Living in Wyoming after Southern CA. (state, better, compared, places)
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My situation is perhaps a little unique because 4 years ago my wife & I moved to Cody, WY from Los Angeles. I had become slightly familiarized with WY after going on several hunting trips in the area. We were able to sell our small L.A. house and buy a WY house for cash, thus getting out from under a mortgage. I have not retired and continue to go to L.A. for a number of weeks per year to service my accounting practice. Although this area is very nice, I am still struggling with some transition shock re: small town life. The issues are the common ones: less diverse shopping, restaurants, etc. and the loss of anonymity which one has in a big city and winters which are real winters compared to Southern CA. It could be argued that all of these things should have been obvious to me before moving here. My real question is: Will I ever adjust fully to this or am I beating a dead horse? We could go back to Southern CA but from a financial standpoint, this would be very difficult.
I have never lived outside California but have traveled a bit and visited places quite different from what I am accustom. I have family members in Puerto Rico and have visited for lengthy periods of time. Even during my visits I get a sense of "island fever" and start thinking to things I can not do. It may sound weird because when I am in San Juan I always love it and spend a lot of time doing enjoyable things. But as soon as I return to California I realize how much there is here and how difficult it would be to give it up. But I like large cities so I am biased anyway. Good luck.
Wyoming would be an adjustment for people from Minnesota. Really you picked a place that is totally opposite of where you are from, so a very difficult transition is expected in my opinion.
I'm probably up for one about now too, moving to Washington from Texas. Though, I'm originally from the suburbs of Chicago. The first time I moved away from the Chicago area was to a place more remote (Ashland, WI) and before long I actually craved...the mall. lol when I was in suburbia I couldn't wait to get away from it.
My advice to you (though you probably don't need it as a mature person) would be you don't have to go back to LA. But you don't have to stay in Wyoming either if you are unhappy. I think you could find a place that is not LA that is not as difficult to adjust to.
Texas, Missouri, Arkansas, Colorado (places near the city) etc. There are more. I think you just picked a place that would be hard for most people from any fairly urbanized area, much less a very warm area, would have trouble adjusting to.
Yeah I'd agree, that's a pretty big shift. If you adjust successfully great, but it might not be surprising if it's too hard. I think the states that border Wyoming have larger cities than Wyoming does so if you feel you want to leave, but that going completely back is undesirable, maybe you could try one of those.
I did something similar to what RGB123 mentioned... I moved Wisconsin to Montana. Now that I look back, a huge part of the difficulty adjusting was the culture shock. It wasn't a big obvious culture shock, but it was culture shock nonetheless. I knew things were different but as a kid I couldn't put my finger on it completely... aside from the obvious fact of being in a different state. lol Kids just know they'll have to make new friends. I don't think they really grasp the concept of culture shock, if they're moving within their own country to a similar-type town. Culture shock isn't always obvious on the outset in that respect. I kind of wish I would've been better prepared for the difference in culture. I really feel like when parents move kids to a different region of the country they should spend time talking about the new state and reading about it together on the internet/looking at pics, etc. I really didn't want to go, and I wish my mom would've checked out some books on Montana (no internet just yet) and got me psyched about different things about different aspects of the state. It probably would've went smoother.
Maybe you can try a bigger city in Wyoming like Casper or Sheridan. Surely those aren't so small where everyone knows everyone. A city like one those may make the adjustment easier. Sounds like he really chose a small town, if he lost his anonymity.
Last edited by MSPLove; 10-01-2010 at 01:43 AM..
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