Coping with separation - Keep Your Life, Family and Career Intact While Living Abroad - page 86

longed, people like her may resent the parent for putting them through this. Sometimes the
frustration may be inflicted in turn on the elders, in the form of aggressive behavior or ab-
use.
Diane needs to have more realistic expectations of herself as a caretaker. Since she can-
not always be physically present it is important that she arrange some help that can lessen
any pain or danger to her mother; for example, a live-in nurse or assisted living center.
Keeping regular contact through phone and e-mail will offer comfort and assurance that
her mother is being cared for.
Diane also needs to draw a line between her mother's needs and those of her own nuclear
family. She has to carry on her life, accept her own limitations and believe that she is doing
her very best within the constraints of geographical distance. Finally, she needs to try not
to force her mother's problems onto the whole family.
T HE ASTRONAUT SYNDROME
When one partner in a marriage is truly dissatisfied with living in a foreign country, the
couple may have to make the difficult choice of one of them returning home while the other
finishes out an overseas contract term. In other cases, one spouse will stay behind from the
beginning, usually so as not to sacrifice his or her own career. Either way, such couples are
facing the “Astronaut Syndrome”.
Randolf complains that all he has in China is work and more work. “I miss my wife
and son terribly. I really can't see the end of this two-year separation.”
Randolf, age 37, an executive with a shoe manufacturer, was sent to China for two years
to oversee the setting up of a new factory near Guangzhou. This was a good opportunity
for career enhancement, as well as to earn extra money. However, because his wife has her
own job back home in Austria, he went to China by himself, while returning home every
chance he can. He recently came back from a six-week visit with his wife and three-year-
old son.
In Guangzhou he lives in a comfortable hotel apartment, and has made acquaintances
among the other foreign residents. He works extra hours in order to build up longer leave
time for his visits home. However, he finds it hard to accept his new “bachelor” lifestyle.
All at once he finds himself having no emotional outlets.
Randolf feels lonesome, unhappy and vulnerable. He has tremendous responsibility on
his shoulders, yet he finds himself depressed and unmotivated in his work.
Randolf is experiencing what most “astronauts” experience. An “astronaut” is a married
person who goes abroad on a temporary assignment to earn money or for career purposes,