When Going Home Doesn’t Quite Feel Like Going Home Anymore

For most of my life, Perth was simply home. It was familiar, predictable and filled with the people, places and routines that shaped who I was.

But after spending so much time travelling and living in Vietnam, returning to Perth now feels different. It is still home but perhaps no longer in the same way.

There is always a sense of anticipation before we return. I look forward to seeing family, catching up on everything we have missed and revisiting places that once formed part of our everyday lives. There are familiar roads, familiar shops and memories around almost every corner.

Yet somewhere between arriving at the airport and settling back into life in Perth, I begin to notice a strange feeling. Everything is familiar, but I no longer feel completely familiar within it.

Seeing Perth Through Different Eyes

Perth has not necessarily changed dramatically. In many ways, I am the one who has changed. Living overseas has altered what I notice and what I value. Things I once accepted as part of everyday life now stand out. The distances seem greater, the cost of almost everything feels higher, and even a simple outing seems to require more planning than I remember.

At the same time, there are things about Australia that I appreciate more because I have been away. There is comfort in understanding how everything works. I do not need to translate a sign, calculate a currency conversion or wonder whether I have misunderstood what someone has said.

Of course, the best part of returning is seeing my family my dad, who is now 94, and my two sons. Every visit with them feels more precious because I am increasingly aware that time does not stand still simply because I live on the other side of the world.

But if I am completely honest, it is my friends who make my trips back to Perth feel special.

I mean the friends I may not have seen since my last visit, yet the moment we are together, the months apart seem to disappear. There are no awkward silences and no need to explain why we have not spoken every week. We simply pick up where we left off, as though the conversation had only been paused.

I once believed I had many friends. After spending 20 years as part of a youth organisation and 16 years working for the same company, my life was filled with people. I mistook being surrounded by people for being surrounded by friends.

When I left, I discovered the difference.

Some disappeared slowly. Others seemed to cut me from their lives almost immediately. A few unfriended me, while others simply stopped making any effort at all. I would be lying if I said it did not hurt. It hurt deeply. After giving so much of myself for so many years, I felt as though I had been thrown onto the scrap heap no longer useful, no longer present and therefore no longer worth knowing.

Perhaps they were only ever connected to the role I played, the work I did or the place I occupied in their lives. Once I was no longer there, neither was the friendship. That was a painful truth to accept.

But five people stayed.

Five people continued to care, even when distance made friendship less convenient. They did not need me to be living nearby, working beside them or regularly appearing in their lives. They wanted to remain my friends simply because of who I am.

Five may sound like a small number compared with all the people I once thought were my friends. To me, those five are worth more than the hundreds who disappeared. They are the ones I can honestly call my true friends in Perth, and seeing them is one of the greatest joys of coming back.

Perhaps losing the others was not only a loss. It was also a painful kind of clarity. It showed me that true friendship is not measured by how many people surround you when you are present. It is revealed by who still reaches for you when you are far away.

Perth remains familiar, but familiarity alone no longer gives me the sense of belonging it once did. The people who stayed, however, still do.

Coming Back for Family

Family is the most important reason I return to Perth a few times a year.

When you live overseas, time with family becomes more precious because it is no longer unlimited. You cannot casually drop in next weekend or tell yourself there will always be another opportunity. Each visit has a beginning and an end, and the departure date is quietly sitting in the background from the moment you arrive. That knowledge changes everything.

Returning can be filled with love and happiness, but it can also be intensely emotional. There are people you cannot wait to hold, conversations that cannot be fitted into a telephone call and practical matters that have waited for you to come home. You want to be there for everyone. You want every day to count. Yet beneath it all is the painful awareness that you cannot recover the time you have missed, fix every problem or be everything that everyone needs. Sometimes the homecoming imagined from a distance is much simpler than the reality waiting for you.

In Vietnam, we have deliberately built a quieter life. I call mine an uncomplicated life; my husband, David, says he is living a Stoic life. Whatever name we give it, Da Nang has given us something we desperately needed peace.

We belong to expat groups where we meet friends for coffee or dinner. I volunteer teaching English alongside an extraordinary Vietnamese professor who also runs a private school. Our days have purpose, friendship and connection, but they are not weighed down by the constant pressures that once consumed us in Perth.

After all the challenges we faced here, that quiet life is not something we take for granted. It is something we crave. Perhaps, in some ways, it is also something we need to protect.

That does not mean we have stopped caring. We care deeply sometimes so deeply that returning hurts. But I have finally begun to understand that every person I love is travelling through their own life. My family and friends each have their own struggles, choices, hopes and consequences. I can love them, listen to them and stand beside them, but I cannot walk their journey for them. Only they know where it may lead, and ultimately it belongs to them. That is a difficult truth for someone who has always wanted to help, mend and make things better.

So now I try to treasure what is in front of me without believing I can control what comes next. The moments are precious precisely because they are imperfect and because none of us knows how many more, we will share.

It is rarely the grand occasions that remain in my heart. It is sitting together around a table, sharing a cup of tea, hearing a familiar family story for the hundredth time, or simply being in the same room with the people I love. These ordinary moments may appear small, but when you live far away, you understand just how much they mean.

The longer we live away, the more difficult it becomes to describe one country as home and another as somewhere we visit.

Missing the Ordinary Things

When I am in Vietnam, there are things I miss about Australia. When I am in Australia, I find myself missing Vietnam. Yes, even the Bun Bao man yelling to sell his dumplings at all hours of the day or night

It is rarely the famous attractions or major experiences that I miss most. It is usually something ordinary: the ease of calling a Grab, not driving in crazy traffic, warm weather, sitting at a local café, recognising people in the neighbourhood or heading out without needing to plan the entire day.

This does not mean one place is better than the other. It means that different parts of my life now belong in different places.

Perth holds our family, our history and many of the memories that made us who we are. Vietnam holds much of our present life: our routines, community, friendships and the freedom we have found through living differently.

Perhaps that is why returning to Perth can feel both comforting and unsettling at the same time.

Can More Than One Place Be Home?

I once believed home was a fixed place. It was the address written on a form or the simple answer you gave when someone asked where you lived. Now I understand that home is far more complicated.

Sometimes home is not a country or an address at all. It is the person travelling beside you, the friendships that survive time and distance, and the familiar routines you carry from one place to another. It is the feeling of being safe, accepted and settled, even when you know it may only be temporary.

For the past two years, one of my closest friends has been planning her 70th birthday. She knew exactly how she wanted to celebrate it: in Bali, a place that is deeply special to her and, I might add, equally special to me.

But this celebration was never meant to be simply a holiday or a birthday party. She wanted to share this milestone only with the people closest to her. She wanted her family and friends gathered in one place, not rushing in for a few hours and then returning to their separate lives, but actually living, laughing and celebrating together.

She has booked an entire villa complex with 11 separate rooms to accommodate 20 of the people she holds closest for a week. We will range in age from just three months old to 80 years old different generations, different lives and different stories, all brought together because one person decided that this moment mattered.

At an age when time feels more precious and tomorrow can no longer be taken for granted, she has chosen not to celebrate with possessions or extravagance. She has chosen people. She has chosen togetherness. She has chosen to create a memory that all of us will carry long after the suitcases are unpacked and the photographs have begun to fade.

After six weeks in Perth, our two weeks in Bali will bring another change of pace before we return to Vietnam. Bali will be a holiday, but it will also be much more than that. It will be a celebration of friendship, family, survival.

It will also be a pause between two very different versions of home: the Perth that holds so much of our past and the Da Nang where we have created our present.

I know I will love being in Bali. I will treasure the laughter, the shared meals and the rare experience of having so many important people together in one place. Yet I also know that somewhere within me, I will already be looking forward to returning to Da Nang.

Home now exists in many places in Perth with my family, in Bali with a cherished friend, and in Da Nang with the quiet life David and I have built together. Maybe home is wherever love has given us a reason to stay and wherever it gives us a reason to return.

Where Home Is Now

Returning to Perth has forced me to face something I had perhaps been avoiding: this is no longer the only place where I belong.

Perth holds my history. It is where I raised my sons, built a career, formed friendships and lived through some of the most important and difficult years of my life. Most importantly, it is where my family remains. My 94-year-old dad is here, and every time I leave, I am painfully aware that time is passing and that living overseas comes with a price.

That is the part people do not always understand. Choosing a life in Vietnam does not mean I love my family any less. It does not mean leaving Perth is easy or that I can board a plane without feeling the weight of those I am leaving behind. It means accepting that I cannot be everywhere, fix everything or live my life entirely around the fear of what may happen while I am away.

There is guilt in that. There is sadness too. But there is also honesty. The life David and I have created in Da Nang is not an extended holiday. It is our real life. It is where we wake each morning, meet friends for coffee, share meals, volunteer, laugh and enjoy the quiet existence we worked so hard to find. It is a life with purpose, but without the pressure that once seemed to follow us everywhere.

Perth will always be part of me, but I no longer need to pretend it is the only place I should call home. Home is where the people I love are, even when I cannot be beside them. It is also where I have found peace, purpose and the freedom to live as the person I am now.

Leaving either place will always carry some sadness. Perhaps that is simply the price of loving people in one country while building a life in another.

I may never again feel completely at home in only one place. And finally, I am learning to be honest about that.

Sheridan-Leigh

MyLifestyle.au – Inspiring slower, smarter and more meaningful travel.

About the Author:

Sheridan-Leigh is the passionate voice behind the MyLifestyle Blog, where life is celebrated with vibrant stories and insightful travel tips. With a deep love for slow travel, she believes in truly experiencing each destination, creating connections beyond the surface. Her blog is a blend of personal stories, expert advice, and a philosophy that life is for living to the fullest and is rich with opportunities for growth and adventure. Join Sheridan-Leigh as she shares her journey, inspiring others to embrace life, travel deeply, and live fully.

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