Hello! My husband and I have been talking and discussing moving our family to Japan from the US. He is a Japanese national, but has lived most of his life outside of Japan so his Japanese is not exactly native but he can understand/talk and read okay, just struggles with Kanji, mine is very basic. We have 3 children (elementary school age), our youngest is going to be 5, and is non verbal autistic with a developmental delay… They are our biggest concern. In the US we have support and special classes in school for our youngest, but we don't know how this works in Japan.
My husband's concern is getting jobs in Japan, I'm an IT Engineer but I don't know if they will allow me to work in IT with beginner Japanese. We could easily afford to buy a house if we sell our current house in the US and would still have enough left over to be okay for 6 to 12 months while we settle in, but I'm unsure where we would settle, he wants to live further away from the city/more rural but I don't know if that would be realistic job-hunting wise or school wise for our kids?
I think I'm just trying to get opinions from other families who've moved and essentially started over, specially with a child with special needs? Our financial situation in the US is better than most but everything is rapidly becoming unaffordable so we're both on the same page about wanting to move. We will be visiting his Japanese grandma next month since I've never been there to get a feel for things.
Any thoughts or advice? Especially in regards to children's special education?
by NebulaOk5712