Siena, Italy. Took a while to get accepted by the locals, but once I was, I loved living there. The landscapes around the city are among the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. And the best food in the world too.

Antarctica is getting warmer.

Takes almost no time to adapt to a new place now. And extra languages. That’s about it.

10 months is more than enough to know that you don’t like a place. Staying more doesn’t make a difference in my experience (lived in 5 countries). There’s a much bigger risk for OP to be even more depressed though.

If you don’t feel happy, it’s perfectly normal to not feel happy. And don’t feel ashamed, because shit happens. You can’t really force yourself to love a place. So you’re not giving up, you’re just moving on.

Note that a similar situation happened to me in Belgium. So at the first opportunity, I left and feel much happier for it.

Sadly the “licenciements économiques” are frequent in France and the current government is making sure people who suffer from it get as little help as possible. I’m sorry this happened to you.

It’s just sad that so many people don’t realize that France is far from a worker’s paradise these days.

You should have said Romanian from the start. And just that really. There’s a massive prejudice against Romanians in particular in Western Europe in general, so your situation is not very surprising.

There’s absolutely zero issue with you going alone to see your family. No later than this summer, my wife went to see her family with our daughter, leaving me behind. I had zero problem with this, because we simply couldn’t afford to all go there. I’d rather she goes alone (or with the daughter) than not at all. Her family has zero problem with this as they understand our situation.

As a French living in the UK, I soometimes can’t stand my fellow French people. Not really their ability to complain about absolutely everything, but rather their frequent aura of superiority. It seems that many still have trouble accepting that France is not an Empire anymore. Doesn’t help that we elect presidents that feel the same way.

Also, the very condescending way of talking very often. Like explaining something an adding stuff like “Anybody could do that really” or “It’s very trivial”. Coupled with the national obsession with maths and it drives me nuts almost every time.

Also, the French are most definitely the most whiny people in the world. The British can’t really compete there, sorry.

Note that the French living in the UK I meet are usually ok, as they feel the same way as I do. ;)

Had my daughter abroad and raised in another country, still abroad. My partner was never a local in any of these countries. She comes from an Asian country and me a European.

It’s definitely challenging, especially when the kid starts going to school. So many things to learn and so much stress. Also, absolutely zero help from either of our families. But we manage.

Regarding languages, I only use mine and my wife hers, which makes my daughter perfectly trilingual. It was never a huge challenge to her and now she can learn new languages very easily. She’s also way more flexible than other kids when it comes to new cultures, as she grew up in a very international environment. It’s a massive advantage to her.

We definitely have racism (lots of it), even if it’s fairly different from US racism, fascism sounds very extreme for me tho (for now).

Ok, proto-fascism then, which is very much what Macron is doing right now.

The south of France is worse, because the people are much less welcoming than in Paris.

I’m from the south West and not necessarily. Like in many places, if you’re not from there, people will treat you like a stranger. My father has lived there for 50 years and he is still treated like a foreigner.

Fake. No very well paid job + your own apartment in Paris is just not possible. Unless your job is much better paid than most jobs in France. ;)

Apart from that, if you’re not blasé, yeah staying in Paris is probably not a good idea.

I don’t agree about the lack of high-energy people there though. When I lived there, I found many of them and they annoyed me with their joie de vivre. Very ennuyeux.

Finally, France is indeed descending very fast into fascism. There’s absolutely zero doubt now. I think it’s a very legit reason to leave the country, because it will get much worse in the future.

My wife has had a similar experience. In retrospect, she has no idea what to think of this. Both going back and staying have their pros and cons. It’s not an easy decision at all and I don’t think reading others’ experiences would help a lot since it varies so much from one person to the other.

I’ve lived in Italy for a while so I’ll just say this: if you don’t have very real job prospects back home, don’t go back. I guess you know already, but the job market there sucks and if you have good opportunities in California, at least try to have a job there for a while before deciding at least.

Also, I assume that you’re still very young, meaning that you’re at the age when you have to experience life to the max. Going back to a small town in Italy may not be the best option for that too.

Is it France by any chance?

I did that twice when my daughter was 3 and 6 and yes, it was very difficult for her at first. But each time after a few months, she started making friends and using the local language. It helped that her teachers were always benevolent and doing their best to help her adapt. After about a year, she was perfectly fluent in both languages and started making friends.

So it’s perfectly normal for them to have a hard time, but if it keeps being a problem after a year, it may be worth investigating to know what’s wrong. Like their language proficiency (make sure they learn it asap). Or bullying at school, by kids and adults alike. I grew up in France and I can tell you bullying is a massive problem there.

Also, socializing with parents at your kids’ schools is also important if you want to organize playdates imho. Not becoming friends, but at least be able to organize playdates and sometimes go out with the kids.