OFW Personal and Family Issues
OFWs DEALING WITH HOMESICKNESS

Homesick Blues

We all like comfort, we all like things we know well and understand. Home is safe - home is easy. Move away from it for a bit and you soon realize you miss a lot of things. You miss home most when things go wrong such as when you're down or sick. Birthdays and Christmas can be low points too.

Adjusting to a new surrounding, expectations, friends, and work routine takes a fair amount of time and patience. Moving away from home, voluntarily as in the case of overseas workers, expatriates and students has always led people to feel homesick.
In the case of expatriates, for instance, the depressive feeling of homesickness may cause the risk of losing their jobs, shame of being labelled as incompetent, the risk of not being able to move up the ladders in their career, or the prospect of unemployment, etc. By nature, we tend to resist change and struggle to hold on to familiar surroundings like the comforts of home, family, and friends. If you're struggling to beat this depressive feeling, here are some homesickness tips to pick you up.

1.Keep in touch with your parents, wife/husband back home through email and digital pictures. This will help both of you adjust. But if you are lazy to write a letter and the cost of regular phone calls is the reason for your ten day fast, it's probably time to make use of more modern technology. Send e-mail to each other or set up your own web site for correspondence from friends around the country.

2.A trip to the local food snack hang out or food joint can cure most anything. A roommate, friend, or someone you can confide in can help make your transition from home a little easier. You might even discover your friend is struggling with the same problems as you. Every once in awhile, watch CD movies and search out a favorite food or cook it at home. Familiar things from back home will cheer everyone up.

3.Talk about being homesick with your friends/ co-workers rather than bottling it up and hoping it will go away. This helps enormously and goes a long way to creating that 'we are in this together feeling.

4.Try writing in a journal, diary or blog the next time you are feeling down. Just write down what's on your mind and express some of your worries and fears. Over time, you can reflect on what you wrote and see how far you've come. You may even take up blogging as a hobby.

5.Social groups and events are a core part of your work experience. You could likewise volunteer to work with other expatriates or overseas workers from your own country at an expatriate club or organization. You might build new relationships and enjoy the satisfaction of helping others.

6.Now is a good time to remember your dreams and think about how much you can accomplish with a little effort and hard work. Write down what you want to accomplish and commit yourself to working towards your goals. Your attitude and confidence will improve as you progress.

7.See what recreational activities you can discover in your area. Find out what's happening in your area. Attend a sporting event, concert or company sponsored program. Plan a weekend get-away with friends. Exploring your new surrounding will add some excitement to the daily grind of work. You may even meet new friends or find a favorite hang out.

Preventive solutions may be deeply rooted in the ability of the organisations to ensure adequate preparations for their expatriates before departure. A little homesickness is normal as you adjust to your new surroundings, but you can't let it dampen your spirit. Preparation should chiefly be concerned with informing oneself about the circumstances in the host country; it should also crucially highlight the possibility that you may suffer some social and psychological isolation for some time before you become acquainted with the new environment, i.e. both physical and social. As part of the preventive methods, you should include plans for frequent return visits back home. Although this may add to your overall expenses, it will still remain cheaper than losing their jobs.

Possibly, you may also request that a relative of yours such as your parent, spouse and children, could be sponsored by your company to visit you occasionally. This may be the mother, father or other relatives. This approach is likely to ensure that there is not substantial breakdown in the family relationship and reduce the feeling of missing dear ones, which is often at the centre of homesickness.

Reducing homesickness could also take into account an attempt to rebuild a socio-cultural network, however artificial it may be. For instance, in areas such as Saudi Arabia, Middle East nations or U.S.A. where Asians, Filipinos and American expatriates work for their respective companies, there could be joint efforts to set an expatriate network (e.g. Overseas Filipino Workers clubs) that could also include host country nationals. Cultural practices such as nightclubs, religious institutions (church, mosque) schools or childcare facilities could be set up jointly to provide a more cultural sensitive network for the expatriates. This is far from implying that parent company nationals and third country nationals should cut themselves off the host society. On the contrary they learn from each other’s adjustment difficulties and successes at the same time as combating somehow the effects of home sickness.

Homesickness is a critical issue for migrants and overseas workers. This could affect expatriates and multinational organizations to a large extent. Homesickness could be a critical factor affecting adaptation and adjustment and should require greater attention than it receives at present.


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OFWs Dealing with leaving family behind

When mom or dad is away, the family goes astray
MARK UBALDE, GMANews.TV
12/18/2007 | 06:50 PM

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After 32 years of having to deal with the routine trip to the airport, Coleen, 52, still felt heavy when she sent off her husband last August to return to his job in the Middle East.

Coleen lost count of the times Fred, 57, went overseas. All she knows is that there's another vacant seat in the dining table.

“If only we had enough, I wouldn’t wish for my husband to leave. I don’t even aspire to be rich anymore. I just want to see my family whole," Coleen says in an interview.

However, when Fred does come home, his five children are hesitant to approach him. Without a vivid memory of their father in their younger years, the children scramble to accord him with a tense respect, almost like fear.

To compensate for lost time, Fred would usually splurge his kids with luxuries and high-tech toys when they were young, and signature clothes now that they are older.

Despite their situation, migration is not at all new for Coleen. If anything, it’s more like a way of life. Her older brother was a seaman in a foreign ship while her younger sister toiled for 14 years in Kuwait.

Coleen’s children, too, are no exception, having seen the immense financial gains from being employed abroad, three of her five children have worked overseas. Her eldest, Amy was a nurse in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia while her son and younger daughter also did stints in the Middle East.


But when Amy left her two sons and husband back in Manila, her marriage turned sour. Her husband spent her earnings and left their home with a mistress while their two sons performed poorly in school. Three years later, Amy was forced to return home to a broken family and a long list of bills to pay

Recently, Commission on Filipinos Overseas chairman Dante Ang expressed alarm in his speech at a conference in Manila on international migration that the social cost of Filipinos leaving their homes is taking the better out of the perceived financial rewards.

“How many families break up as a result of temporary migration? How many times have we heard of a husband or a wife running away with the neighbor just because the spouse has been working overseas? What about the children? Who takes care of them while one or two of their parents are out there earning a living abroad?" Ang pointedly asked.

All in the family

While the ‘old’ generation used to bank on education as a ticket to a better life, the goal of most families today is to land employment overseas.

Maruja Asis, director for Research and Publications of the Scalabrini Migration Center (SMC), a non-governmental organization dealing with migrant labor research, said families have changed their option for social mobility in recent years.

Asis wrote in a 2004 article for the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism that in a 2003 survey of SMC involving more than 1,600 children (aged eight to 10), 47 percent would like to work abroad. Out of this number, 60 percent were children of migrant parents.

“Another route to social mobility has been opened: overseas employment. The lack of employment opportunities and/or the low wages in the country have driven millions of Filipinos to leave their families to work abroad. In the last 30 years, many families have moved out of poverty or improved their economic conditions, thanks to the remittances sent by family members who work abroad," Asis said.

While remittances are by far the greatest positive effect migration has on the Philippine economy, its negative impact on the family ties raises the question of whether exporting labor should even be promoted in the country.

It is perhaps one of the ironies of labor migration: one leaves the family to improve their lives only to come home to a broken family.

Migration’s roots

The first wave of Filipino migrants in the country’s history can be traced in the early 1900s, as ‘manongs,’ from Ilocos sailed off to Hawaii as pineapple planters.

Noted for their unparalleled work ethics and cheap labor, Filipinos were then exported to California as fruit-pickers and were later hired to rebuild American bases in several countries shortly after World War II.

It wasn’t until the 1970s that the number of Filipino migrants surged.

Ang recalled that then Labor Secretary Blas Ople thought of a “novel" idea of deploying Filipino workers to the Middle East to take advantage of the oil-boom and temporarily remedy the growing rate of unemployment in the country.

“To the credit of the government, the policy of sending Filipino workers abroad, helped defuse what could have been a social volcano," said Ang.

More than 30 years after, the Philippines is now the third largest migrant-sending country in the world, next to India and China, according to the recent International Organization for Migration report.

The fourth State of the Philippine Population Report (SPPR-4) noted that out of the more than eight million Filipino migrants. 3.8 million are overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).

OFW remittances have also doubled in the last few years. According to SPPR-4, from around $6 billion in 2000-2002, remittances rose to $12.8 billion in 2006. The remittances from January-September 2007 posted a 15 percent growth compared to the remittances in the same period last year.

With this number, the International Monetary Fund cited the Philippines as the third largest recipient of remittances among developing countries (behind India and Mexico) in its World Economic Outlook Report in 2005.

The millions of dollars remitted annually by the so-called “modern heroes" indeed keep the economy afloat so miraculously that what seemed like the government’s temporary solution became a permanent fixture in the country’s economy.

Reasons for leaving

In an article titled, “Understanding International Labor Migration in the East," which appeared in the May-June 2007 Newsletter of the Philippine Institute for Development, Asis identified the factors why Filipino migration has been sustained for almost four decades.

Asis enumerated three reasons: First on the list is the persistence of immigration because of financial difficulties.

“Economic difficulties are still crucial in people’s decisions as to why they migrate abroad."

Since the deployment of OFWs in the 1970s, the standard of living in the Philippines for most families remains bleak. According to the SPPR-4, the rapid increase of the population which, in effect, creates more young dependents and labor entrants in the country, limits the job opportunities and pushes most Filipinos to work overseas.

The second reason for the migration, according to Asis, is the institutionalization of migration.

Asis said that the Philippine government seems well prepared to process the desire of Filipinos to migrate. Government agencies like the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) and the Office of the Undersecretary for Migrant Workers Affairs of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) are aligned to help overseas Filipino workers with their concerns.

As proof of the government' seriousness in the welfare of OFWs it came out with the first law in Asia which provides protection for Filipino migrant workers, the 1995 Migrant Workers and Overseas Filipinos Act.

But the last factor that seems to trickle down from generation to generation, Asis said, is the development of a culture of migration.

According to her, working abroad has become an accepted fate to most Filipinos. In fact, she said it now unusual for a Filipino not to aspire for a job abroad. This is evidenced by the growing popularity of nursing, caregiver, and computer engineering courses which are geared towards overseas employment.

And as most jobs abroad employ stringent standards to screen out other applicants, only the brightest are accepted by companies. This results in a continuous outflow of the country’s best minds. In fact, 121 Filipinos leave the country every hour in search of a better life elsewhere.

While it is clearly stipulated in the Migrant Workers Act that the government “does not promote overseas employment as a means to sustain economic growth and achieve national development,“ it also offers few employment opportunities for the growing number of graduates joining the labor force.

The desire to seek greener pastures abroad is also evident in a 2006 Pulse Asia survey, where three out of 10 Filipinos said they are willing to pack up their bags and leave the country if it were possible.

Distorted values

In a 2004 talk, Asis enumerated some of migration’s side effects over the years. According to her, migration results in the blurring of the already vague sense of nationalism in the country. The popularity of nursing, caregiver and computer engineering courses are not necessarily related to career aspirations but to a dream of working abroad.

“While Filipinos are not the only ones who wish to go abroad, the national dream or obsession that going abroad has become has stirred much concern. If this trend persists—and all indications suggest that it will—what kind of nation will become of a country where its people envision their future elsewhere," she said.

Migration also distorted some of the values of Filipinos. She mentioned that remittances may result in materialism among members of the family especially when migrant parents would engage in spending sprees in an unwitting way of compensating for their absence in their children’s life.

Aside from these, migration also introduces life-threatening diseases like SARS (in 2003), AIDS or HIV, and more recently, the avian or bird flu.

However, Asis focused more on the bigger picture which is the effect of migration to the families left-behind. She also attested to the impact of the feminization of labor overseas which may have a deeper impact on the children and the family in general.

Losing our mothers

While over the last three decades, more males worked abroad, official records of recent years indicate a change in the profile of OFWs gender ratio.

Since 2004, the number of women working overseas has steadily increased. The Commission on Population (Popcom), who prepared the SPPR, attributed the feminization of labor to the growing demand for health workers, particularly nurses and caregivers, who are mostly females.

However, the changing face of migrant workers does not only happen in the Philippines.

The World Bank, in its report, “The International Migration of Women," said that close to half of the migrant population in the world are women.

For Andrew Morrison, lead economist at the World Bank’s Gender Group, the more women migrants, the more positive effects to the development of the economy it will have.

“Women are sending lots of money to their families back home, and evidence from rural Mexico shows that their migration leads to positive effects for the homes they leave behind," Morrison observed.

“Our study shows the opposite," said Dr. Lourdes Arellano-Carandang, a renowned child psychologist who recently launched a book titled, “Nawala ang Ilaw ng Tahanan: Case Studies of Families Left Behind by OFW Mothers."

“They remit more money because they are more faithful in remitting than the men but that’s on the side of the money only. The emotional and social costs are not talked about but the money, but we have to consider the entire [OFW] phenomenon holistically," Carandang explained.

“May pera ka nga pero malungkot naman kasi wala si Nanay, tama ba ‘yon? The psychological cost is so high on the family," she added.

Motherless homes

When fathers took most of the jobs abroad, it left only a little dent on the Filipino family since it was viewed largely as part of their roles as providers. However, when mothers left, the entire family had to adjust.

The departure of the mother redefines her traditional role as the primary caregiver by taking on the position of the father as the main provider. Meanwhile, the father is often unprepared to assume the mother’s caregiving function, which in turn, affects the entire family, especially the children.

While Coleen admitted to having fewer problems with Fred away from home, such was not the case when her daughter Amy left for Riyadh.

“My grandsons would cry to me and ask: ‘Bakit umalis si Mama?’ Not only was I their lola but also their mother," said Coleen.

“Malaki ‘yung nawala sa pamilya nila," Coleen lamented. “I told my daughter that it would be better if she hadn’t left."

In their case study, Carandang and her team interviewed 10 migrant families, who like Amy, left behind her family to work abroad. For a year, they studied each of the family’s backgrounds, their insights and feelings about the mother leaving the household. They discovered that there is a “pervading feeling of sadness in the family and a deep longing for the mother to come home."

Most fathers unfortunately do poorly with house management, including taking care of household chores and being sensitive with their children’s needs. The team suggested that the males should accept their new roles not as the breadwinner of the family.

Depending on their age groups, children also have different understanding of their situation.

“While the young children simply miss their mother and don’t really understand why she has to be away, the adolescents are in conflict because they appreciate the necessity and benefit of working abroad (in that they can go to school and buy more things), but they also feel sadness," a part in Carandang’s book read.

Interestingly, children of migrant parents also become the “tagasalo" of the father in the family when he doesn’t perform his duties well. That’s why there are kids who would volunteer to cook the family’s meal, do the laundry, perform household chores, and even cheer up the father who they sometimes see as “sad and helpless."

Home remedy

Carandang and her team suggested several measures for members of the family to implement in order to lessen the emotional burden on the children and even the fathers left behind.

According to them, children should be allowed to have an outlet where they can cope with their situation. Letting the kids play enables them to “‘re-enact’ what is happening to them in order to make sense of what is going on around them." Expressive activities like art, music writing, drawing, or just observing nature’s beauty will enable the child to deal with the absence of their mothers.

“The programs for OFW families must emphasize and inform the families about the importance of playing. A community program for play and ‘expressive therapies’ can be implemented in the barangay hall, or multi-purpose center for the children," recommended the book.

However, while it may be good for the child to play, they discourage parents from buying expensive toys. The group explained that ‘good toys’ need not be expensive. Sometimes parents feel they need to compensate for their absence and guilt for leaving by indulging their children in high-tech play things like computers, playstations, or game boys. But Carandang’s team warned that this may even result in the child’s addiction to these types of expensive toys.

“Instead of compensating by giving expensive toys, they should communicate and express their loving feelings to the children,“ she suggested.

The advent of modern technology has also made the communication lines more accessible, convenient and cheap. Regular communication is vital not only to the fathers but more importantly to the children.

“A simple act of asking how they are, what happened to them during the day, etcetera, can boost children’s feelings of being loved and cared for," she said.

Simple gestures such as asking, “Kamusta ka na? Kamusta pag-aaral mo?" can have a tremendous impact on the child.

In order to lessen the spending sprees of the family left behind, the absent parent must explain thoroughly to her family the reason why he/she is leaving. This will ensure that the family members won’t be lured into overspending or splurging their loved one’s hard-earned money.

Other suggestions mentioned in the book include: asking the extended family’s help in raising the child; tapping into the school to provide additional emotional support; and encouraging fathers to play with their children.

It is also crucial for the fathers to know that their change in roles in the household does not necessarily demean his identity “or his perception of himself as a male—that doing the responsibilities of the mother does not make him less of a man."

With this, the authors highly recommend the establishment of a ‘Center for Fathers’ where they can converge with other males in the same situation and share experiences with them.

Coming back

While the government hails OFWs as the new unsung heroes of our time, families like that of Coleen think heroically of their loved ones for sacrificing life and limb, defying war and travel bans just so they could eat three times a day, despite being hardly ever present at the dinner table.

“For now, we still have to pay for the house and the car. He still wants to provide for his family but, at the same time, I feel sad," she said.

Fortunately, things are starting to go smoothly in Amy’s family.

Amy and her husband were able to reconcile their differences and were even able to buy a cab to support their livelihood. She is now working as an assistant in a popular facial clinic in Manila and has no plans of leaving the country anytime soon. Cheri has found a stable job at a call center and has been promoted several times.

“I told her (Amy) not to dream of going back abroad. I just advise her to bear with it. It’s more important if they’re complete, fix their lives first," said Coleen.
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Buhay OFW Story
(Submitted: December 20, 2009)

I left Philippines 2005, I have six kids, my youngest then is four, it's the hardest things iIve ever done in my life, leaving my kids, not knowing if they will survive or not, but we were suffering too much hardship, so i had no choice but to leave and work as a nanny in canada. I've trusted my ex-husband to look after my kids, but after six months here in canada my oldest daughter phone me that her dad, hasn't been home for four months,he's got another woman and my kids' schooling are suffering already, but I though it out telling my kids that I loved them that I'm doing this for them so in two years, they will come to Canada with me....

I'm just lucky that I have my own mom and brothers and sisters to help out... but the money i send to my in- laws is still not enough no matter how big or small, the kids are complaining that they don't have money to go to school, what happened is my in-laws were the one using my money and their son  is supporting another family.

So i decided that i will make my sister and brother as my trustee, it causes a lot of problems. My in laws are mad, but that's the only way my kids will eat properly and  go to school regularly... To make matters short, after i got my status in Canada, I started processing their papers to come to Canada, they started asking money again, it took me 2 years to realized that they were using my money again for themselves, their papers were almost cancelled because nobody is responding on the letters that they send them, but they are asking money from me, so when i learned all this, money stop coming, asked my own family to looked after  my kids, i don't care if they get mad anymore, i send the money to my brother.

It took me 7 year before i got my kids over to canada, the sad part is my two oldest one were not able to come anymore cause they're over age... 4 of them were in canada now and I'm now divorced and newly married to a Canadian, my kids found a real dad on him, that their own dad didn't have.. It's sad that it has to end like this but no matter what there's always light at the end of a tunnel........

By: Nilda Dube