Halfway to Each Other: How a year in Italy brought our family home

I was so inspired by my chat with Susan Pohlman.

The Pohlmans were an ordinary family from California with a marriage in crisis, until they took a leap of faith and unexpectedly found love again in a small seaside town in Italy. In her new  family memoir, Halfway to Each Other: How a year in Italy brought our family home,  we’re invited along for her family’s life-changing journey abroad.

“On the eve of our separation, my husband [Tim] and I made a most unexpected decision fueled by faith, grace and hope; we moved our family to Italy,” says Pohlman. While on a business trip, with only 24 hours left until they were scheduled to fly back home to the U.S., they decided to lease an apartment and enroll their two children in an international school. “Our marital therapist called it an elaborate scheme of avoidance at best.” This was a snap decision, but the Pohlmans knew they needed to extricate themselves from a way of life that was not working.

Upon arrival in Italy, the children were less than enthusiastic about the prospect of a new life in a foreign land (lots of tears and panic attacks), but gradually the family slipped out of the constraints of their fast-paced life in L.A. and embraced la dolce vita. “I could see, with sudden clarity, the downfalls of all the ‘stuff’ we had surrounded our children with at home,” says Pohlman. “Matt couldn’t hide in his PlayStation. Katie couldn’t insulate herself in a world of
instant messages. We did not have the resources or the wherewithal here to make decisions about each child’s ‘uniqueness.’ I hadn’t realized that that was a privileged way of life.”

By actively simplifying their lives, struggling to learn a foreign language and navigating through their new Italian lifestyle, the Pohlmans learned what it felt like to be on the same team again. In the end, their marriage was saved.

“You don’t need to go all the way to Italy to learn these lessons,” says Pohlman. “But I learned that over-planning our family’s life was stifling the fun of discovery. Now, instead of viewing life as a series of achievements, I cultivate adventure wherever I can.”

To learn more, visit www.susanpohlman.com.