Whenever they hear my accent, people ask me where I’m from and what brought me to Seattle. When I respond, “Microsoft,” I must add that I followed my husband — only to be identified primarily as a “trailing spouse” and often resenting the rest of the conversation. All of us who have moved with our partners, prompted by their careers, still have our own lives and dreams, the right to pursue them wherever we are in the world, and the need for a loving community to help us find new roots.
Therefore, in the decade since moving to the United States as a newlywed, I’ve had mixed feelings about the term “trailing spouse” and its evocation of being always a step behind, or even worse, dragged along. Growing up, I was always the one who liked to walk first: in my family, among friends in school, among colleagues, when I first started working. I was never afraid to raise my hand and blaze a trail that others will follow.
True to form, when my fiancé received a job offer contingent on relocating to Seattle, I was the first to embrace the idea of leaving our hometown of Belgrade, Serbia. For me, the unknown journey before us was a path of reinvention. To Marko, however, it seemed like an exile. He was reluctant, he was devastated — but he accepted, trusting in my excitement about the imminent adventure and that we would take this journey together. Over the years, in fact, he would complain that I had dragged him away from home. In a dark corner of his heart, he felt as if he were the trailing spouse on my dream of bending, stretching, and erasing the world’s borders.
As a writer, I know well that every story can be written in many ways, through different eyes. While my husband’s American experience might have felt like an exile, the same years for me were a heroine’s quest, a journey of finding my true self.
