I want to change host families . . . is that allowed?

Yes of course! And if you are thinking about it, chances are you probably should.

My First Family: When It Didn’t Go as Planned

So I never actually, technically made the decision to change host families. The decision was always made for me.

When I was planning on becoming an au pair, I genuinely thought I would stay with the same host family for the whole two years. (Two years is the maximum amount of time one can have an au pair visa in France.) I told everyone that was my plan and I was committed to it. Heck, maybe I would even stay with the family longer as a student and still babysit on the side for them.

I had spent months video calling and messaging my future host family. I got to know them really well and asked a million questions (link to what questions should I ask potential host families) I was their first au pair and they were my first host family.

This was mistake number one. Do not au pair for someone who has never had an au pair before!

The family was incredibly sweet and they really did have the best intentions.

But they didn’t know what they were doing and I definitely had no clue what I was doing. So I ended up loafing around a lot, not being very helpful because I hadn’t been asked to work and I wasn’t assertive enough to make myself useful. I tried. I really did. But they had two small kids and were clearly exhausted all of the time, and I became another thing for them to deal with, rather than a weight off their shoulders.

For example, I had to drive the kids to school and pick them up twenty minutes each way every day. Except the car was manual.

And I am American.

So they spent all summer teaching me how to drive their very old and broken-down car. Actually, it was only the dad who taught me. And he didn’t speak English. And at that point, I didn’t speak French. So that pretty much went as well as you can imagine.

Anywho, after six months, the mom went to the doctor and got bad news. It was a condition she had already been living with, but it got worse and she needed surgery sooner, rather than later. This meant she was going to be bed-ridden for months basically, and my host family decided they would rather host actual family to help them out during those times, without placing an extra burden on me.

So I was very politely fired.

I hadn’t done anything wrong, exactly (well actually yes I made a million tiny mistakes, as anyone living in another culture with different rules would their first time), but they assured me it wasn’t anything serious. My host mom just knew that the next many months were going to be depressing and hard for their family, and she knew I came here to explore and have fun, and she didn’t want me to deal with it, so they sent me packing.

Luckily for me, I saw it coming. And I had been rather unhappy for a while. Sometimes the dad would yell at me and it would make me cry. Or the kids would scream all day. Or I would spend hours cooking everyone an American meal and none of them would like it. It left me feeling isolated and exhausted.

Like I said before, being an au pair is not for the weak.

By the time they sat me down, I had already been searching for another family just in case. I redid my profile on aupairworld.com and I knew what I wanted. They gave me two weeks to find another family and offered to be a reference for me. My host mom talked with the potential families I interviewed with and told them all great things about me. Which I am grateful for.

I knew I wanted to live in Paris this time around, in a separate apartment. My first host family lived an hour by train away from the city. I thought it would be fine, but it ended up being super limiting because I meant I could never stay in the city at night and make friends, because I had to leave by 8pm to catch the last train. I also couldn’t go to Paris during the days I worked because it wasn’t worth the time to go there and back in between picking up the kids, and I couldn’t risk the train being late and not picking the kids up from school.

Living with the family is SO difficult, in a million ways. So I knew I wanted to live on my own, and I was willing to make sacrifices.

By sheer luck (well, more misfortune really) there was a family whose au pair had a family emergency and had to go home. I saw their profile the day they posted and met with them in the city later that evening. It was one kid, and they were a handful. But the apartment was in the 11th arrondissement and had a (very obstructed view) of the Eiffel tower.

The Paris Dream (Almost) Fulfilled

It was perfect.

What wasn’t so perfect was the contract the family sent me the next day – littered with illegal working conditions. For example, they wanted me to work 35 hours a week, and legally I couldn’t work more than 25. They also did not offer to pay for my groceries, which they are required to do. And, they stated that when they went on vacation for two weeks every two months, they planned not to pay me. Again, this is not allowed.

This severely wounded my excitement to work with them. I was dumbfounded how they had had 12 au pairs before me, and none of them had complained about these conditions. And I tried to negotiate with them. I talked with their previous au pair and she confirmed the contract and I cited what she said in a text to them asking if they could please make the contract legal. However the dad was a very rich lawyer, and got very offended by my insinuations. He said it’s only one kid and I was being ridiculous to ask for all those things.

I was under a lot of pressure. I only had a handful of days left before I had to leave my first host family’s house. And they were the only family that had offered me a contract that lived in the city and were okay with me having a dog.

So I accepted the offer. Like an idiot. I think it made my first host mom mad at me because I explained all of this to her as it was happening, and she told me not to do it and to go with another family that lived out in the suburbs. She thought I was being an idiot. And maybe I was. But I also knew what I wanted – to live in Paris. And despite all of the grief and unfair conditions I endured the next nine months. . . I don’t regret it.

I loved that apartment. I was able to host friends over for the holidays and offer to have people crash on the second bed when they needed to. I was able to host my sister when she came to visit me.

Most importantly, that street is where I met my current boyfriend for the first time. It’s where we had our first date.

It completely shaped my experience. I was able to go on dates and have friends over – which is something many host families don’t allow when you live with them. (For the safety of their kids, which I actually agree with.) I was able to eat what I wanted when I wanted. And my free time was completely free.

Yes, it would have been great if I could have gotten a proper contract. But overall if I could go back in time, I would make the same decision.

An Unexpected Summer in the South of France

My contract ended when school ended. So come July, I was facing homelessness again. This time at least, I had more time to prepare. Again, I interviewed with dozens of families. (I am now an official pro at interviewing. I mean – not really. But I feel like I should earn some kind of check mark on my aupairworld profile or something for having gone through the same thing so many times.)

By sheer luck, I found a family living in the south of France. I knew I needed to return to Paris in the fall to go to school, but the summer was a perfect opportunity to travel for free. And I mean come on, who doesn’t want to live in the south of France? (link to post about living in Arcachon with all my photos will be here)

They had older children – teenagers. So I wasn’t entirely sure why they even wanted me to come live with them. But I was not going to question it! I said yes absolutely and packed my bags and spent two months on the beach of Arcachon with basically no responsibilities. I cooked occasionally for everyone and walked the dogs and tried to speak english with them. But there weren’t any real working hours. My job was mostly it seemed just to spend the night there when the parents couldn’t because they were working in Bordeaux.

This summer wasn’t perfect – It was a strange situation and I didn’t exactly become best friends with the teenagers because they were, well, teenagers and they acted like it. (Cannot believe I used to be one of those. Teenagers are scary.) But it was great for what it was and I am very grateful.

They were probably my favorite family. The dad was super nice and more generous than either of the other two families had been. I love it when people are generous, because I myself, love to be generous. I think the world would be a whole lot better if everyone was this way.

So yea, go ahead and change

There are very few situations where it becomes complicated to change. However, I ran into a few with my visa.

There came a point where I wanted to change families, but I felt I couldn’t because I worried that leaving could affect my visa renewal. In order to extend the au pair visa into a second year, you need a lot of supporting documents from the family. And I didn’t want to risk not having them if I quit, so I ultimately decided to stick it out, just in case. Looking back, I am sure I could have switched, and hopefully found a nice family that would have provided all of the necessary papers. Au pairs switch families all the time at renewal, and it works out just fine.

Sometimes if things are really not going well, families will threaten legal action against their au pairs if they leave. This has never happened to me, but I read the stories in the group chats. In reality, there is really not much the host families can do. They cannot revoke your visa and they can’t report you to the police unless you are breaking the law.

Unfortunately, this also works in the other sense. If au pairs are being abused, there are very few authorities that will help, because we are immigrants. The French police simply do not care. If you find yourself in a dangerous situation, leave immediately. Stay with a friend or get a hotel, and you will be able to find another family shortly.

In general though, if you are just unhappy with your current situation, you deserve to change. None of us au pairs come here to be miserable. Sometimes, yes, it can be miserable. But overall you are supposed to be enjoying yourself and learning another culture. Otherwise, what’s the point? Don’t be overly committed, like I was. It’s okay to break your contract.

Remember, your happiness and personal growth are priorities. Don’t hesitate to make a change if it leads to a better experience – because that’s what being an au pair should be all about!

Let me know if you have any questions about switching families. Or if you have any dramatic host family stories – I absolutely love to hear them.

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