Immigration Unfiltered: The Grief, the Grit, and the Entrepreneur Africa Raised

Two continents, one heart - and the grit it takes to build between them

Last week I cried in a room full of leaders, when it was my turn to answer how I was doing.

I’m not sure who was more taken aback, myself or the group. All I could think while crying was, fck, this is not how I was raised.
“Get it together, Michélle.”

I felt so embarrassed afterwards that I decided to unpack it, like any good strategist would. I gathered some data to try and establish what exactly triggered it, because even I didn’t see it coming.

I’d been feeling very low and homesick for a good couple of weeks. I’m talking about 5 out of 10 here. Longing for Africa like never before, but also without any real desire to go back. Just a deep-rooted heartache for the culture, the “gees”, the family, the friends, and obviously, let’s be honest, the sun. Combine that with anger for what the country has become in terms of corruption, safety, and just all things spicy and you have me sitting in a jet wash of emotions, doing my best to function, until someone in that group asked a genuine, heartfelt question:

“How are you doing personally?”

And that was me… done.

When the Leader Becomes the Loneliest Person in the Room

As a business owner, no one genuinely and wholeheartedly ever asks you how you’re doing. The focus, rightly so, is on your team - their wellbeing, their workload, their growth. The leaders, the founders, the entrepreneurs - we all get left miles behind in that equation.

In South Africa, I had years of a strong, unspoken network of entrepreneurs and business owners, genuinely just people who got it. People who knew what it meant to operate in chaos and still deliver. To “make a plan.” To laugh in crisis, to celebrate every single, irrespective of how small the win, with champagne every Tuesday.

Moving to another country means that for the most part you leave that behind and you start from scratch. While online networks are great, they’ll never beat the face-to-face coffee catch-ups, the well timed tequila, or the ‘bru, everything is figure-outable hustle’ or the silent understanding that comes from being cut from the same survival cloth.

Those kinds of relationships take years to cultivate.

Gathering the data

So I did what I do best: I gathered data.

I reached out to a few trusted friends and business networks and asked how they really felt towards the end of year two of immigration. The consensus? Everyone felt sh*t. Not necessarily depressed, just emotionally winded.

Every time we try to explain that to someone back home, there’s always that one comment:
“Well, then just come back.”

Please, don’t be a “doos”.

That’s so far off the point.

It’s not about wanting to move back, or not embracing the adventure. We sold everything, backed our decision, and took on the unknown with a leap of faith and excitement. What’s in Africa isn’t in the UK, and what’s in the UK isn’t in Africa. Both give you something and both take something away.

The psychology of homesickness

Homesickness isn’t just about missing a place, it’s also about missing the version of yourself that lived there.

South Africa raised me in its wild rhythm - raw, loud, unforgiving but yet beautiful. A place where resourcefulness is oxygen. It raised me to roll with the punches, but keep the “gees.” To move fast or get left behind. To improvise, to think on my feet. It gave me grit, humour, and a sixth sense for risk. That’s not something you just “get over.” It’s embodied in you.

In the UK, the systems work. People breathe easier and move much slower. “Tomorrow’s another day” isn’t necessarily laziness, it’s just not crisis management. However, if you’re used to operating in an environment where the sun burns hot and life burns hotter, that calm can sometimes feel like someone’s turned the volume right down on life.

It’s okay, because both realities can be true and learning to hold two worlds at the same time becomes part of the immigrant’s heart beat.

Immigration is identity surgery

Immigration doesn’t just move your postcode, it rearranges your identity.
You become two people:

• One who understands every joke, every cultural reference, every rhythm of your old life.

• One who’s learning new norms, new slang, new systems, and a new way of belonging.
  

That friction? It’s uncomfortable to say the least. However packing up your whole life in a 23kg suitcase and stepping into a new one, also forges a different kind of grit.

It teaches you to build from scratch again. To lead without the crowd. To find “home” not in a location, but within yourself. I’ve come to realise these past few days, home is your roots, your upbringing, your values - not just your street address. It’s who and what you take with you when the game and field changes.

To my fellow entrepreneurs

To every business owner and entrepreneur out there navigating life between two worlds - I see you and I respect you.

You’re holding it together for your team, your family, your clients, while quietly rebuilding your sense of belonging. You’re carrying the weight of decisions that no one else will ever fully understand. Sometimes one gentle question hits you like a plot twist, and suddenly your tears will arrive before your brain has caught up.

That moment doesn’t diminish you. If anything, it shows that transformation is happening beneath the surface.

So no, I’m not going “home,” and no, I’m not running away from the life I’m building.

It’s about learning to hold grief and gratitude in the same breath - to honour what shaped me while embracing what’s shaping me now, and to realise that you can outgrow a place and still love it fiercely.

So let’s keep building, keep figuring out the coping mechanisms to carry us through this season - the healthy ones, the messy ones and the necessary ones.

Let’s also remind ourselves that these emotions are not only normal, but part of the terrain. Some days we are dancers, some days we are warriors and some days we are both in the same hour, but we will keep showing up tomorrow, keep moving forward and backing ourselves in building a life that combines our worlds together in the best possible way.

Because if there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s this:

You can take the girl out of Africa, but Africa stays in her bones, and that grit together with faith, is all she needs to keep building.

also, if all else fails, well there’s always champagne..