It’s a long process, but still making progress! I feel pretty adjusted and self sufficient, but my French could be better. Working on it — and have come to terms with it probably being a life-long journey.

Soooooo, almost a year later : how are you progressing with the whole ‘French adapting’ thing ?

Thanks for reading and the lovely message Ruth!

I agree with Dorian, I’m a french and I had to learn English (while still living in France), and what I found the most helpfull what to do m extra in English. I mean by that that when I’m going to whatch a movie or read a book, I’m going to do so in english.
You may found that tyring at the begining, but, learning while doing something you like is still better, I think, than learning by making mistakes at work or at familly diners…

Thank you so much for these words of encouragement and advice! It is nice to hear from someone with the same experience. I sometimes think my French is getting worse since I started working, since I work mostly in English and it is harder to make a lot of time for studying when working. I need to make it more of a priority–I like your advice about being sure to intake more French also. I’m still a few months from year one being complete, but I have heard from others too that it is usually the hardest. Cheers to an easier road ahead. Merci!

Fellow American ex-pat here. It’s been three years since I planted roots in Paris. I understand all too well the beautiful mess that assimilating here can be. Regarding conquering the French language thing: I, like you ,don’t innately speak French on a regular basis (primarily because my job necessitates communication in English) which has hampered my progress. However, what I have found to be the MOST effective to learning the language has been – rather counter-intuitively – listening and reading the language as opposed to actually speaking it. What you should aim for is maximizing your French language input, rather than your output. Once I committed to spending at least 1/2 hour daily to listening and / or reading French, I saw notable improvements. Even more so when I would spend more time on a daily basis to these activities.

That being said, you’ll probably also run into plateaus where you’ll feel like you’re not making progress, or even that you’re taking a few steps backwards. Don’t worry, though ; that’s a natural part of the language assimilation process; things pick back up eventually.

Regarding the varying phases of adapting to the culture here, my ‘worst’ year was probably year one; my second year, I feel really good about; back to general confusion and desperately trying to hold onto the last vestiges of Americana during the better part of my third year; and changing course to feeling as French as un croque-monsieur at the present time. So, for me at least, there’s been an ebb and flow with the process. All you can do is go with it!

Thank you Kez, what a sweet message to receive. It can be incredibly frustrating and then difficult to motivate myself, but this is one of the things I’m working on — not being so hard on myself about it. Thanks for the encouragement!

Don’t be too hard on yourself for the language, the best way is not to give yourself any choice. Volunteer at a dogs’ home or somewhere else where you are forced to speak French, one or two days a week, force yourself to read (even if it is only the free press from the metro), I found I improved in leaps and bounds once I HAD to do it. Of course, I had a headache for 3 months straight :/

Also, accept that you will never understand it all. Even now, after living and working in France for 15 years, I still find that every new situation brings time with magazine, websites and dictionaries. Looking for somewhere to live when I arrived had me scouring the PàP website trying to understand what a 4 pièces was, getting pregnant had me looking up a whole bunch of words that definitely weren’t covered in my school French lessons and reading 9 mois just for vocabulary, building our house had me reading Faire construire sa maison, giving birth (another whole bunch of words to learn), currently going through a divorce (legal documents are sooooo difficult in a foreign language, let’s face it, they’re bad enough in English).

Don’t be afraid to ask, or make yourself a list to learn if you know you’re going to a new situation. Read blogs, newspapers, put the radio on, or the TV on, resist the urge to do everything in English if you can…

If my email shows up and you want to use it, feel free, I won’t have been in every situation that you may find yourself in, but I will be able to empathise if you just want to vent to a person that you don’t know and don’t have to face every day. It can be a life saver.

If I can do it, you can!

Kez