Foreign Service Reading List
A Portable Identity: A Woman's Guide to Maintaining a Sense of Self While Moving Overseas
By Debra R. Bryson, MSW and Charise M. Hoge, MSW
A number of excellent books provide advice on the logistics of international moves, with a few paragraphs--or even a few chapters--devoted to "adjusting to overseas life" or "cross-cultural communication." However, I have long felt a lack of information about how crucial it is to know yourself and what is important to you. This knowledge can help you find or develop what you need in order to thrive in a foreign environment. This is particularly true for those of us who move because of a family member --those of us who arrive in a new place having to create a new life without the instant routines of pre-arranged work.
A Portable Identity does a thorough job of addressing the issue. The authors present information such as internal and external factors affecting identity, give personal examples from their overseas experiences, and ask questions, printed with plenty of space for the reader's written responses. They ask readers to reflect, write, and create diagrams of roles and relationships. The material is useful even if you leave everything blank, which I confess was my initial approach!
Much of the book consists of working through an original model the authors call "The Wheel," intended to help expats purposefully reconstruct their identities. The underlying assumption is that the reader is a person (woman) who has just arrived in a foreign country. As someone presently living in the U.S., the book's approach does not coincide with my circumstances. Even so, I found that some of the questions launched me into a new understanding of what was missing in my temporary Stateside life.
While the questions might not fit everyone exactly, the book is nevertheless extremely helpful for anyone whose life is in transition. In fact, I would have found this manual invaluable in facing the changes in my life after giving birth to my first child, probably my most difficult transition ever! It would have been very useful to look in-depth at my previous identity, what had changed, what kinds of support I needed, which factors I simply had to accept, and how I could create meaningful new activities.
Even for someone not interested in answering questions, the book's sometimes painfully honest personal accounts provide riveting examples of the challenges of adapting to life overseas. Men who are "trailing spouses" will have to mentally change the pronouns, but should find it equally useful. A Portable Identity belongs in the personal library of every expat: it is a definite "must-buy"!
Jan Fischer Bachman
Debra R. Bryson, MSW, LCSW, co-author of A Portable Identity: A Woman’s Guide to Maintaining a Sense of Self While Moving Overseas, and co-founder of www.aportableidentity.com, a website for the book and an on-line support for trailing spouses during an international relocation. As a Foreign Service spouse, Debra helped successfully advocate for spouses of embassy employees to be able to work legally in Thailand. Debra has dedicated her career to helping others maximize their full potential, including counseling expatriates, in a variety of multi-cultural settings. She has relocated over fifteen times, and currently resides in Austin, Texas with her husband and two daughters.
Charise M. Hoge, MSW, MA, ADTR, co-author of A Portable Identity: A Woman’s Guide to Maintaining a Sense of Self While Moving Overseas, and co-founder of www.aportableidentity.com, has worked in the field of health and healing for over twenty years. Charise is a licensed social worker as well as a certified dance/movement therapist and yoga teacher. As a counselor of expatriates in Thailand, she developed expertise in cross-cultural issues. Her own experience as an expatriate includes living in Central America as a child, in Europe as a student, and in Asia as a military spouse. In all, she has relocated more than ten times. She currently resides in the Washington, DC area with her husband and two daughters.