Are we there yet?

Five months ago we landed back in Singapore on a wing and a prayer, and I’ve got to say, these five months have been extremely challenging. We came back because we needed to be happier with our life, and that comes from a few different elements for both of us. The most significant thing missing for me was work opportunities. I need to work. I love working. It gives me a thrill being out there, I enjoy interacting with smart people, and I love the creative process when I pick up professional writing assignments – or even better, when I get to create the words a company uses to describe itself. Steve also needs to work and be excited about what he’s doing, he needs to stretch himself and he needs to work with like-minded people beyond the world of Geosynthetics. He’s now doing that and he picked up two contracts last week. He’s a clever man.

But as I said in my earlier blogpost – Gaining Time – we also need to have time for each other AND most importantly, time for our boys. We know we could never have it all in Australia. It’s just not designed for that, especially with no family help around the corner, so we came to the understanding that we needed to be in a place where we could have help, even if we had to pay for it. This help means we can rely on everything being taken care of in the home so we can just get on with living and working... just the way we want it.

In the last week, I can honestly say, I think we’re there. It’s been a hard grind. There’s been a lot of disappointment. People have said they’d follow-up and we’ve heard nothing. Things haven’t worked out how we thought they would. Business hasn’t come through when we were told it would. We’ve stressed and strained over paying rent and school fees. There have been days, weeks... well it’s just been all consuming at times...

But as we’ve moved through this cycle, we’ve had a chance to see where the business opportunities really are and we’ve reshaped what we offer to more closely reflect a need. We’ve had a few angels step in along the way to help us out or make sure we’re getting a chance to meet the right people. And we’ve persisted, remained positive and hopeful, put ourselves out there at every opportunity, we’ve worked out how to have fun in the midst of the stress, and when we gotten down we’ve kicked ourselves (or each other) in the arse and said “feeling like this doesn’t serve us, it only makes the situation worse, so perk up sweetlips and focus on the future - it’s going to happen.”

It’s happening, and while we’re not in comfortable-land by a long shot, we’re heading there and moving towards the life we want. A life where we’re all happy and relatively content. The next chapter definitely has to have more ease in it – not something I’ve ever really sought on my life journey to date. No idea why I haven’t taken the easy roads...

However, based on these last few months, I’ve got to say, believing in something and staying true to your direction is not an easy thing to do. Most people don’t move countries with a family and no back-up or job - but we just had to, we were unhappy. Making massive changes is something we know how to do (hey we’ve both done it a lot) but it’s never without good reason – I mean I can’t think of anything more important than being happy, being professionally satisfied, spending time with my love and giving our boys every chance we can to help them become amazing men? It’s been the right choice. A hard choice, but the right choice.

Many have questioned our choices and decisions. Some ask us openly, others don’t but we know they want to. Some look at us and wonder what the bloody hell our decision making parameters are? I was asked again on Saturday why we’ve moved around so much and most of the time, I can’t give an answer that makes sense to everyone. The reality is we made a decision that we would keep shaking things up until we were happy, and while we’ve gone through a lot of ball ache in the process, returning to where we left, we’ve always been prepared to do whatever it takes to find what we want. Sometimes you’ve got to go through these times to really appreciate what you value and we will never regret the last two years – oh the life lessons!

BUT I can tell you something for sure - we won’t be moving countries again in the short term. In fact, we figure we’ll be here for a long time. It’s definitely home. We’re in the right place. We’ve got an amazing community of friends around us and Singapore is buzzing, vibrant and dynamic right now. It’s awesome.

The other wonderful thing is the boys absolutely love it here. They have a constant community of children to run around with, and Lex has a renewed faith in his school environment after the horribleness he experienced in Australia. A psychologist told us that experience may come back to kick him in the arse when he’s around six or seven, so we’ll be bracing ourselves for that. But he is absolutely overjoyed to go to school these days and that alone has been worth all the heartache of the year so far. Not to mention, he’s talking. Not 100% at his level yet, but he’s getting there. It’s so cool – I love hearing what that little man has to say. What about Jax? He'd be happy anywhere – he’s just a dude and already the most popular boy in school. That kid I tell ya!

There you go. I thought you’d be interested to know what’s been going on. Do I have my red Hermes bag yet? No. Is Steve driving his Audi R8 yet? Not quite. But we’re getting very close to drinking a lot of champagne... we hope.

The lesson – follow your dreams, follow your heart, and never EVER give up.

Yours, without the bollocks

Andrea