S01E09 Moving to France With Children: Jem’s Inspiring 15-Year Journey

Jane: Welcome to another episode of Sunflowers Podcast. Once again, we would like to thank you for all the support you've shown: the likes, the shares, and the subscribes. Also, thank you to the people that have bought us Sunflowers. We really appreciate it; it helps us to continue with what we're doing. Today, our guest is going to be Jem. Jem is a really good friend of mine and her story is well inspirational. It involved bringing out small children, which I just can't imagine, and the journey goes from there. So I'm just going to now introduce Jem. Hi Jem, thanks for coming on.

Jem: Thank you for having me.

Jane: Not a problem at all, it's been a pleasure for you to come. Tell us who you were before you came out here.

Jem: Oh, it was a long time ago now, so I'll try and remember. 15 years ago. I was a young mom with three little kids at home. I worked a part-time job in the local school. Really, it was just everyday mom life, rugby runs, and all of that, trying to keep the house running.

Jane: Keep the house running, all of that sort of stuff. So then somebody had a conversation about France. Who had that?

Jem: We spoke about it for a few years when the boys were really little, but I was probably too young to make the plunge. The language worried me, and my middle son's got a visual impairment, so I was really worried about the schools and communicating. As the years went on, it was always a discussion between us. Steve's always wanted to be in the countryside—he's a country bumpkin and the complete opposite to me, cuz I was a town girl and didn't know anything about the countryside. Then we had a few holidays out here with some friends that lived here. We kind of just fell in love with the place. I saw how they did it really well with two little kids and I thought, "I might be able to do this." While on holiday, we saw this beautiful house for sale and decided to put an offer in. Six months later, we were here. It was that quick.

Jane: How old were the boys at that point?

Jem: 6, 9, and 11. We had to do it quick because we were worried about our oldest going into senior school. We thought about having it as a holiday home for a while, but our worry was if the boys started to go into teen years, they wouldn't want to come out.

Jane: So you've arrived. How did reality compare against expectation?

Jem: We moved in the winter, so I think that set me off on the wrong foot in a way. Because we'd holidayed in the summer, it looked like paradise. The flowers were blooming, it was beautiful. Then we moved out at the beginning of January and it was freezing cold. Absolutely freezing cold. I remember thinking, "What have I done? Like, literally, what have I done?" I had to persevere quite a bit. Later that year, we had friends and family come visit. Once I started seeing their faces, I could relax and feel less isolated. I felt it was very isolating. There wasn't an awful lot going on in the community at the time. It was a bit of a culture shock—very quiet, nothing around. I like to socialize, and where we stayed there was literally nothing—no takeaways, you needed to go 20 minutes into town to get a burger or McDonald's. Steve embraced the whole thing much better than I did. I think men can leave their family and friends a little bit easier than girls. We're probably a bit more emotional about that side of things.

Jane: Was it hard leaving the family?

Jem: It was heartbreaking. I didn't really think about it until the goodbye actually happened because I was so excited about our new venture. Then the goodbye came and it was soul-destroying. I'm really close to my family and friends, so to leave them all was really hard. To be fair, that feeling hasn't left me; it's still there all the time.

Jane: You watch the families changing from afar while you're here, still longing for family.

Jem: Yeah, I come from a big, close family. My cousins were like my brothers and sisters. Leaving them as they started having children, and watching my nieces and nephews grow up through Facebook and FaceTime, is very difficult.

Jane: So you're here and the boys need to go to school. Was it any easier trying to register them and getting them into school?

Jem: To be honest, I was very lucky. A very good friend who was already here introduced me to Sara. Sara was my rock—she's our new mayor now. She helped me with all the school forms, getting the kids into school, introducing me to the teachers, and translating for me. We arrived on a Saturday and the boys were all in school Monday morning. We threw them straight in because I didn't want any anxiety to build up. I thought, "Just get them in at the deep end." I'll never forget their little faces. Chase, my youngest, was only six and a very quiet child; putting him in the classroom and saying goodbye haunts me to this day. Ryan, the middle one, was full of life and ready to go. Jack had normal teenage nerves going into senior school. But the Mairie office helped a lot and everybody was so lovely and kind to the boys.

Jane: We can't stress enough how important it is in a rural setting to reach out to your Mairie's office, because they are the center of the community.

Jem: They really are, and so helpful. They were very welcoming and wanted us to settle in. It was a positive experience from the start. The only negative side was me getting my head around being here.

Jane: Everyone goes through that stage of "What have I done?"

Jem: Halfway through the year, I remember phoning my sister in tears going, "I don't know what I've done, I don't know why I've come here." It was a roller coaster all year. I was getting drained from the emotional roller coaster and the anxiety of just going to the shops or the bank. I had to learn French quickly. I'm not fluent, but I speak enough to live comfortably. I was thrown in the deep end needing to speak to teachers and help with homework. We lived on Google Translate. Again, Sara was so patient and helped me through it.

Jane: You came from a town and Stevie embraced the countryside. Tell us about the animals.

Jem: The donkey came with the house! Fifi the donkey came with the purchase because the boys said, "We don't want to move unless Fifi stays." So we negotiated the donkey into the house sale. Steve loves animals, so that started him off. Soon he wanted sheep and pigs, and very shortly we had a smallholding. It wasn't really my bag—it was more of a chore for me—but Steve loved it. We raised our own meat, grew our own vegetables, living the good life. But Steve was going back to work in the UK, doing five or six weeks there and five or six weeks here. So for a lot of years, I spent time alone here with the boys. That was really hard, but it forced me to learn how to do things. I had to learn how to use mowers, strimmers, and build fires. When we got the wood burner, Steve said, "We need some kindling, babe." And I asked, "What's kindling?" He told me I had to learn to survive out here, so I did.

Jane: You had a zoo of animals for about 10 years. When did you start working out here?

Jem: Within the first year, I started picking up cleaning jobs and anything where I didn't need language skills. I was a catering assistant in England, and when a job opened up at the local school, I thought it was perfect. But Sara explained I needed French qualifications. So I picked up gîte cleaning and catering help—anything that fit around the kids and animal feeding schedules while Steve was away. Later, I ended up being an estate agent for a couple of years. Going from cleaning people's houses to sitting in a notaire's office was interesting.

Jane: How did you find that?

Jem: At my first sale meeting, I was being trained. I sat in the notaire's office, looked down, and realized I had bleach stains all over my leggings! I moved to the side hoping no one would see. I thought, "I can't do this, I've never done this work before." But I carried on, met lovely people, and worked a lot with the Dutch community. I loved showing houses and talking to people. The meetings were difficult and pushed my French to another level when dealing with French clients, but it was really enjoyable.

Jane: What was the big dream that took a long time to get?

Jem: The big dream was to own a carp fishing lake. Ever since Steve was a little boy, he wanted to own a lake. I was ready for a change too. Thanks to the estate agency, I had my head around the admin and paperwork, so I knew I could run a business out here. French administration is hard, especially since Brexit, but with patience, it's doable. The boys were moving out to uni, so we decided to sell the family home. We worked as a team for 15 years; Steve supported us financially and sacrificed his time in France, so now it was his turn to stay full-time in France and run a business. We found the perfect place and both fell in love with it.

Jane: What size is the lake?

Jem: It's a 10-acre lake. Steve would have preferred bigger, but this was a compromise on location. It's about an hour and a half away from our previous commune. Moving was hard because I felt like I was leaving my life and friends all over again. But it was nice to see a different part of France, known as the land of a thousand lakes. We even moved Fifi the donkey in a horse trailer. I was so nervous driving down, but she stood completely fine the whole way.

Jane: How is the business going now?

Jem: We bought it in December and we're entering our second season. We have a gîte for up to six people with central heating, an in-ground swimming pool, a jacuzzi, a sauna, and woodland walks. It's a family venue—husbands and kids fish while moms relax by the pool. Plus, Beauval Zoo is nearby. It's a beautiful place and I pinch myself every day that it's ours.

Jane: What are the plans going forward?

Jem: We're renovating another building into a secondary gîte. We actually bought next door when it came up for sale so we could reunite the original village property, which the Mairie was thrilled about. It's a long-term project—probably 15 years. Once the second gîte is ready, we can host larger family groups.

Jane: If you could go back to the girl crying on the phone to her sister, what would you say to her?

Jem: I would say it's okay to feel that way; you're not weak. If you concentrate too much on the bad stuff, it can overwhelm you. Relax, it's going to be okay. Laugh at yourself when you say the wrong thing in shops. The good times come, and the environment itself can pick you up if you let it. Reach out to the community when you feel isolated. Those down moments made me stronger, and now we're living our dream.

Jane: You deserve it, you've worked so hard. Gemma, thank you so much.

Jem: Thank you for having me!