There is a particular kind of exhaustion that no immigration document prepares you for. It is not the kind that comes from long work hours or jet lag, it is the slow, grinding fatigue of never quite knowing where home is, or whether you are allowed to leave it.
In conversation with financialexpress.com, Juhi Nigam, a South Delhi-based content creator, opened up about spending years caught in the maze of US immigration, promotions, cool-off clauses, travel restrictions, and a father battling Covid she could not reach. After years of living with the uncertainty of L1 and L2 visas, Juhi and her family have now moved back to India for good.
The ‘Golden handcuffs’ of the American dream – Why I returned to India
Juhi’s husband was employed in the US on an L1 visa, a category designated for intracompany transferees, while she accompanied him on an L2 dependent visa. When his career progressed and he received a promotion within his company, his visa was upgraded from an L1B to an L1A status.
What should have been a moment of celebration came bundled with a clause that changed the course. The upgrade required a mandatory one-year cool-off period outside of the United States. “We tried all of our possible options, but there was no way we could escape that,” Juhi told financialexpress.com.
At the same time, their visa extensions only came in two-year periods. That meant they could never plan too far ahead. “We could never buy a house because of the unpredictability of the future,” she said. “All of this was mentally so taxing. The pressure of not having a permanent home, a permanent location, it was adding up to our stress levels on a daily basis.”
It is a reality thousands of Indian professionals in the US know all too well. L and H visas may open doors to better jobs and bigger salaries, but they also come with endless renewals, extensions and approvals that turn even the most ordinary life decisions into calculated risks.
Living in ‘Forced Stagnation’
For Juhi, the visa wasn’t just a travel document; it was a barrier to professional growth and emotional presence. Being on an L2 visa meant her career was tethered to a ticking clock. “I had been working in the same company for the past 2 years simply because I was on L2 and we knew that the visa was coming to an end so there was no way a new company would hire me. Additionally, whenever an extension is filed, we are not allowed to travel outside the country.”
However, the most painful moment of her time abroad had nothing to do with work. During India’s devastating second wave of Covid-19, Juhi’s father tested positive. But with her visa extension still pending, she was unable to leave the US and be with him. “I could not travel because of this extension thing. That particular incident ingrained sleepless nights in my head, and it took me two years to come out of that.”
The invisible first year nobody talks about
While social media often presents moving abroad as an exciting new chapter, Juhi says the reality can be far more difficult. She recalled spending her first year simply trying to adjust, learning a new culture, settling into a new routine, and managing daily life without the support system many people in India are used to having.
“People never openly talk about how much your life changes when you first land there. In the initial years of leaving your country and trying to settle in a new country, that shift transforms you as an individual completely. I remember vividly, the first year I spent entirely on trying to make that shift possible for myself. New culture, new routine, having no help around, doing every single thing on my own, no family, no one to talk to, it’s just a lot,” she told financialexpress.com.
When asked whether she would have returned to India even if a Green Card had arrived at her doorstep the day before her flight, Juhi was honest. “Not really,” she said. “Having a Green Card is every immigrant’s dream, so probably in that case I would not have boarded that flight. It might sound selfish, but that is the truth.”
Back in India: The joy and the jolt
Even with the challenges of returning, Juhi said family made the move worth it. “The only and only reason that I am able to survive here in India is my family,” Juhi said. Her son, for whom the move was, in many ways, made, now grows up surrounded by grandparents, cousins his own age, and the texture of Indian festivals celebrated with the people who give them meaning. “To be able to see him spend time with my in-laws’ side of the family and my family is very heartwarming,” she added.
But the return has also delivered its share of friction. India, as she rediscovered it as an adult, is different from the India she left as one. The air quality was an early and urgent concern. Her son, accustomed to the clean air of the American environment he grew up in, needed medical attention shortly after landing.
“In terms of infrastructure, my son was very used to visiting the parks and doing a bunch of outdoor activities. From the moment we landed, I was on the lookout for good parks around my area, but to my surprise, as someone living in South Delhi, the community parks or government parks were so bad, so bad that we had no parks to take him outdoors,” Juhi said.
And then there is the rhythm of Indian professional life, which runs late in ways that are difficult to retrofit around a young child’s needs. “In India, usually work starts late and ends by 8-9. It is still a very big challenge for us to give him the evenings that we used to give him back then,” she explained. In the US, the family had a routine: her son would return from daycare, and the evenings belonged to outdoor time and play. Now, with offices running until well past dinnertime, that rhythm has been disrupted.
What she wants you to know before she packs
For the thousands of Indian students and professionals currently preparing their documents, booking their flights, and mentally composing the first Instagram post from a foreign city, Juhi has one message, not a warning, exactly, but a preparation.
“Staying abroad will change you as a person altogether,” she says. “There is no good or bad, but the version of yourself you see in India is going to be completely different from the version of yourself you will have a few years later. Be prepared, it’s going to be an exciting journey, but make yourself really, really mentally strong to go through so many things. There will be a lot of good and bad family-related stuff that you will miss and you need to be prepared for it.”