From the beginning on I’ve been very honest with you about what I find hard about moving to a new country. My biggest fear and indeed one of my biggest struggles here in the US has been finding friends from the beginning on. I know that it is mostly my fault, because I might not be the most outgoing and easy person. But I didn’t expect it to be that hard to find some nice people over here.

Now – nearly 18 months after we first moved the US – we found some nice friends and have a good circle of close people. But it for sure isn’t the same as back home. We hung out with one of Flo’s new co workers and his girlfriend yesterday. I met them before and absolutely love them, but for the first time I really got to talk to them yesterday. When I talked to the girl alone, she told me how hard even she as an American has it to find friends in LA. She is from the East Coast and told me that she considers the West Cast as somewhat of a bad place to actually make friends.

When you move here you have to learn the difference of an actual friendship and a superficial nice gesture very fast. No, I don’t want to say Americans are superficial. I really don’t think that. They are nice and open – and Europeans might often misunderstand that. But you have to learn to not mistake a nice move as a friendship. And I guess that is what happened to me when we first moved here and often left me a little confused.

I guess the best tip I can give everyone who plans on moving here or just did so is take your time. Don’t think everything has to work out perfectly in the first years. Maybe you will be lucky and find friends super fast. But maybe you won’t – and that’s absolutely okay. Because you are building a whole new life for yourself – and you have to do that one step at a time.

Okay, first of all I have to say this: I don’t wanna seem cranky or unthankful with this post. So first thing I have to say is that I am so so thankful that this whole dream came true for us and that we are still living in the US, have a pretty nice life and not that much left to ask for. But I want to be honest with you and therefore I have to say from time to time that life far away from home can suck big time! From time to time it hits you a little harder and this week I had one of those weeks.

It all started when our really good friends from Germany got married the other weekend and for sure we couldn’t go to their wedding. It sometimes just rips your heart out that you miss nearly everything. Then my little nice turned 6 – again without me. And it was mine and my brother’s birthday this week. I don’t care much about birthdays, but it is hard to be away from all your loved ones when you have a day that should be all about love, family and close friends.

After two years here I feel like we settled in pretty good and found some great friends – but still it isn’t the same! The funny thing is though that noone really seems to realize that. People always tell me stuff like “Oh, you totally live the dream”, “I would give so much to be in your shoes” or “You are so lucky!”. Yeah, I actually did make my dream come true by moving here and making life work for me. But pretty much everyone keeps to forget what I gave up for that and what I still have to keep up with to make this last. It seriously can suck so much to live 10.000 miles away from all the people you trust, it can be awful to work with people who have a completely different mentaliy than you do and it can be painful as shit to still have to learn new things every day.

I am proud of what I achieved and sometimes I can’t believe that I didn’t just give up and go back to Germany! But please don’t mistake living the dream with making a dream come true! I still have a lot of things to accomplish and get out of the way, to live the dream! And even if they will be very painful sometimes, I am looking forward to meet those new roadblocks.

I always told you that I won’t spoil you by only telling you about the good things of living far away from home. So today I will talk about one of the big downsides. Our good friends got married this weekend, my little niece will celebrate her 6th birthday next week and my best friend will become a father any day now. And guess what: I will miss all of it. A lot of our friends celebrated weddings this year, the arrivals of their firstborn or important birthdays. All of those are moments where it is really hard for me to live here.

I am very lucky to have good friends that won’t ever let me down or come anything between or friendship even if I live a few thousand miles away. But I can’t hust hop on the next flight to live through big moments with them and that will always stand between us. It just really hurts me sometimes how I just can’t be there and even more that this will never change. Being away from the dear people in your life probably is the biggest downside of moving away. And also the most hurtful one.

On days like these it takes a lot of energy to just pull through and don’t let yourself drown in sadness. Even if your friend’s lifes happen in another timezone and far far away, you have to keep building your own life in your new home. And that can’t be filled with sadness. In moments like these I always remind myself of why we moved here in the first place. Which is to pursue or dreams and life the dream we always had. And the easiest thing to do that is by enjoying the beauty of our home – which for the most part for me means go to the beach and visit places I love.

It took me a little time to get these sad feelings under control and not mistake them for thoughts of moving back to Germany. Now I more try to cherish them, because they show me how lucky I am to still have those really close people in Germany. People who love me for actually making my dream come true and will always be there when I come back – even if it’s just to visit.