Posted to London With the Family at Home: The Evenings
On a posting or assignment in London while your family stays behind. Why this is different from moving, how the calls work best, and what to do with the evenings.
By KF.Social·4 min read·Published 13th September 2026
You are in London for a posting of a year or two and your family is at home. You did not move. They did not move. There is a flat here with your things in it, and a house somewhere else with your life in it, and you go back when the leave allows.
This has a particular difficulty that neither a business trip nor a relocation has, and it is worth naming because most people carry it without ever putting it into words: building anything here feels slightly disloyal, and building nothing here makes the posting much worse than it needs to be. That tension is the whole thing.
01Why this is not moving and not a business trip
On a two week trip nobody expects a life. On a proper relocation the family comes and there is a joint project: schools, a house, a plan. An unaccompanied posting has the duration of the second and the legitimacy of the first, so it falls between them and nobody has advice for it.
The practical result is that people postpone. Everything here is provisional, so the flat stays half unpacked, nothing gets joined, and the whole posting is spent waiting to go home. Two years of that is a long time and it does not make anybody at home better off.
02The calls, which are the thing to get right first
The instinct is to be in constant contact and it usually works less well than it sounds.
Fixed times beat constant availability. A known call at a known hour, that both ends plan around, is better for everyone than being permanently half-available. It stops your evenings being a waiting room and it stops the calls being interruptions at the other end.
Talk about ordinary things. A call that is only logistics and news becomes a status meeting. The small dull detail of the day is what actually keeps people in each other's lives, and it is the first thing to disappear over distance.
Be careful about only ever reporting the bad days. There is a natural pull towards proving you are not enjoying it, and it is worth resisting, because it slowly makes the posting sound worse than it is to the people who can do least about it.
Children need frequency more than length. Short and regular works considerably better than long and occasional, and reading a book over a video call at bedtime is worth more than an hour on a Sunday.
03Permission to have an evening
This is the part that goes unsaid. Going out here can feel like a small betrayal, as if you are supposed to serve the posting rather than live in it, and that gets stronger the more the people at home are managing without you.
It is worth being direct: an evening with people in it does not take anything from your family. The alternative is not devotion, it is a man or woman sitting in a rented flat for two years, and the person who comes home from that is worse company than the one who had a life. Nobody at home benefits from you having been miserable in a well-organised way.
The version of this that actually causes damage is a secret one. An evening you would happily describe on the call is fine.
04Practical things for a posting of this length
Unpack properly. It sounds trivial and it is not. A half-unpacked flat is a daily statement that none of this counts, and you will be looking at it for two years.
Have one thing on a fixed weeknight. A posting has no natural structure once the working day ends, and one fixed evening does more for a week than three vague intentions.
Do the visits properly. When they come, or when you go, plan something rather than defaulting to the trip being about seeing each other in a house. The visits are the part of the posting everyone remembers.
Know your leave dates early and put them in front of you. A posting is much easier to be in when the next trip home is a date rather than a vague sometime.
05What we do, in one paragraph
KF.Social books you a seat at a table of six in a London restaurant on a set evening, with other people who are in London for work rather than living here permanently. It is 15 pounds for the seat, plus your food and drinks. On a posting like this it is most useful as the one fixed weeknight above: a low-commitment evening with people in it, on a specific date, that you can describe on the call home without a second thought. The restaurant lands about six hours before, and who you are sitting with about an hour before, when the group chat opens. Cancelling 72 hours or more ahead returns the 15 pounds to your card, and inside 72 hours it does not. London only. The tables coming up are here.
Related Questions
How is an unaccompanied posting different from moving abroad?
It has the duration of a relocation and the legitimacy of a business trip, so it falls between the two and there is little advice for it. Building a life here feels slightly disloyal and building none of one makes the posting much worse, and that tension is the central difficulty.
How often should I call home on a long posting?
At fixed times rather than constantly. A known call at a known hour that both ends plan around works better than being permanently half-available, because it stops your evenings being a waiting room and stops the calls being interruptions at the other end. With children, short and frequent beats long and occasional.
Is it wrong to go out and enjoy myself while my family is at home?
No. The alternative to an evening with people in it is not devotion, it is two years in a rented flat, and the person who comes home from that is worse company than the one who had a life. The version that causes damage is a secret one; an evening you would happily describe on the call is fine.
What should I do in the first week of a long posting?
Unpack properly, which sounds trivial and is not, because a half-unpacked flat is a daily statement that none of this counts. Then find one thing to put on a fixed weeknight, since a posting has no structure at all once the working day ends.
How do I make the trips home work better?
Know the dates early and keep them in front of you, because a posting is much easier to be inside when the next trip is a date rather than a vague sometime. And plan something for the visits rather than defaulting to seeing each other in a house, since the visits are the part everyone remembers.
KF.Social
