Has something like this happened to you or someone you know?

📄 Frustration around understanding local procedures: How do you get the form they said you need? What is even written in this official letter?

😣 Feelings of stress or helplessness: “I can’t even talk to the contractor or the teacher in kindergarten.” “Will there be English speakers at the doctor’s or the bank?”

🤝 Difficulty making connections and friendships; it’s confusing, frustrating, insulting, and annoying, and people don’t stick by.

😟 Moments of regret and panic: “What have I done to myself? To my family? Is there a way back? Or “What will be? Will I be able to create for myself what I had in my home country in terms of friends, work, family?”

🤐 Difficulty sharing these struggles with friends and family, alongside feelings of guilt: “How can I even complain?” or “I try to share, but they don’t get it.”

🤔 Identity crisis: “What does this say about me? Where do I belong? Was I mistaken in thinking of myself as a “citizen of the world” who can get used to everything and connect to everyone?

You’re Not Alone. Many immigrants feel this way. And it influences their well-being in distinctive ways.

While immigration brings many good things, it also generates unique challenges. Research shows that immigration reshapes most aspects of our lives: family, work, relationships, self-efficacy and self-worth, identity and values, and more. That’s a lot to go through at once.

The Immigrant’s Struggle: A Balancing Act: When I think of immigrants, the image that comes to mind is of a woman walking a tightrope while carrying many heavy boxes, trying not to fall. As immigrants, we face many challenges at once, a tough situation compounded by the fact that the foundations that once gave us stability and strength are not always accessible.

I believe we can talk about “immigrant mental burnout”—an experience in which daily life includes a variety of minor stress-producing events that last for several years and cost us daily resources.

In response, I help immigrants build a “resilience routine” that allows them to recharge, process the immigration experience, and realize the positive potential of immigration.