Homesickness is a form of loss which may never grant closure. But a heart in two places can still find joy | Gaynor Parkin

“I don’t have the words to describe it properly, I just feel I’m in the wrong place and I don’t want to be here.” For the past few years, *Suzanne has travelled each year halfway around the world to visit family and close friends in her birth country. While the farewells are always hard, Suzanne usually settles back home after a few weeks, staying connected with video calls and regular messaging even when time differences made it difficult. This time, though, something felt different. Suzanne was struggling with an overwhelming sense of dislocation and disconnection. “I thought a longer visit and more time with everyone would make it easier to come back, but it’s actually made it harder,” she said. “The goodbyes just don’t get any easier, and I feel that my heart is there, even though I live here.” Related: I took my daughter on a holiday to Hong Kong to visit family. I didn’t realise how hard it would be to leave | Lucille Wong Suzanne was particularly upset that the timing of her return meant she had missed her favourite aunt’s birthday celebration by a few weeks. “The family met up for tea and cake, and I felt so sad not to be there. I so wanted to be with her for her birthday and more than anything to just be physically there, not calling in from halfway around the world on a phone.” “Then today I felt sad again because I baked a really special cake that turned out perfectly and I wanted to share it with family, but of course they are there not here, and that sadness took away some of the joy of creating it.” As she spoke, it was clear this wasn’t simply nostalgia: Suzanne has spent her adult life navigating two worlds. An extended visit and more time, rather than healing the ache, seems to have sharpened it. The loss of the ordinary In trying to understand why this most recent re-entry has been the most difficult so far, Suzanne wondered if “the ordinary parts of life” are the aspects she grieves the most. “I miss the birthdays, popping around to see them for tea, or planning to meet up next week, or linking up for a weekend.” Paradoxically, the longer visits exacerbate her feelings of loss: “Because we don’t get to see each other very often the visits end up feeling pressured and almost too intense, because we are trying to pack everything into the time we have together”. Suzanne described the ache of her realisation that perhaps the visits can’t ever compensate for the everyday presence she grieves for. “Actually, I think it’s impossible, no visit can make up for the fact that I’m not there most of the time, and that means I’m missing out on the ordinary things.” When homesickness doesn’t fade Researchers often describe homesickness as a distress caused by being away from home, with an expectation that it eases with time. But for many, the longing never fully recedes. It becomes a form of ambiguous loss – a term coined by family therapist Pauline Boss to describe grief that lacks closure or clear resolution. Ambiguous loss occurs when something or someone is absent, yet still profoundly present in our minds and hearts. Suzanne’s family are present for her and she can talk to them, even see their faces – but they remain physically out of reach. Boss’s research shows that this kind of loss can be as enduring and painful as bereavement, precisely because it cannot be completed. Suzanne read about ongoing homesickness and this ambiguous loss in a lovely piece in the Guardian. Lucille Wong’s reflections resonated deeply with Suzanne: “When you have two worlds, you always have to say goodbye to one” and carrying with you “the heaviness of having to leave”. Wong also describes some hope and acceptance: “I think how wonderful it is to have two worlds, and despite having to leave one (for now), we hold the experiences, memories and connections. We learn to make room for the best of both worlds.” Making room for the best of both worlds Suzanne had engaged in therapy a few different times earlier in her life and found it helpful for making sense of her experiences and crafting a full life. “I know [from this therapy] that when the homesickness hits I’m grieving, and that grieving comes in waves and layers. And I do know there’s no fix or resolution to it.” In coping with this most recent bout, Suzanne is grappling with the challenge to acknowledge her homesickness and grief, while making room for the best of both worlds. This process of making room has led Suzanne to the puzzle of how to make sense of seemingly contradictory and conflicting emotions. Related: If you’re feeling anxious, take a moment to pause before pouring that glass of wine | Diane Young “How do I make room for gratitude, joy and relationship connection[s] with people in my life here, without being overwhelmed by sadness and loss and longing for people over there?” she asked. Psychological research suggests that mixed emotions – like sadness and gratitude – are not contradictory but coexistent and in fact neurologically integrated. This paradox validates Suzanne’s experience and, as Wong identified, appreciating the wonder of two worlds and perhaps a heart in two places may enable Suzanne to find comfort in the transitions, rather than distress. To help with the “how” and find some comfort, Suzanne has been experimenting with recent advice from the grief expert Dr Lucy Hone. Hone recommends approaching grief in “manageable chunks”, oscillating between facing and avoiding it, using activities that are distracting to create breaks from grief. In these breaks, Suzanne gets glimmers of feeling more at peace. “I’m trying to feel grateful for what I have here without letting the sadness for what I don’t have take over,” she said. “Maybe that’s the only way to live with it – to make space for both.” Living with it will probably be lifelong for her. In this, Suzanne is not alone. Her story reflects experiences many migrants, expatriates and long-distance families know well: that while longing, love and loss are deeply interconnected, our hearts are flexible enough to hold them all both here and there. *Suzanne is an amalgam of a few different people, all of whom have given permission for their experiences to be shared here. Specific details have been changed for privacy • Gaynor Parkin is a clinical psychologist and founder at Button Psychology