The Places We Call Home podcast

Yolanda Reshemah
  • 5.0 (12)
  • Society & Culture
  • Updated Biweekly

I created The Places We Call Home for women who’ve immigrated and are rebuilding their lives in the USA — women carrying loneliness, homesickness, culture shock, and the pressure to stay steady while figuring out who they are now. Moving from one country to another is still a massive undertaking. Only 4% of people do it. It still requires courage. And it’s often the women who end up creating what sustains life abroad — community, friendships, purpose, mental wellness — all while attending to everyone else and quietly asking themselves, “How do I thrive here?” When I moved abroad, I learned quickly that immigration reshapes everything: who you thought you were, what you believe you can achieve, how confident you feel, and what “home” even means. You’re excited and bewildered at the same time. You’re grateful for the opportunities but feel the pressure to make them count. And you start to wonder if belonging is ever going to arrive. This podcast is where we talk about all of it. I share my own stories, the tools that helped me stay grounded, and conversations with women from around the world who are navigating identity, friendships, cultural differences, fitting in, partnership, career, culture, and the ache of distance. We explore what it means to live between geographies, to be understood in a place that doesn’t share your language or your history, and to create a meaningful life when everything familiar is far away. If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed, isolated, or stretched thin while trying to “live the dream,” this podcast is your room — a place to feel seen, tell your story, and feel less alone in the becoming. For and by: immigrant women, expat women, women supporting women, women rebuilding identity abroad. Courage, wellness, resilience, tenacity

  1. 1d ago

    #77. The Day You Stop Begging to Belong

    There's a moment every immigrant woman hits and once you hit it, everything changes. In this episode, I'm talking you as my friend. Because starting over in a new country forces you into a delicate truth most people never say out loud: you can chase inclusion for years and still feel lonely, unseen, or disconnected. Real belonging begins somewhere else entirely. I share what I takeaway from Natalie's story (episode 76) when she left Taiwan for California's Bay Area the warmth she grew up with, the sudden quiet of a new culture, and the powerful decision she made when she stopped asking Why wasn’t I invited? and started choosing people who genuinely appreciate her. Let's talk about the subtle ways women shrink to fit, the difference between chemistry and consistency, and why leading with a part of your culture can anchor you in places that feel unfamiliar. And we end with the daily practice I've used that builds the kind of self‑appreciation that protects your energy, your identity, and your belonging. If you’re navigating a new country like us expats in the USA, a new chapter, or a new version of yourself, this episode will help you feel seen, grounded, and reminded there are more friendship connections to be made than not. Belonging is built with the right people. belonging, immigrant women, inclusion, identity work, culture, self‑appreciation, expat life, starting over, emotional resilience, community building, relocation, authenticity, women’s stories, Natalie Chu

  2. 6d ago

    #76. Friendliness Isn’t Friendship: What Expat Women Learn the Hard Way

    A conversation about belonging, friendships, and rebuilding yourself in a new country. I sat down with Natalie Chu, who moved from Taiwan to the U.S. with a childhood dream and found herself facing the emotional truth expat women rarely say out loud. She talks about the “friendly but not actually your friend” moments, and the shock of realizing that belonging doesn’t show up just because you arrived. Natalie shares what she misses most about home — the morning markets, being known — and how different it feels to build community in the Bay Area. We talk about navigating safety in San Francisco, learning American social cues, and the moment she stopped chasing inclusion and started defining belonging on her own terms. This episode is honest, grounded, and deeply human. If you’ve ever moved countries, cities, or chapters, you’ll hear yourself in the tension, the ache, and the small wins that make starting over possible. A grounded conversation about connecting, community, identity, and the truth of starting over abroad. Natalie is the founder of a new podcast, Built Young, examining the journey of young entrepreneurs - Under 25. Over 1 M, and the ethics we can learn from them. Expat women immigrant women Taiwan Bay Area culture shock belonging loneliness move abroad identity homesickness community starting over migration stories international students migration USA friendship homesick

  3. Sep 5

    #75. Why You Don’t Feel Like Yourself Abroad: How to Reclaim Your Identity

    When you migrate, you enter environments that reinterpret you. In this solo episode, Yolanda Reshemah breaks down why so many immigrant women, expat women suddenly feel unfamiliar to themselves after moving abroad, and how identity distortion happens long before you realize it. From credential devaluation to accent bias to being misread in rooms where people don’t yet understand your history. Yolanda explains the emotional and psychological impact of being seen through someone else’s lens. Drawing from her conversation with Assistant Professor Neisha Terry Young and her own six international relocations, Yolanda shows how identity disruption is a predictable response to being repositioned by new systems, cultures, and assumptions. She offers two practical tools to help you reclaim your sense of self: • A Narrative Audit to separate who you are from who others decide you are • A Belonging Anchor to stabilize your identity while you rebuild confidence and community. If you’ve been feeling disoriented, diminished, or disconnected from your old self, this episode gives you grounded, emotionally honest guidance to reclaim your identity and rebuild belonging from the inside out. Reclaim who you are — before the world decides for you. identity distortion; identity disruption; immigrant women; expat identity; belonging abroad; confidence loss; competence grief; misrecognition; credential devaluation; accent bias; narrative audit; belonging anchor; migration identity; emotional resilience; immigrant experience USA; expat life; rebuilding identity; Yolanda Reshemah

  4. Aug 27

    #74. Reclaiming Your Worth — Finding Yourself Again After Migration

    A conversation about rebuilding identity, reclaiming your worth after migration. Educator and scholar Neisha Terry shares the deeply personal journey of navigating identity after migrating to the United States. She speaks openly about having her Jamaican teaching credentials reduced to “nothing,” being questioned about her legitimacy, and the emotional weight of constantly proving herself in spaces that weren’t built with her in mind. She speaks candidly about the exhaustion of becoming, the discipline of returning to being, and the moment she decided to stop shrinking herself and stand firmly in her truth. she acknowledges that self‑definition alone doesn’t erase structural barriers or the exhaustion of proving yourself. Belonging requires both inner clarity and external change. Her story is a reminder that that every woman navigating a new country, a new culture, or a new version of herself deserves to feel seen, valid, and whole. A grounded conversation on identity, worth, and the courage to define yourself on your own terms. immigrant women, expat identity, belonging after migration, Jamaican educator, women entrepreneurs, move abroad, study abroad, live abroad, homesickness, isolation, credential evaluation experience, women in academia, mental wellness, courage, resilience, women of color in academia, self‑definition, authenticity, cultural transition, reclaiming worth, migration identity, Neisha Terry Young, The Places We Call Home podcast

  5. Aug 19

    #73. Why Going Back Home Never Happens for Immigrant Women—The Myth of Living the Dream in the USA

    A conversation on identity, home, and why going back never truly happens for immigrant women. In this episode, I continue my conversation with Dr. Neisha Terry Young, Assistant Professor at Stony Brook University, about what it really means to build a life between geographies. We talk about the emotional weight of being an unconnected immigrant, the freedom she misses from her childhood in Jamaica, and the realities of raising Black boys in America. Neisha shares how a recent health crisis brought the ache of distance sharply into focus — “I wish I were still at home,” she says — and we explore why going back home never truly happens once migration reshapes your identity, your relationships, and your sense of belonging. We also talk about accents, self‑expression, and the challenge of being understood in spaces where your language and culture are not the norm. Neisha reflects on the moment she realized her Jamaican Creole couldn’t be heard in the way she intended, and how that shifted her understanding of voice, confidence, and becoming. This episode is for anyone navigating life across borders — emotionally, culturally, or physically — and for anyone who has ever wondered why “living the dream” doesn’t always feel like the dream at all. A conversation about identity, home, and the truth behind "living the dream". immigrant women; expat women; move abroad; homesickness; loneliness; Jamaican diaspora; belonging; identity; home; migration; American Dream; accents; Black motherhood; diaspora stories

  6. Aug 12

    #72. Immigrant or Expat? Neisha Young on Naming Ourselves. Pt.1

    Jamaican scholar and assistant professor Nisha Terry Young joins me for a grounded conversation about identity, belonging, and the labels we inherit when we move to the United States. We explore the difference between immigrant and expat—and how those words quietly shape the way women migrants are seen, judged, and expected to perform competence in their new lives. Nisha shares how her identity as a Jamaican woman fuels her work, and how her decision to pursue a PhD became a direct response to the limiting narratives placed on immigrants in American schools. We talk about the quiet pressure migrant women feel to prove their value, the fatigue of constant adaptation, and the emotional cost of rebuilding identity in spaces where anti‑immigrant and anti‑Black narratives still sit in the background of everyday life. She also takes us home to Jamaica—its mountains, riverbanks, wood‑fire cooking, music, and mangoes—and reminds us how home stays alive through taste, sound, and small rituals that steady us when loneliness creeps in or when the grief of the old self shows up unexpectedly. This episode is for any woman navigating competence loss, language shame, identity whiplash, and the slow, uneven work of belonging in a new country. Part two continues next week.

  7. Jul 24

    #71. The Hidden Rulebook of Your New Country — What Every Migrant Woman Should Know

    Five practical tools every migrant woman can use to stop feeling lost Ever felt overwhelmed after moving abroad? This episode gives you the missing manual. Host Yolanda Reshemah breaks down two essential skills every immigrant, expat, and migrant woman needs: Learning the hidden rulebook of your new culture and; Using curiosity and optimism as practical survival tools. You’ll walk away with five clear, actionable strategies to help you feel more grounded, more capable, and more at home in the place you’re rebuilding your life. As the woman who has relocated six times, host Yolanda shares her tools learned the hard way ... through life, not from books and theories. She first moved at age 10, then as a teen, a young professional, a wife and most recently as a mother. On Wednesdays guest conversations bring you lived experiences from a community of women who know where you are and how you feel. If this episode gives you something real, follow the show and share it with one woman who needs this today.

  8. Jul 19

    #70. Bubblegum, Barbie and Becoming American. Pt.2 Yuliya Patsay

    My expectation was that we were going to buy me a Barbie ... jeans, and bubble gum! This conversation with writer and storyteller Yuliya Patasy is an unusual exploration of what it means to arrive somewhere new — physically, emotionally, culturally, and generationally. Yuliya immigrated to San Francisco as a child, landing in a converted garage apartment packed with grandparents, great‑grandparents, aunts, uncles, and the weight of her parents’ hopes. Her early memories of life in a country that no longer exists are vivid: “I’ll never forget what it was like to live with 12 people in an apartment [ in the Soviet] sharing a bathroom.” She shares the pressure her parents felt to “turn things around quickly,” the loss of professional identity, and the disorientation of entering a system where the rules — social, cultural, bureaucratic — were entirely different. She also speaks candidly about the humor and heartbreak of childhood expectations, like the moment she realized Barbie was not life‑size: “I was like, this? No. I hate this.” We talk about belonging, language loss, and the tension between honoring the culture you came from and raising children who are fully rooted in the place you now call home. Yuliya reflects on her memoir, which began as a simple recipe collection and became a deeper excavation of family, memory, and identity. And she offers grounded wisdom for families stepping off a plane today, carrying their hopes in a suitcase: “There are good people everywhere… building relationships is really the path to feeling at home.” If you want more tools, stories, and honest conversations about building a life abroad, follow the show. Each episode gives you something real you can use and someone real you can relate to.

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5
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About

I created The Places We Call Home for women who’ve immigrated and are rebuilding their lives in the USA — women carrying loneliness, homesickness, culture shock, and the pressure to stay steady while figuring out who they are now. Moving from one country to another is still a massive undertaking. Only 4% of people do it. It still requires courage. And it’s often the women who end up creating what sustains life abroad — community, friendships, purpose, mental wellness — all while attending to everyone else and quietly asking themselves, “How do I thrive here?” When I moved abroad, I learned quickly that immigration reshapes everything: who you thought you were, what you believe you can achieve, how confident you feel, and what “home” even means. You’re excited and bewildered at the same time. You’re grateful for the opportunities but feel the pressure to make them count. And you start to wonder if belonging is ever going to arrive. This podcast is where we talk about all of it. I share my own stories, the tools that helped me stay grounded, and conversations with women from around the world who are navigating identity, friendships, cultural differences, fitting in, partnership, career, culture, and the ache of distance. We explore what it means to live between geographies, to be understood in a place that doesn’t share your language or your history, and to create a meaningful life when everything familiar is far away. If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed, isolated, or stretched thin while trying to “live the dream,” this podcast is your room — a place to feel seen, tell your story, and feel less alone in the becoming. For and by: immigrant women, expat women, women supporting women, women rebuilding identity abroad. Courage, wellness, resilience, tenacity

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