My wife still hasn’t forgiven me for the “Barcelona Bathroom Incident of 2019.” Three weeks into our year-long stint in Spain, our ancient apartment’s plumbing decided to stage a revolt. At 3 AM. With water gushing from places pipes shouldn’t exist.

As I frantically Google-translated “catastrophic flood” to our confused landlord, Sarah stood knee-deep in water, holding our passports above her head, giving me that special look that said, “I followed you across an ocean for THIS?”

Listen, couples who travel together stay together—or murder each other trying. There’s no in-between. After surviving five extended international stays with my better half (and narrowly avoiding becoming a crime statistic), I’ve learned a thing or two about making overseas adventures work when there are two hearts, two careers, and two very different tolerance levels for adventure involved.

The Pre-Departure Relationship Stress Test

Let’s be brutally honest: planning an extended stay abroad together is like volunteering for relationship bootcamp. My wife and I discovered this while attempting to downsize our belongings into four suitcases before our first big move.

“We need to bring the waffle maker,” she insisted, clutching the rarely-used appliance like it contained state secrets.

“We’re going to BELGIUM,” I countered. “The literal home of waffles!”

Two hours and one marital standoff later, the waffle maker stayed behind (and remains a sore subject five years later).

The planning phase reveals everything—who’s the over-packer, who’s the budget-tracker, who researches neighborhoods versus who just “vibes it.” These differences aren’t relationship-enders, but they’re definitely relationship-definers.

My advice? Have the uncomfortable conversations early: Will you share finances completely or keep separate “fun funds”? Who handles housing emergencies? What’s your collective plan when one person inevitably has an “I hate everything about this country and want to go HOME” meltdown? (Spoiler: everyone has at least one.)

The Two-Person Career Jigsaw Puzzle

Unless you’re trust fund babies or digital nomad unicorns with perfectly portable careers, working abroad as a couple adds another spectacular layer of complexity.

Sarah and I learned this the hard way in Tokyo. My remote job let me work from anywhere, while her company promised an “easy transfer” to their Japanese office. Three months in, her “lateral move” had somehow morphed into a quasi-demotion with longer hours, while my supposedly flexible remote arrangement meant 3 AM meetings with the head office.

We barely saw each other for weeks, becoming cranky ships passing in our tiny apartment’s night. The breaking point? Finding my exhausted wife asleep on the bathroom floor after a 14-hour workday, still in her suit.

That night we established what we now call “Foreign Land Rules”: No work after 8 PM, mandatory unplugged weekends twice monthly, and emergency “sanity dinners” whenever either of us starts eyeing plane tickets home.

For couples considering the big move, have realistic career expectations. Research work cultures, understand visa limitations, and have detailed discussions about whose career might need to temporarily take the back seat—and how you’ll handle the inevitable resentment that can bring.

The Social Life Seesaw

Here’s a relationship test: throw two people with different social needs into a country where they know absolutely no one and watch what happens.

In Amsterdam, my extroverted self was desperate for community, dragging us to every expat meetup and awkwardly befriending baristas. Meanwhile, Sarah was perfectly content with our quiet routine and Zoom calls to friends back home.

“Not ANOTHER mixer,” she’d groan as I enthusiastically signed us up for yet another gathering of strangers.

Our breakthrough came when we stopped treating socializing as a couples-only activity. I joined a local basketball league and found my people, while Sarah eventually connected with a small book club that met monthly. We built our Venn diagram of friends—some shared, some separate—and both felt more balanced.

The lesson? Don’t expect identical social needs abroad. Sometimes the kindest thing you can do for your relationship is spend time apart, especially when you’re otherwise sharing 600 square feet of living space in a foreign land.

The Unspoken Competition of Adaptation

Nobody talks about this, but I’m going to: there’s a weird, silent competition between couples about who’s “better” at adapting to the new culture.

When Sarah picked up Portuguese faster than me in Lisbon, I felt irrationally annoyed. When locals at our neighborhood market started greeting me by name while still treating her like a tourist, she simmered with frustration.

These petty feelings are normal but toxic if left unaddressed. Our solution became celebrated wins: creating ridiculous ceremonies for language milestones (complete with dollar-store trophies) and designating specific cultural domains where each of us took the lead. Sarah became our Portuguese medical care navigator, while I handled transportation and utilities.

Remember, adaptation isn’t a race, and different adjustment timelines don’t indicate relationship strength or weakness. Some days you’ll be the one having cultural breakthrough moments; other days you’ll be the one crying because you can’t figure out how the stupid foreign washing machine works.

The Homesickness Asymmetry Problem

The cruellest rule of couples abroad: you will never, ever be homesick simultaneously.

Just as you’re settling in and feeling at home, your partner will fall into an existential crisis about missing their mom’s birthday or craving a specific cereal that costs $15 to import. And precisely when you’re drafting a heartfelt email begging your old boss for your job back, they’ll be skipping around, fluent in the local language, wondering why anyone would ever live anywhere else.

During our year in Vietnam, Sarah hit peak homesickness during Thanksgiving—sobbing into her phở while watching her family’s celebration on FaceTime. Meanwhile, I was having the time of my life, making local friends and embracing our expat adventure.

Three months later, our roles dramatically reversed when my grandfather fell ill back home. Suddenly I was the one researching emergency flights while Sarah—now comfortably adjusted—gently reminded me why we’d committed to staying.

The secret? Don’t try to “fix” your partner’s homesickness. Sometimes the kindest response is simply, “I hear you, this is really hard, and it’s okay to miss home even while loving our adventure.” Create small traditions that honor both worlds—weekly video dates with distant friends, celebrating home country holidays with ridiculous dedication, or finding that one restaurant that makes something resembling your mom’s signature dish.

The Identity Crisis You’ll Both Have (But Never at the Same Time)

Somewhere around month four abroad, expect existential questions to start bubbling up:

• “Who am I outside my usual context?”
• “Are we crazy for doing this?”
• “Would we be further in our careers if we’d stayed home?”
• “Are we just running away from real life?”

Sarah hit this wall in Berlin when her carefully constructed identity as a competent professional morphed into “the foreigner who can’t properly order coffee.” I faced it in Hanoi when locals kept treating me like a walking ATM rather than the culturally sensitive traveler I imagined myself to be.

These moments aren’t just normal—they’re necessary breaking points that usually precede deeper cultural integration. The gift of weathering them together is witnessing each other become more resilient, adaptable versions of yourselves.

When It’s Time to Go (Or Stay)

The hardest conversation for globetrotting couples? When one wants to leave and one wants to stay.

After nine glorious months in Portugal, Sarah was ready for our next adventure. I, however, had unexpectedly fallen in love with our little coastal town, our apartment with the crooked floors, and the whole slower rhythm of life.

For weeks we danced around the topic, dropping passive-aggressive hints about lease renewals and job opportunities elsewhere. The tension built until one wine-fueled night on our balcony when the truth spilled out: she felt stagnant, I felt at home.

The compromise wasn’t easy. We extended three additional months beyond our original plan, with a firm departure date circled on the calendar. Those final months were bittersweet but intentional—completing our Portuguese bucket list while researching our next destination together.

Sometimes the answer isn’t staying or going, but acknowledging that your shared journey contains chapters with different lengths.

The Brutal, Beautiful Truth

Here’s what nobody tells you: successfully living abroad as a couple doesn’t mean eliminating conflicts. It means having conflicts in more interesting locations.

You’ll still bicker about dishes and budgets and whose turn it is to call the internet company. But you’ll do it against the backdrop of extraordinary experiences that remind you both why you chose this unconventional path—and each other—in the first place.

My favorite memory from our years of global wandering isn’t some picture-perfect travel moment. It’s Sarah and me, soaking wet at 4 AM in that flooded Barcelona bathroom, when she suddenly started laughing uncontrollably.

“When we’re old,” she gasped between hysterics, “this is the stuff we’ll actually remember.”

She was right. The disasters make the best stories, the challenges forge the strongest bonds, and somehow, figuring out foreign life together creates a special kind of intimacy no couples’ retreat could ever match.

Just maybe leave the waffle maker at home.