Reverse Culture Shock

Reverse Culture Shock (a.k.a. "Re-entry Shock", or "own culture shock"^[6]) may take place — returning to one's home culture after growing accustomed to a new one can produce the same effects as described above. This results from the psychosomatic and psychological consequences of the readjustment process to the primary culture.^[7] The affected person often finds this more surprising and difficult to deal with than the original culture shock. This phenomenon, the reactions that members of the re-entered culture exhibit toward the re-entrant, and the inevitability of the two are encapsulated in the saying "you can't go home again," first coined by Thomas Wolfe in his book of that title.


end quote from:
Culture Shock in Wikipedia.


"you can't go home again" Thomas Wolfe.  Yes, I can totally relate to this saying. Once you spend a few months in different cultures coming home is never the same as when you grew up wherever you grew up on earth.




When you experience "Reverse Culture Shock" it is completely unexpected by most people and often sends people into a confusion or a depression for some time. In addition to this I had Ghiarddhea which is protozoa in my intestines likely picked up from feces in the dust in Nepal and Kathmandu at that time. So, out of the 5 of us 4 of us had protozoa in our intestines. So, we went to a foreign disease specialist because I was as skinny as I had ever been since age 17. She said the best outcome without injuring our livers would be to just let it sluff off as we were in no danger of starving to death here in the U.S. because the protozoa would all die in this environment from India and Nepal within 6 months living here in the U.S. But the next 6 months in the U.S. I often saw black spots before my eyes as I wasn't getting the nutrition I needed often. But like she said I began to gain weight again after 6 months and so did my wife and kids. The only other thing we dealt with was lice from my 10 year old son that we found when we returned to the U.S. in his hair. So, since he was young I simply shaved his head to get rid of them and he wore a baseball cap until his hair grew out again.


However, psychologically the four months in Japan, Thailand, India and Nepal permanently changed us to where we all feel like Citizens of Earth which is a very different way to feel than we did before. We are Americans too. But being an American is more like being a Californian than it was like being an American was before this trip. It is one of the reasons that I can write a blog like this as I feel the whole earth is my home now.