My kids were jumping up and down excitedly, bombarding me with questions.
‘Will we really live near the beach?’ my daughter Ada, eight, asked.
‘And go swimming every day?’
Before I got a chance to answer, my six-year-old Eadie had chimed in.
‘Will there be kangaroos in our backyard?’ she wanted to know. ‘What about snakes and spiders?’
I couldn’t really blame the girls for having questions – or for their excitement. Me and my husband Andy felt exactly the same way.
We’d just decided to apply for a visa to move from Sheffield, in the north of England, to the Gold Coast, Australia, after years of dreaming of a family adventure overseas.
Now that we’d got the wheels in motion and told the girls, it was starting to feel real.
After five long years, the Schofields finally got their visas approved to move to Australia. A routine pre-migration health check had raised issues with their eight-year-old daughter
Don’t get me wrong, we loved our life in the UK. Andy earned good money as an electrician (he laughed when I told him Aussies call them sparkies!) and I ran my own successful children’s therapy business.
The girls were settled in school and we never had to pay for childcare because my mum was always around.
But one thing Andy and I had agreed on was that we never wanted to live with regret.
In my twenties, I’d backpacked through Australia and I’d fallen in love with the sandy beaches and laid-back way of life.
For years I’d been longing to go back, vowing that I would make it a family adventure if Andy and the girls were keen – and they very much were.
Once we’d lodged our application, we started to get our ducks in a row, thinking it’d be approved in no time.
We sold our family home and started renting, so we’d be able to leave almost as soon as our application was approved.
But the weeks, then the months, dragged on.
Michelle and Andy’s eldest daughter’s visa was rejected because she failed the medical test. She has a growth hormone deficiency which is manageable but can be expensive
Andy and I were starting to get nervous. And the girls’ excited questions had turned into anxious ones. ‘We will be going soon, won’t we?’ Ada asked.
‘When can I start packing my suitcase?’ Eadie wanted to know.
I hated that I couldn’t give them answers. I wanted to know what was going on, too.
Five years in limbo
Finally, four months after we submitted our application, I received an email with the subject line: VISA APPLICATION OUTCOME.
My heart started racing with excitement. I was at work and thought, ‘This is it, we’re going to Australia!’
But then I opened the email.
To my horror, we’d been rejected. And the reason? Ada had failed her medical.
Australia, like many counties, has routine pre-migration medical screening for people applying to live and work there. This is to determine if a migrant will be a burden on the taxpayer-funded healthcare system.
The email further explained that immigration had denied our application because Ada’s medical costs ‘exceeded the cap’ of what the government was willing to pay for over a 10-year period. The family was ‘stuck in limbo’ for five years before finally getting approved
Despite knowing Ada had a health condition, we hadn’t once considered – or been told – this could impact our visa application.
Ada was born prematurely and struggled to put weight on as a baby. When she started nursery, then moved into school, we noticed she was always quite a bit smaller than all of her friends.
She couldn’t run as far either, and would get tired easily.
At first, we struggled to get answers from the doctor, but we sought a second opinion when Ada was three and a half, and finally got a diagnosis.
She had a growth hormone deficiency. Luckily, it was easily managed. She just needed an injection every evening, and in no time she was the correct weight and height for her age.
She needed to keep taking the medication so her hormones would remain in check.
I couldn’t believe something so minor, which we’d been managing for years, was now standing in the way of our dream of moving Down Under.
The email further explained that immigration had denied our application because Ada’s medical costs ‘exceeded the cap’ of what the government was willing to pay for over a 10-year period.
It was something that should’ve been picked up during the application process but wasn’t.
I called my husband straight away to tell him the devastating news. He was so confident we’d be accepted that he thought I was joking at first.
That night, we put the girls to bed without telling them. I couldn’t bear to crush their dreams.
‘Surely there’s a way to get them to reverse the decision?’ I sighed to Andy.
We both had great jobs with a range of desired skills, we all were in good health. We had as much to offer Australia as it had to offer us, or so we thought.
We decided to appeal the decision, but for an entire year we didn’t hear a peep from the immigration department.
Frustrated and impatient, an immigration lawyer helped us with the situation.
Having sold our house, we felt in complete limbo living as a family of four in rented accommodation – especially as we had to move three times in the space of two years.
Moving our belongings from one rental to another was a nightmare.
Feeling exhausted and defeated, we finally settled into a third property where we decided to remain for as long as needed.
Not knowing what our future held was stressful. I gained weight and Andy lost some.
After another couple of years went by, I’d almost lost hope entirely. I started looking at property to buy in the UK.
Andy was more positive than me. ‘They could approve our visa any day now,’ he told me.
So we carried on renting, but it was soul-destroying.
When we were contacted for a second round of medical tests, my hopes lifted. Maybe they were almost ready to reassess our application?
The turning point
In January 2024, I received an email – Ada had cleared her medical. We all had!
Andy rang our migration agent who confirmed the good news. A few tweaks to our application and a reassessment on the medical costs had got us over the line.
‘Looks like you’re going to Australia,’ they said.
We were completely blown away and shocked beyond belief. Within two weeks, our visas came through and it was all systems go.
We ended our lease, sold our belongings, and scrambled to save some money before we departed.
Then, the same week we were booked to fly, my mum became sick and she had to go to the hospital for blood tests and an MRI. I broke out in itchy red rashes from stress.
‘You better not have cancer the week I’m leaving to go to Australia,’ I told my 67-year-old mum in hospital.
I was trying to make light of it, but I was terrified – and not just for us.
The health scare made me think: ‘Is she going to be okay when we’re gone? This is going to be so hard when she’s ill and we’re not around.’
Doctors are still conducting tests to determine what the problem was, but meanwhile we had a flight to catch.
Saying goodbye to my mum and stepdad at Heathrow airport was harder than I ever imagined. I couldn’t talk; I just wept.
After giving mum a long, tight hug she handed me a card. I still haven’t read it, I can’t bring myself to do it.
The reality that we won’t see our families until Christmas is setting in, and I’m sure we will discover many other harsh truths about living so far away.
But when we touched down in Gold Coast in early February, we headed straight for the beach. We put our toes in the sand and paddled in the water.
As the girls giggled and jumped in the waves, I knew it’d been worth the effort.
- As told to Carina Stathis