A Hypothesis

Recently I ran across a study of the effects of returning AFS students to their home cultures. There were some very striking similarities between loss of a loved one through death and the grieving process most students (around 61%) experienced with regard to returning home after a year long stay away. The study found that students were having a much more difficult time returning to their own countries, cultures, and friends than they had in leaving those same things. The adjustment back to their old lives, in other words, was the most difficult part of the AFS experience. Again, this is not all, but a pretty substantial majority in the study.

Interestingly, my wife was speaking with our student's liaison about how we were doing since our student had been gone. In response, my wife said "it feels like someone died." Could it be that we are experiencing the same thing as a returning student? If so, how is that possible. We went nowhere new. We still had a familiar culture around us, with family, with jobs, and with our own popular culture. And yet the fact is, we were having the same symptoms as a returning student.

So here is my hypothesis; because we are childless and both in our forties in age, we were, in effect, living in a different culture before our AFS student came into our lives. As time went on, we were exposed to a completely foreign culture for us. That is, high school dances, sports, plays, concerts, picking up the child, delivering the child, meeting new parents of friends of our daughter, and on and on. We experienced the same level of change, in the most important ways (i.e., our daily routine) as our AFS daughter. And so, when she left to go home, not only did she leave us without her in person and spirit in our house, she closed the door behind her to the new culture we had experienced as a result of having her part of our life.

Therefore it should be no surprise that we are having difficulty adjusting back to our "old" culture. And in fact, we are not at all happy with being back where we were before she came

Just a theory. But it explains our deep feelings of loss and sense of isolation. Knowledge and understanding are the first steps in dealing with our problems. And at least I have some grasp of just what the heck happened to us. I am feeling a bit better and am able to see the happy parts of our experience rather than only mourning their passing. Hope this helps you too.

The End

Strange title to start with, I know. But that's where we are right now. The end of our first AFS hosting experience.

I don't know about anyone else, but I am shocked at the amount of suffering the departure of our host daughter has stirred in us. Sad. Lonely. Depressed. We are "Empty Nesters" without ever having had our own children. I feel kind of like Jean-Luc Picard, captain of the Enterprise in Star Trek Voyager. He experienced a whole lifetime of virtual living by getting married, having children, growing old and then dying. With the aid of alien technology, he had the whole experience in 80 minutes through a hypnotic beam from a robot. In the same way, by hosting our lovely (most of the time!) daughter, my wife and I experienced the "birth" of a child, getting to know the child, growing to love and respect the child, and having the child leave home, taking our shredded hearts with her back to Germany—all in the span of 11 months.

Hence, the aforementioned, severe pain of separation.

And that's the point of this blog. I searched long and hard for some kind of information or a clearing house that host parents could use. Or just a place where someone understood and could empathize. And maybe my answer is in the fact that there is such a small amount of support for post host parents—that is, there is no demand for it.

When I started my search, I had questions like; is it normal to feel this way about a kid you only knew for 11 months? Do the kids that leave feel the same way about their host families? Do they stay in contact with host families in general? If so, what percentage? Are we losing our minds to have this strong of an attachment to a kid that didn't really show us real affection?

There was no information to be had. And so I turn it to you, host parents.

What is your experience, having sent your AFS child back home? If you've hosted a few times, or at least more than once, surely you know how things generally go. Your experience would be extremely helpful to me, and I am certain, many others as well. So please, fill us in. Won't you?

Thanks in advance for sharing!