June 2025

Hi there, my dear friends.

I know. I know.

It has been over four years since my last post. Four years! When I look at the date on that last entry — March 2021 — I honestly have to take a moment. So much has happened since then. So much has changed. And yet here I am, sitting at my desk in Cologne almost at midnight, opening up this little corner of the internet again, feeling equal parts nervous and excited.

If you’re still here — thank you. Genuinely. It means more than you know.

So. Where have I been?

Life happened. A lot of it.

When I wrote that last post in March 2021, the world was still deep in pandemic fog. I had just started adjusting to the 9-to-5 rhythm of working life, which — as I mentioned back then — was honestly harder than I expected. I thought once I settled in, I’d be back to posting regularly within weeks.

That didn’t happen.

What followed was one of the most intense, messy, beautiful, and sometimes overwhelming periods of my life. I started new job and navigated the wonderful bureaucratic maze that is German adult life (if you’ve ever tried to register a new address, cancel a contract, or understand your Krankenkasse statement — you know exactly what I mean). I made new friends, lost touch with some old ones, and spent a lot of time just… figuring things out.

And then 2022 happened. For me, as a Ukrainian living abroad, February 24th of that year split everything into a “before” and an “after.” I won’t say too much about that right now — it deserves its own post, its own space — but it changed something in me. The way I think about home. About identity. About what it means to be Ukrainian and to be here, far away, watching from a distance.

Writing felt impossible for a while. And then it just felt like something I had left too long to go back to. But here’s the thing about this blog. I never stopped thinking about it.

Why I’m coming back

Honestly? I missed it. I missed the writing, the documenting, the feeling of putting something real into words and sending it out into the world. I missed having a space that was just for me.

But I also want to do something new with it. The blog started as a window into my expat life — mostly practical stuff, some of the photo walks, the quirky German holidays. And all of that is still here, still very much part of who I am and what I want to share. But I’ve grown a lot since 2021, and I want this space to reflect that.

So I’m introducing something I’ve never written about before.

Introducing: Mental Health Diaries

This is the part I’m most nervous — and most excited — to tell you about. Over the past few years, I’ve been on a journey with my mental health. I’ve been learning a lot about ADHD, anxiety, and OCD — what they look like, how they feel, and how they intersect with the very particular experience of living abroad in a country that isn’t where you grew up.

It’s a lot to navigate. And I’ve found, again and again, that when I go looking for resources or just someone who gets it — someone who understands both the mental health side and the expat experience — there’s almost nothing out there.

So I’m going to write it myself.

I’ll be sharing my personal experiences, the practical stuff (like trying to get a diagnosis or find a therapist in Germany as a non-native speaker — spoiler: it’s an adventure), and the everyday reality of living with a brain that works a little differently. It won’t always be neat or tidy or fully resolved. But it will be honest.

I hope it finds the people who need it.

What’s coming

Here’s a little taste of what I’m working on:

• A photo walk through Cologne — my home for a few years now and honestly one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever lived in
• An honest post about being Ukrainian in Germany in 2025 — community, identity, grief, and gratitude all tangled together
• My ADHD diagnosis story and how I navigated the German healthcare system to get there
• A guide to finding an English-speaking therapist in Germany (the real one, with actual tips that work)
• Updated expat guides — job hunting, German learning, living here — because so much has changed since 2021
• And plenty of photo walks, travel stories, and the everyday moments that make life here so interesting

Thank you for still being here

If you’re reading this — whether you’ve been here since the beginning or you stumbled across this blog just today — I’m really glad you’re here.

This space has always felt like a little diary, a little conversation, a little community. I’m ready to pick that back up.

See you in the next post. 🤍

— Iana