When Kunal received a job offer from Rabobank, he was sure that it was a great career move. His wife Ishita was excited about moving with him and started dreaming about how they would start a family in the Netherlands. The process was smooth. They arrived with two lugguage bags in the middle of 2024.
After a month of settling-in, Ishita also started searching for a job. After applying to more than twenty job openings and attending a single round of interview in two companies, she realized that rejections are simply a part of the journey. By December, the number of job offers on LinkedIn started plummeting. Though the young couple was able to manage their finances and live a comfortable life, staying at home and receiving some more emails saying “Sorry, but we require Dutch”, things started to look harder.
The Beginning of an end
Ishita received a call from a recruitment agency informing about an opening at an international IT company that offered a brutto salary of 55k euros – much below what she was expecting, but you gotta do what you gotta do. By March 2025, she had a job. Now they could plan better holidays, and did not have to look at the prices to decide what brand of tomato ketchup they wanted to buy. Things were fine for six months.
It started as a sentence, after a long call with family back home – said casually – “I don’t think I want to stay here anymore.” Kunal assumed that it was temporary. A phase. Maybe it was the late autumn weather. Homesickness was doing its annual round. He nodded, said “We will see” and moved on.
But the sentence came back. Again in a week. And again after another week. More clearly each time. By December, Kunal realized something uncomfortable: They were no longer imagining the same future. By the end of the year, the couple went to meet their families in India and this is when Ishita announced – “I will stay here two weeks more”.
How it Hits
By the end of January, Ishita had a job offer from her last job in India – with a better role, and a much higher salary.
Kunal and Ishita are one story I heard firsthand – but after speaking with more people in the community, I realized that this conflict is surprisingly common and rarely discussed openly. Migration doesn’t exhaust people equally.
One partner might feel professionally stable, socially integrated, and relieved by distance from the pressure of Indian society.
The other might feel permanently foreign, emotionally isolated, and in many of these cases, tired of starting from zero.
Ridhi and her husband moved to the Netherlands during the last phase of lockdown. She was starting a postdoc position at the University of Amsterdam. Kishore found a job soon, but decided to leave by the end of 2022. After two more years working as in another postdoc, Ridhi decided to leave her academic career behind and returned to join Kunal and they are living a happy life in Hyderabad. Though not all the couples we heard about still live together.
Neither is wrong. But the asymmetry matters. “Going back” means different things to each of you. For one person, returning to India means familiarity, family support, and feeling seen again. For the other it can mean career regression, loss of autonomy, and undoing years of effort. You are not disagreeing about the place of residence. You are disagreeing about what kind of life feels survivable.
Common Mistakes
Treating it as a temporary mood: Sometimes it is. Sometimes it’s not.
Turning it into a moral argument: “Family is more important” vs “Career matters too”
Outsourcing the decision to parents or visas: Avoidance dressed up as practicality.
Assuming love will automatically resolve it: Love helps. It doesn’t decide.
Before you decide anything, plan a serious session and structure it around the facts, while not ignoring the emotions. You must ask yourselves these questions – the answer is not important, but simply addressing these is:
- Who has already compromised more?
- If we stay, what does the unhappy partner lose long-term?
- If we leave, what does the other give up that can’t be rebuilt?
- Are we tired of the country—or of this phase of life?
- Would this decision feel fair five years from now?
These questions don’t simplify things.
They make the trade-offs visible.
There Is No “Correct” Outcome
Some couples stay and renegotiate expectations. Some return and rebuild, like Ridhi and Kishore. While there are stories of long-distance families that live separately, painfully, but honestly. None of these outcomes mean the relationship failed.
Sometimes, it just means migration surfaced a truth earlier than you expected. If you’re in this situation, you’re not alone.
And whatever you choose, it deserves thought – not shame.
Names have been changed to preserve anonymity.
