Quality Of Life?

[Richardrawlings]

I read in the life after death thread about people looking for quality of life. Having heard any number of horror stories and how people end up working harder with longer hours to make their "dream" work how does that stack up with quality of life?

After all if its rural living then surely a move to the country in the UK would suffice. No new language to learn, you already know all the customs and mores of the country. and there are more than enough derelict buildings that could be renovated.

Would any of you who have lived in france for a long time consider moving either back to the UK or to another country to improve your quality of life knowing the hardships that you had undergone?

To those of you who hope to move to France what do you hope to gain?

Richard

[Coco]

LAST EDITED ON 18-Jul-04 AT 03:18 PM (BST)

Hi Richard

Who on earth can define "quality of life"? It has to be different things to different people.

For us, in the UK we left home at 6.50am, sat in traffic for 2-3 hours each morning to get into London (if it was 3, I would have to try and think of excuses to my boss for being late every day!) We then did a 7.5 hour day and then sat in traffic for anothr 2-3 hours to gt home - cooked dinner then fell asleep on the settee til it was time to go to bed. We could never even think about having a social life Monday-Friday.

These days we start work any time between 7.15 and 8.15 (depending on when guests want breakfast) - we thought we would have plenty of free time in the daytime but that just doesn't happen in the real world - then we often don't get to bed til gone 1am because, as we have learnt over the last year, one thing B&B guests LOVE to do is talk to you, usually about themselves, occasionally asking about our lifestyle but one thing's for certain, it is inevitably us who have to close the conversation and say that we really MUST go to bed.

So longer hours in France? If you exclude the commuting time in the UK then YES certainly. But we are in our own home, we are in control of the situation. If we decide to take off to the coast in the middle of the day, we feel like naughty children, but we CAN do it - then to make up for it, we both work all day Sunday, like today (just ironed 4 sets of duvet covers and pillow cases, ten T-shirts and 4 shirts). Compared to our previous life (even though we have more money worries) the "quality" is much, much better.

Now some may look at our lives and totally disagree!! But "that's life"!!!

I think you could probably substitute "quality of life" for "happy life". Or may "living a life" rather than "existing".


Coco

[Penny29]

Hi,

I found the points you raised in your posting very thought provoking.

Yes, I guess we could have moved to the countryside in the UK but there were a number of reasons we didn't do this:-

1. It wouldn't have been half as exciting.
2. We could not afford it (unless prepared to consider Outer Hebrides or similar. Brrrrrr)

For me the challenge of learning to live and converse in a new language is one of the big plus points of moving abroad. I feel a wonderful sense of achievement when we manage to make ourselves understood and/or get something ordered/organised. Each day we learn something new or experience something different - such a change from the jaded city lives we lived back in the UK.

As for ever going back - all I can say is I hope not. We are an itchy feet couple so I doubt we will stay in France forever, but who knows. If not there are plenty more countries in the world to explore and many more languages to master. I would see returning to the UK as a retrograde step.

Penny

[Washy]

For me, Coco hit the nail on the head when she said 'in control'. We were in the rat race back in the UK, did not say 'Back home' as we considere here home now. Ill health retirement, business not doing well, long working hours, mortgage, a dodgy endowment policy, high bills, etc, etc you have heard it all before.

We had always holidayed in France and had bought a ruin very cheaply in 1992, it was just about OK to live in, so we did ours sums. Plans A - M were all set out in a large French style school book, and we constantly referred to them and amended them until we had convinced ourselves that we could survive more comfortably in the sun in France.

No rat race, no long hours, no high bills, no mortgage, no millstone business - no worries!!

We have successfully 'downshifted' with no detrimental effects, we are both in better health and we more than just survive, we have a happier, healthier existence. We even have a better social life although that was not one of our criteria for moving, it has just happened.

We could not possibly have done this in the UK with house prices as they are.

[Val_2]

The quality of life I get here is knowing that my home and family are a lot safer than they would have been where we lived in the UK. I was a nervous wreck when we left there after having murder less than 200m away,shotguns going off in the night,cars vandalised in driveways for spare parts,intruders in the neighbour's house during the lunch hour whilst she was eating her lunch,kids hanging around outside our gate every evening and all weekend drinking and swearing at anything that moved and if you asked them to go..... All this in leafy Buckinghamshire where the cheapest house is over 170K which means we couldn't go back if we wanted to now and with these council tax rises they were talking about onthe news yesterday, there will be droves of people coming across the channel to escape I shouldn't wonder. We may work harder here for a lot less but at the end of the day there is no weekend working and we get treated as individuals for who we are and not for what we may have. I never did keep up with Jones and the new car and foreign holiday every year anyway!

[Hegs]

I work hard still, about the same as I did the UK, maybe even more. But I have no commute and in general much less stress. When it's playtime, the weather is generally better than UK, the roads are less busy (for cycling), there are a lot more interesting things to see not far from here. I reckon if I took a year off, I still wouldn't get to see everything I want to in a 2 hour drive from here.

A far cry from traffic jam/B&Q/traffic jam weekends we had in the UK, yes I could have done more outside but there are so many obstacles which don't exist in France.

>After all if its rural living
>then surely a move to
>the country in the UK
>would suffice. No new language
>to learn, you already know
>all the customs and mores
>of the country. and there
>are more than enough derelict
>buildings that could be renovated.
Rural UK is too expensive, unless you go a long way oop north. We briefly considered it, spent some time up there but decided it was too bleak plus the wine left a lot to be desired

Learning another language to fluency is a challenge, a valuable life skill and something I will be very proud of when it happens. Ditto for customs and mores, IMHO if you don't enjoy learning new things then you might as well book yourself into a retirement home right now.

[Stuart]

Richard

Won't the answers that you get to a question like this very much depend on the attitude of the people responding, and their preferred methods for dealing with life's little surprises?

What I mean by that is that some people might consider a potential obstacle to be a challenge to be overcome, while others may treat the same obstacle as a barrier that is impossible to get around without severe hardship.

Judging from reading through the comments on some of the other threads, I seem to be in the first camp. That may not always be such a good thing as we can have a tendency to jump in and try something before we have a true understanding of what is involved. When this has happened to me, I have usually been lucky enough to manage to muddle through somehow. However, I have to admit that there have been times when I have not been so fortunate.

The other side of the coin belongs to the more cautious (and possibly wiser) who need to plan things thoroughly before they will take the plunge. They will possibly have more chance of success but, to me, it might take some of the adventure out of it. Personally, I am of the opinion that sometimes ignorance really is bliss! While I can see that it is good to consider the possibilities, I also wonder if you can needlessly frighten yourself into not taking the chance.

Stuart