Adjusting to coming home?

[MAB15]

So I know I need to live in the moment but currently it is hard. I am doing summer school right now, I have 2 weeks left and then I will be travelling home to be there for a year or so. I will be moving in with my boyfriend again and I am so excited but also so nervous about the adjustment period. I know we are strong enough to handle it but I just keep thinking about how much we have changed and how different we are and how we will adjust to that in the very near future when we move in together. I know if I were to be with him at home we would have changed anyway but it's different given that we have been apart for 11 months now. I am just not sure how to go about this adjustment period and just want a little support and maybe some stories on successful adjustment periods!

Thanks!

[Tanja]

I don't unfortunately have any experience on adjusting cause I'm not in your situation... But I can still throw in a few supporting words right?

You have lived with him before so hopefully the transition won't be too much to handle, I can't really tell you whether or not it will all go smoothly because I've read both happy and not so happy stories about it in here but I'm pretty sure you'll bounce back fairly quickly and get back on with the daily routines with each other... After all you both already know what it's like to live with each other so it's not going to be a new situation.

Surely the happiness from being together again will overshadow any minor sticks and stones there might be

[lunamea]

I do have an adjustment story, but unfortunately not a successful one. I returned home to my husband 6 weeks or so ago and found he has changed A LOT (I already figured that when I was still abroad, because he would club more and more and care less about videochatting/talking to me and we'd have serious fights all the time). He's holding a grudge because I "left him alone" to study abroad (even though he agreed at the time) and now that he found his freedom (a freedom he hadn't had previously), he's just doing what he wants and doesn't much care for my opinion anymore. Add to that that I suspect there's someone else (he's lying to me and behaving suspiciously) and there's no trust anymore and you have a perfect mess.

Still, I wouldn't say that any of that is typical for a closing-the-distance story. I'm pretty sure you both have changed and my advice would be giving it some time to adjust to each other again before freaking out that things have changed etc. A week after I came back, my hb admitted that he doesn't have the same feelings anymore, that when he thinks about coming home to me, he's looking forward to it, but then when he sees me, he doesn't feel anything. I thought that particular example might be a reaction to him having expected my being home to be way different (or me to be different, as in the same as last year.) So, I'd expect disappointment in that respect, but I'd try to stay calm and just see where things take you after you've adjusted again.

As I was the one coming home from abroad, I had all these cultural transition issues going on, too and I think I'm still not feeling a 100% at home here. I've only lived at our new apartment for 6 months before I went abroad, so I didn't totally feel at home here yet even before I left and coming "home" to an apartment that had been my husband's alone for almost a year was difficult, too. I'd say it's a good idea to go to places that are familiar to you/from which you have happy memories, esp. if you're not moving back to where you've lived before.

Generally, just don't expect too much and take your time in growing together again. Good luck!