Doctors Without Borders Archives | Trailing-Spouse.com

Now I know I can’t lose

As long as you follow

I’m going to win

I’m going to beg, steal, or borrow

As long as you follow
Fleetwood Mac

Since Fleetwood Mac’s Christine McVie died on November 30, I’ve been listening to “As Long As You Follow” on repeat, often with tears, but sometimes with laughter, remembering how I once joked that it was the perfect song for the career expat.

“You can sing this to me at our wedding!” I chirped at my then-fiancé, when we were discussing plans for our married life.

We didn’t know where we were going, or when. All we knew was that at any moment, a call would come from his employer and we’d have a week to wrap up our lives. We said our “I do’s” in New Orleans, and next thing I knew we were on a flight to Nairobi, where he had a role that would fulfill him for the next two years, and I… well, I had myself to contend with.

Following to a fault

Though he never sang McVie’s words to me, I followed my husband: from Nairobi to Kampala to Paris to Lyon and finally, eight years ago, to Geneva.

Disclaimer: I am a former trailing spouse. My husband and I separated a few years ago, shortly after our move from Lyon, France to Geneva, Switzerland.

We are still very much a family, however, and my Ex lives up the street. But, if COVID-19 ever gets under control and he decides to move? I would not be faced, once again, with the question of closing up one life and inventing a new one wherever we land.

It’s not that this process has ever scared me. As a chronic expat, in the course of my 52 years, I’ve lived in 15 different cities, in nine countries, on four continents. I became a trailing spouse mainly because I fell madly in love with my sexy, smart Ex — but probably also because it seemed so normal to move around the globe because of a man’s job. My dad was a U.S. Foreign Service officer and my ex is a humanitarian medical doctor and epidemiologist who has worked with Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

First, I followed my father. Then, my husband. Now, I find it really exciting to ask only myself: Where next?

Doctors Without Borders

Yesterday’s Gone; Tomorrow Will Be Here

Following to a fault

Confessions of a Chronic Expat