I missed feeling relaxed. I missed the routine I’d fought so hard to establish there. I missed the freedom and joy of finding self-expression through writing. I had no time to write now. I couldn’t even read a book. Those that I started reading in Switzerland sat halfway read, frozen in Swiss time. Who cared if French children didn’t throw food or whether or not Julia Child loved living in Paris. Who cared about the pilgrimage of Harold Frye? I haven’t picked up any of those books again.

I tried to join a book club here, but maybe it was too soon or just not a good fit for me because I went once and never went back. I joined a gym eight months ago. I haven’t gone in yet but I write a check once a month and keep the door key on my key chain. I called a counselor I had worked with once before but couldn’t make an actual appointment. I missed all the doctors’ appointments I’d scheduled.

The days rolled on, relentless as only a U.S. schedule can be. I worked. I didn’t eat lunch, and I stayed late. My kids never said they missed me, but I would start to get calls close to dinnertime: “Where are you?” “Are you ready to come home yet?” Guilty hands would shut my laptop and I’d leave. I’d ready myself to walk into what felt like a hospital waiting room, except that the patients were my children in various states of neediness. Make dinner. Print this. Sign this note. I need 450 cupcakes for tomorrow. Accusations were the nightly greeting: You forgot to put more money on my lunch account; or You bought the wrong book covers; or worse, I waited at so and so’s house for three hours – how come you didn’t come get me? You were supposed to come get me.

I talked about Switzerland less. People aren’t especially interested beyond the initial “Welcome Home” conversation, and I understand that. But internally I struggled to make those experiences make sense. I knew there was a better way for me to raise kids, eat, shop, and work. I knew that a work/life balance was worth fighting for.

The days rolled on. Fall became winter. Winter became spring and then, at last, summer. I did what I needed to do at work to buy myself a few weeks of respite to be home. I entertained kids and unpacked the last few boxes that had sat neglected, kicked to the perimeters of various rooms. I went through the kids’ rooms purging and refreshing. I organized and organized and organized – desperate to steal back what a disorganized house takes from your “free” time. But I kept pushing aside the box full of Swiss memorabilia.

I didn’t know how to unpack that. I didn’t know where to put these things. So, I didn’t. I bought a plastic storage bin and repacked that box and then hauled it to the basement where I left it like a Swiss time capsule.

Then something interesting happened in early July: the anniversary of our move back to the U.S. And it felt like a new year. The straight black line that demarked life “Before Switzerland” and “After Switzerland” grew fainter. The “After” part became less painful. Less chaotic. I became more determined to fit the puzzle pieces of me back together again. Find a way to be me here, because that was the biggest problem.

I felt like I’d found a bunch of puzzle pieces to me there and they just wouldn’t fit again once I arrived back here. But that wasn’t because I was here, but rather because I tried to pick up right where I’d left off three years previously. And that, I’ve discovered, is impossible. Remember that door thing? That door is closed now. And I have a suspicion that I might be in the middle of a different doorway now. I’ll let you know.

Life is full of transitions: births and deaths, marriages and divorces. Big ones and little ones too, like a lost tooth, riding a bike, or a new boss at work. Transitions are hard. Change is hard.

Repatriation is very hard. Repatriation is a process, not an event. It may take a long while. A long, long while. But one day, I’m confident that you’ll wake up and feel better. And somewhere down the road, you’ll look back and you’ll see. You’ll see the past and hopefully, a present that reminds you, in the best possible ways, of the past. And if you look very closely, you might even see a doorway.

By Jennifer Dziekan

Jennifer lived in Switzerland for three years with her husband and three children. In July, 2015 she found herself making the transition back to the US. Nothing was easy except for possibly the grocery shopping. Back ‘home’, back to work, and back to feeling like a fish out of water.

Illustration by Laura Munteanu

Laura has studied Journalism and Advertising, and has been working as a journalist and an illustrator. She has been illustrating for magazines, websites, charity and diverse campaigns. She lives in Zurich with her husband and eight-year-old daughter.

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