I took a year off between college and grad-school. I needed a break before going back to school and I'm very happy I took the time to think about what I wanted to do and where. In that year, I worked for a great non-profit in Sofia, made a lot of friends and ended up dating a Bulgarian guy. I was NOT happy to be going back to the States but I had been accepted to grad-school and thought it would be silly not to go.

I am VERY glad I did. Graduate school was a humbling but ultimately very rewarding experience. I got a Master's degree in Political Science from Penn State. It was at Penn State that I met Kyle who is now my husband. (I will skip the story of my break-up with my Bulgarian boyfriend. Let me just say that it wasn't pretty and it was one of the hardest periods of my life).

I returned to Bulgaria after I was finished with my MA for one reason only: I was homesick. I was tired of going back and forth. I was tired of living parallel lives. I couldn't do it anymore. I made that decision without Kyle. He said he would come visit me in Bulgaria but I didn't think he would.

But he did. At the time, he was already done with his coursework and was writing his dissertation. He came to visit, loved Bulgaria, we got engaged and he soon after moved to Sofia. We stayed for a little over 2 years and had a great life there. I think it was GREAT for our marriage. He now speaks (some) Bulgarian, knows my family and friends very well. I think I make a lot more sense to him now.

We moved back to The States not because we didn't like Bulgaria but because he is a college professor and there were absolutely no real job prospects for him in Bulgaria. We thought it would be a lot easier for me to find work that I love in the States than for him to do what HE loves in Bulgaria.

All this back and forth has taught me that as long as I think of my "Bulgarian" life and my "American" life as two separate things, I can't be happy. Being married to Kyle and living in Bulgaria with him was a great learning experience... I was forced to integrate various parts of myself in a way that really make sense now and did not in the past.