As a new immigrant to Canada around 10 years ago, I still remember my family’s very first winter. A lot of newcomers have this memory! For those of us who arrived in Canada in the winter, our first memory was stepping outside of the airport into the frigid air of reality! Could life on earth actually survive this cold, we wondered. If we arrived in summer, our cold wintery stereo-type of Canada got blown away by the unexpected heat, leaving us thinking that winter couldn’t be that bad with summers this hot! That was us: we arrived in June, it was so beautiful and hot! It made us feel like winters weren’t going to be so bad...we were, of course, so wrong!
The first blizzard arrived very early, on November 1st, the day after Halloween, and I was not prepared for what to expect. I was on my way home as the storm was in full force and I felt trapped in the middle of, what seemed like, a white-coloured nowhere inside the GO train and of course going at a very, very slow pace. At the same moment, my husband was driving in congested stop-and-go traffic to pick up our son from daycare. Because of the sudden snow storm the whole GTA was in chaos. My husband eventually made it to the daycare, arriving an hour late to pick our son up. It took them another 2 hours driving home for what was usually an average 30- minute drive.
We were shocked and started to question our decision: why did we bring our family here in this cold place? How will we survive in such a crazy long, winter in this country? I shared my feeling of disappointment with some immigrant friends who had been in Canada for a few more winters than I had. I was encouraged to look forward to spring, to summer, to the most beautiful fall in Muskoka, and also to the potential fun in winter. I am happy to say that we have survived a few more winters since then, and could even say we enjoy winter! But at that time, I had no idea whether we could survive in this new, cold, country.
Looking back on my last few years in Canada, I realized that we were going through all the stages of Culture Shock, which is, apparently, a very normal experience for immigrants!
Culture Shock has four stages
The Honeymoon stage, (mine was in the summer we arrived – how wonderful Canada was then!) Then came winter, which pushed us into the 2nd stage rather quickly, which is Culture Shock. For others, culture shock comes after the daily stress and exhaustion from adapting to so many new things and missing home.
Then, hopefully, there is the 3rd stage, which is Adjustment, followed by the final stage: Acceptance. Note that these stages are not experienced in a straight line, nor are they completely finished before we start a new stage, they overlap and often the experience feels more like a roller coaster of ups and downs. I wish I had known that then, I might have felt less anxious knowing it was actually quite normal and that it was a stage...which means it has an end!
The illustration below shows how immigrants tend to ride high for the first 9 months or so. But for the next 9 months, we apparently dive dramatically into a valley. As time goes on, we slowly climb back up to being happy again. Like taking the roller coaster in Wonderland, settling in Canada has many ups and downs before we reach a feeling of stability.
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However, some of you may feel as though you have been stuck at the bottom of this rollercoaster for a very long time, perhaps you have lost hope and feel isolated despite the support of family and friends near and far. If so, I would suggest reaching out to community organizations that specialize in helping newcomers in their settlement, employment and language needs. Often those who work there have had similar experiences on the “emotional roller coaster” and can give support and advice from their own experience.