Italy welcomes the digital nomad! If you’ve been dreaming of moving to Italy but thought it was impossible, your chance has finally arrived!
Italy has just launched the so-called “Digital Nomad Visa” which enables non-EU-nationals who are self-employed or remote workers who derive their income entirely outside of Italy, the chance to live in Italy on a year-by-year basis.
For Italophiles and wannabe expats around the globe, this may just be a dream come true.
Tiffany and Katy discuss the details of this new visa, what the requirements are, and if it’s a good or a bad idea for Italy’s economy.
You can listen to the episode right here, or find the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, and elsewhere.
Related Episodes:
567 What if Moving Abroad Isn’t Great? (with Darlene Sullivan)
566 How to Move to Italy (with Thea Duncan)
562 Moving to Rome—Sight Unseen, Part 2 (with Brie Ripley and Ryan Sparks)
551 How to Retire to Florence—with Your Granddaughter (with Dreck Baker)
540 I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself (with Glynnis MacNicol)
538 Stayers, Goers, and Newbies
537 Navigating US Taxes as an Expat (with Nathalie Goldstein)
527 Moving to Rome—Sight Unseen (with Brie Ripley)
Four key takeaways from the episode:
- Italy has launched a new digital nomad visa, allowing remote workers to live in Italy for one year (renewable) if they meet certain income and insurance requirements.
- The visa application process may be complicated, requiring proof of accommodation, tax compliance, and navigating Italian bureaucracy.
- There are concerns about the impact of more foreigners on Italian cities, which are already struggling with over-tourism and housing issues.
- The hosts discuss the challenges of healthcare and taxation for foreigners living in Italy under this new visa program.
Full Episode Transcript:
Katy
Hi, I’m Katy Sewall. Welcome to The Bittersweet Life. It’s a show that’s not littered with advertisements like so many podcasts are these days. You’re not going to hear an ad burst through like a typical ad break on a commercial radio station. This is a show that’s mainly funded by listeners and right now we’re asking you to hear the call and help us create a show that is both peaceful, no loud ads, and thought provoking, but also well funded. If we can’t pay our bills, we can’t make this show anymore. And our hope is that you appreciate what you find here and show your support with whatever you can afford. And we have a goal. We would love to have enough people pitch in on a monthly basis so we can rely on over $1,000 a month in donations. That would really help stabilize this program. To keep this show going with all of our other work obligations, we have got to outsource some of the weekly work. At a very minimum. I would love to have some audio editing help, but we currently have no budget for that. But maybe, just maybe, you’ll hear the call and help. Maybe you’ll become a part of our inner circle. And you know what? We will thank you for your donations. You’ll receive tons of bonus content, live meetups, one on one interactions, handwritten thank you notes, and more. Just visit patreon.com the bittersweet LifePodcast. For $5 a month or more, you can tell us you love the show, support the show’s continuation, and get a ton of thank you gifts in return. That’s patreon.com/thebittersweetlifepodcast. You’ll find links to donate in the show notes and I want to thank Gail and Joan, Joanne and Linda, and also Patty for hearing this appeal last week and responding to it right away. $5 a month doesn’t get you very much these days, but it will get you a lot here. I recently paid a poet sitting on the side of the road $5 to write a poem about this podcast and I want to read you what he came up with. His name is Oliver Daleo and here is his poem about the bittersweet life, about living abroad and moving home and all of the other questions that life brings about. He writes. We wander through this world Cement serpents, cities, rivers and streams, Purpose and dreams Seed of our soul grown in the soil in the home away we roam now wonder where vision leads and it seems I’m never too early or late. But what awaits or lies behind there isn’t at least a piece of where I’m from on my mind. What do you think? Was that worth $5? And do you find this show to be worth at least that much to you? If so, consider supporting it and than. Welcome to Rome. This is the Bittersweet Life with Katy Sewall and Tiffany Parks. Hello, this is the Bittersweet Life. I’m Katy Sewall.
Tiffany
I’m Tiffany Parks.
Katy
Tiffany over in Rome, Katy in Seattle. And today, Tiffany, like a news journalist, you’re bringing us the latest from Italy.
Tiffany
Oh, yes, I’ve got my finger on the pulse of the expat world because there’s been big news coming out of Italy that has made a lot of people, I imagine, very excited. A lot of people who’ve always wanted to move to Italy and who didn’t have the opportunity because Italy has launched a new digital nomad visa is, I think what they like in shorthand, what they call it. And this has already existed in Spain, Spain and Portugal for a little while, some other places in the world. But Italy I think is only the third European country to do it. And it’s basically a one year renewable visa for people who already have work either working remotely for a foreign company or someone who is self employed and you know, freelancing or has their own private clients. But basically the rule is like you have to be getting your income from outside of Italy and there’s lots of requirements. You have to have been doing this type of work for six months, like meaning doing the, like working remotely for six months. You have to be what? I don’t know, I can’t remember what. They’re highly skilled I think is the phrase they use. But I mean, again, that’s very open to interpretation. Highly skilled, sure. Obviously there has to be work that can be done remotely. So you know, clearly there are certain things that lend themselves to that and certain things that don’t and you have to make a certain amount of money and I believe you have to have your own health insurance. They don’t want people taking advantage of the Italian, the free Italian healthcare system.
Katy
Interesting. Do you?
Tiffany
Yeah.
Katy
I have a couple questions. Do you happen to know what the minimum threshold for income is?
Tiffany
I, I saw it because I just double checked.
Katy
I know they have the same thing kind of for the retirement visa you have to prove you have a certain amount of money in the bank and it’s a pretty substantial amount of money that you have to prove that you have. But yeah, I would think if it’s like an ongoing Job. Hopefully it would be lower, yes.
Tiffany
Oh, it’s definitely lower. I’m not seeing that you need to have a certain amount of money in the bank. I’m not seeing. Seeing that here. I know in Portugal you do, but it’s. It looks like you only need to make about 28 grand, but that’s in euros per year. Like, you only have to prove that that’s what you’re making. Okay. So it’s pretty accessible.
Katy
Hang on. And I’m gonna look up what 28, €000 to dollars is.
Tiffany
It’s. It’s probably about 30, 000. It’s very close right now. The dollar is very high.
Katy
Yeah. 30,000, 203. 60 cents.
Tiffany
Yeah. Okay. I don’t understand this phrasing. Help me understand this. It has been announced that the visa is open to workers who have an annual income of at least three times the minimum level required for exemption from participation in health care costs in Italy. Like, it’s worded so convoluted. You have to make three times the amount of the minimum required for exemption from participation in health care costs.
Katy
Okay.
Tiffany
You’re exempt from participating in health care costs. It means you’re exempt. You don’t have to pay for your health care because you make too little money. I guess that’s what they’re saying.
Katy
Right. So you have to make three times that. So what is the minimum exemption? It must be.
Tiffany
Well, it must be one. One third of 28,000.
Katy
Yeah.
Tiffany
It says that you have to make three times. Three times the amount. So. Yeah. Health insurance appears to be the most important requirement of acceptance, with individuals needing to take out robust plans valid for the entire period of their stay.
Katy
Hmm. So as a person who’s only used the free Italian healthcare system for the one year I lived there and got a pretty sizable concussion while I was in Rome. Mine these episodes to find out how I. How would that actually work? Do you have any idea? Like, would I have to go in and be like, here is my insurance card when I checked in at the emergency room? How do they even know to accept an insurance?
Tiffany
Because, I mean, that’s a good question.
Katy
They didn’t ask me for anything, so.
Tiffany
Well, in Italy. In Italy, you can go. Anyone can go to the emergency room. Tourists, illegal immigrants, whatever. Legal people. Obviously, anyone can go to the emergency room and get free care, but you cannot go into a public hospital and book like, I need a mammogram. You can’t go in and book that unless you have the Italian health care card.
Katy
Oh, okay.
Tiffany
You can’t. Not in a public hospital or a public clinic. You can go into a private place and book it, but it will cost a lot more. It’s not. It’s not inaccessible. The amount of private. Private. And in fact, Italians health insurance is becoming more and more popular here because a lot of people prefer to use the private sector. And, you know, they’re like, well, if I’m going to be paying for, you know, all of my visits, to do them privately, I might as well have insurance. So we don’t have health insurance here, but, you know, it’s. It’s becoming more and more common. So I assume if you were to go to the emergency room, you might. Yeah, you might show that or you might. Because usually when you go to the emergency room, if you’re like, okay, I’ll tell a little quick story. I had a friend who was living here, and she was actually not technically illegal because she was English and it was before Brexit, so she could live here, but she didn’t have residence. Like, she’d never gone through all the paperwork. She didn’t speak Italian very well, and she just kind of let it slide.
Katy
Yeah.
Tiffany
And she fell and broke her elbow. Cracked her elbow. I was with her at the time.
Katy
Ouch.
Tiffany
Yeah, yeah, it was pretty bad. She went into the emergency room and basically just said, I’m a tourist. And I remember. I remember I was with her and she’s like, yeah, I’m a tourist. I’m from England. I happen to speak Italian. But, yeah, yeah, but if she had been a. A legal resident, she would have had a health card. Even as a foreigner, but even if she was a resident, she would have had her health card. So if you go into the emergency room, it’s expected that you, you know, either you are a tourist and you’re. You actually are, and it happens, or you are some kind of. Either, you know, you’re a citizen or you’re some kind of foreigner with some kind of document to your name. I guess if you were to go into the emergency room, probably nothing would happen, but you couldn’t get any regular services.
Katy
Yeah, like routine care is off the.
Tiffany
Exactly.
Katy
That makes me want to ask Tiffany, in all those years that you were an illegal in Italy, what did you do? Did you just, like, forego any kind of medical care in general? Were you just kind of going with the sturdy? I’m in my 20s, early 30s. I was, I was.
Tiffany
I was very, very rarely sick. I can remember maybe two occasions, and one time I went to the Dermatologist to a private dermatologist and paid because I had. I had a skin issue. But I think one time I was really, really, really sick. But it was probably a bad stomach bug. But it was like one of those stomach bugs where you think you’re dying. Like, you really, really feel like you’re dying. And so I went to the emergency room.
Katy
Yeah, you’re like, I think I have cholera. And they’re like, well, don’t. You don’t.
Tiffany
It’s.
Katy
You’re gonna survive. It’s the flu.
Tiffany
Yeah, it was something like that. I. I really think that might be the only time.
Katy
Yeah. And now that you’re legal, you’re just doing all the regular things, mammograms every year.
Tiffany
Oh, yeah, well, that I do. I do all those women tests that we gotta do. Yeah, I do that. And then. But what I need to do, which I haven’t done in a couple years, is like, get my full, my full. All my blood and urine tests and take them to my main doctor and be like, check this out. Make sure I’m okay. I haven’t, I haven’t done that in a while. You can get a physical. Like, I haven’t had like a basic physical.
Katy
So do you have any idea, like, for this digital nomad visa, is it like completely open ended? Because it has. That must have insurance for the entire duration of.
Tiffany
Well, no, it’s one year, renewable.
Katy
One year. So, yeah. Okay, so one year, you have to leave or you have to apply again? Basically, yes.
Tiffany
Yes. And here’s the hard part. The hard part is that you have to prove you have a place to live. And that is kind of the catch 22. Because it’s very difficult to rent an apartment, as you, you and Derek probably remember. I mean, it’s difficult to rent an apartment full stop, but it’s very difficult when you don’t have legal. First of all, it’s very difficult if you’re not in the country. And secondly, it’s very difficult if you don’t have paperwork yet. So you’d have to potentially go to Italy as a tourist, find a place to live. But convince the people that, you know, you can. I mean, how would you. I don’t even know how you would do it because you’d have to. Who knows how long the application process takes? Yeah, I know Italy. I know Italian bureaucracy. They don’t do stuff fast. No. So I’m. I mean, minimum. I’m talking a minimum of like three months. Minimum. I mean, I know. I remember having my interns complain. And every single intern, they said, Every single one said the same thing. You know, they came to Italy on a student visa, which, you know, you get from the consulate in your home country. Before you go, you get your student visa. And then once you get to Italy, you have seven or eight days to take it to the. To the police station or the immigration center and file all your paperwork. And then they eventually give you your permesso di sojourno, which is how you prove you’re legally there. A visa isn’t enough. You’ve got to get the perimessa di so giorno. And so many of them said, you know, I’ve been here since September, now it’s May, and I finally got it.
Katy
Two weeks. Yes, I remember that nightmare I went through that for with Derek. Cause he had to do that whole thing. And it was literally that experience where you think you have everything in order, and you go to the post office to file some of it first before you go out to the place on the outskirts of Rome.
Tiffany
This is hell.
Katy
And that. And they did that thing that, you know, you had. Joking, warned me about, which was, well, you don’t have this particular stamp. And you’re like, what? What are you talking about? We have everything. No, no, you’re missing this one stamp. And then we spent an entire day going to some neighborhood I’ve never seen again since I’ve been to Rome all these times. Like, I have no idea where we were to get this one stamp from these one people and take it all the way back to the post office and then wait for the long process to go pick it up in person. So, yes, it is. It’s almost easier to be illegal in Italy than it is to be legal. But they do that themselves. Like, even it’s true. It’s just because it’s so many stamps and so many different people having to sign off on different things, not to mention the people here in the States. That guy, remember the Italian man that we went to meet with to get this whole process rolling before we moved? And he was in no hurry either.
Tiffany
So you’re going to have to convince a landlord to be like, okay, I need a signed contract for this place, but I can’t move there until my application is approved, which might be in six months. They’re going to be like, no way. I have to rent this place. This place is empty now. I need to rent. I’m not going to hold it for you for six months. So unless you have the money to pay it for all that, I Think it’s. I think it’s probably a bigger investment than it sounds like. I think once you actually try to do it, you’re going to have to probably pay for a place. But I can’t imagine any Italian landlord letting you rent a place unless they lie and, like, give you a kind of a fake contract, which. How were you going to even know people who would do that for you?
Katy
What if it was like. I mean, kind of like when we moved there, we had a place where we could land for a month. Do you think that would be enough? Like, as long as you’re going to somewhere, you’re not going to move into the street.
Tiffany
How early did you set that up?
Katy
I don’t know.
Tiffany
How far in advance?
Katy
I don’t remember.
Tiffany
I mean, it must have been relatively recently before moving, I would assume. I mean, I guess maybe on Airbnb, you could book a place, like, six months out and be like, okay, I’m going to be here for the month of April, 20, 25 or something, maybe.
Katy
So how much would a listener have to bribe you to say that they were living in your apartment?
Tiffany
There is not, almost. Not any amount of money that I would do that for because it is such a headache. I mean, it is such. You can’t even imagine the headache that it would be. I would have to hire a lawyer to drop a contract. I would have to figure out how. I would have to definitely go to, like, the. The city, you know, my municipal area, and register that I had somebody there. Actually, I would. I would definitely have to register the person with their passport photo and say that they’re there. I’d have to inform the trash company, and I’d have to tell them that we have another person living in our house. And so our trash bill would be more. I would have to inform… I mean, technically, when someone moves into your place, they’re supposed to apply for residency. I mean, this is if I’m doing everything up and up, if I’m doing everything correctly, right? And then, of course, I would have to pay taxes on it, on the money.
Katy
So how much would somebody have to bribe you to not do it on the up and up?
Tiffany
Yeah, see, but that creates a problem because if you’re creating a paper trail for yourself, you’re putting a contract out there and putting it in the hands of the Italian government. No, no, no. I wouldn’t do it for any amount of money because I could get arrested for that.
Katy
At least 10 years from now. You might get arrested joking about the snail’s pace of the bureaucracy.
Tiffany
The bureaucracy is slow, but they, you know, they do. Yeah. They can enforce laws.
Katy
They…
Tiffany
The bureaucracy and the police are not exactly the same people.
Katy
True.
Tiffany
They’re finance. They have a financial crimes unit. Like, they have an entire police force that is just financial crimes. Yeah, that is. That. That could only be possible in a country where tax evasion is, like, the public sport.
Katy
Yeah. Okay, so given all that, how good of news is this, in your opinion?
Tiffany
I don’t know. I mean, I think it’s good news for a lot of people who are dreaming of moving to Italy and don’t have Italian roots. You know, relatives in their background, don’t have someone they can marry, don’t have university. They’re going to… it’s hard to move to Italy, you know, it’s hard to come up with a way to do it legally. And so this is a great opportunity for people who really want to. But on the other hand, I’m like, Italy is already… I mean, and I say this as an expat…
Katy
Right.
Tiffany
Okay. I’m a citizen now, so I’m kind of exempt.
Katy
Yeah.
Tiffany
But I, you know, I came as an expat. I came as a foreigner and…
Katy
An illegal immigrant.
Tiffany
Okay, why do you constantly mention that, Katy?
Katy
Well, because I think it’s an interesting part of your story, and it’s something that I think people always have a… like, when you talk about illegal immigration, you know, you don’t necessarily think about, you know, electively moving to countries. We always frame it as, like, these people must move from their country because of a war, because of famine, and there are a lot of people who are doing it for dreams, for fun, you know, for aspirations. So it’s just an interesting layer, I suppose, that I like to highlight.
Tiffany
Let’s say undocumented, Katy, okay?
Katy
Undocumented. Fair. True. Better words. Use better words. Yeah. Okay.
Tiffany
So I was saying. I’m saying this as an expat, but, you know, the truth is there are a lot of foreigners in Italy right now. Like, it’s. The country is overrun. It’s at its breaking point. And I mean, I know that there are so many, so many tourists, and the number of tourists in the city are going to dwarf, absolutely dwarf, the number of these digital nomads, you know, probably a thousand to one, if not more. So, I mean, it’s not going to probably make a difference, but, you know, the center of Rome has become one giant Airbnb, and so few Romans, especially, you know, regular non-filthy-rich Romans, live in the center of Rome. It used to be there were a lot of older people, you know, who had these apartments back when they were not that expensive, especially in the close suburbs. I say suburbs, it’s not quite the right word. The close… the neighborhoods right outside of center like Monteverde, Monte Mario, you know, Testaccio. These neighborhoods were once working-class neighborhoods and the apartments there were very reasonable and so ordinary Roman families were living there. And now they’ve become very expensive areas to live. And so you used to see like, okay, yeah, there’s, there’s the, the foreigners and there’s the Airbnbs, but there’s also a lot of these, you know, older families. But now it’s just slowly I, you can just see that sort of the demographic change. You know, I don’t know what the number of Airbnbs is, but it’s ridiculous. Like it, it’s just everywhere. Everywhere. And you know, Venice had to put a day trip tax on, you know, we, that Rome has. Most Italian cities have a tourist tax for, you know, for the nights that you spend in the city to offset whatever, the trash collection of all the tourists and etc., etc. But now for Venice, because Venice is a major stop for cruise ships, they finally have installed—I think it’s a great thing—it’s a day trip tax to Venice. If you come into Venice by train, by ship, whatever, you have to pay a certain amount of tax and it’s not in addition to a hotel overnight tax, it’s either or. So if you’re paying a hotel, you don’t have to pay the day tripper tax. But yeah, I mean the city has been kind of devastated by the cruise ship industry because these cruise ships come in not even considering the pollution that they cause. And the water, the way the water is raised by these giant ships coming in because they displace so much water. And that’s a major problem for Venice. But the people who are coming ashore don’t really spend very much money.
Katy
Yeah.
Tiffany
You know, because they’re, they’re eating on the ship. They’re going through a tour guide company that’s through the ship. Maybe they’re buying some trinkets at the souvenir shop. That’s about it. So Venice has really been, you know, overrun by tourists who aren’t supporting the economy in any way.
Katy
Couldn’t they decide to not allow cruise ships to dock near them.
Tiffany
That’s what people, they’ve been working towards. And I, I think, I’m not going to say either way because I can’t remember and I don’t want to say something that’s not correct. But I know that that was something that a lot of people were pushing for for many years, and I, I feel like they succeeded. So maybe they’re having to dock at like a nearby… whatever is nearby. You know, they’re going to find a way. You know, they’ll find a city that’s close enough and they’ll bus people up to Venice because it’s just too many people who are cruising the Mediterranean want to go to Venice. It’s, you know.
Katy
Right.
Tiffany
It’s a top site. But there are port fees. You know, when you’re a cruise ship, you do have to pay port fees, but again, that money will go to the government. Great. But it doesn’t go to the people. Right. It doesn’t go to the merchants.
Katy
So when you think about this digital nomad visa, I mean, there are two ways to think about it that it will, like, again, kind of continue this trend of flipping it Italy to, For more foreign people living there. But then there’s also the individual, like, maybe I could move there.
Tiffany
Yeah, exactly. Which. Well, that’s what I’m saying. I’m not going to say that it’s bad or good. I think it’s wonderful for people who do dream of moving to Italy. And Italy has had a problem in recent decades of, you know, the brain drain. You know, the intelligent and well educated Italians are jumping ship for, you know, places that are going to pay them properly or pay them at all.
Katy
Yeah.
Tiffany
And so they feel like, wow, we’re losing so many great professional people who could really be supporting our economy. So I think that’s one of the reasons that they’ve instituted this. They’re like, well, maybe we’ll get some people in, in, you know, the country, but who are gonna, who are gonna bring money in.
Yvette
Right.
Tiffany
Because the idea is like, okay, I’m living in Italy, but all the money that I make comes from outside of Italy.
Katy
Right.
Tiffany
So that’s just more money for Italy.
Katy
Right, right.
Tiffany
It’s going to be spent in Italy.
Katy
Do people have to pay taxes, do you think? If they’re a digital nomad?
Tiffany
I don’t think they have to pay taxes to Italy. Now that’s a really good question. Because as far as I know, Italy does not have it. Well, I know that Italy does not have a citizenship tax requirement, which America does. America is one of two countries in the world that taxes its citizens no matter where they live.
Katy
Right. I know. Lucky you.
Tiffany
Yeah. Well, you’re exempt if you make under a certain amount. You do have to report your income, though. So you do have to file your taxes, but you don’t have to pay unless you’re making over. I think it’s like 120,000 a year.
Katy
Oh, that’s good.
Tiffany
And you only have to pay on what you make over that.
Katy
Oh, that’s good. Yeah.
Tiffany
So, yeah, it’s not terrible. I mean, it’s terrible. If you make a ton of money, then you’re actually being double taxed. And I don’t really think that’s fair, personally, but that’s another story. The. What I was going to say is Italy does not have citizenship taxation, but it does, as far as I know, have resident taxation, which means. Which would, in theory, mean that if you are living in Italy and you’re a resident, like you’re an official resident there, which you would be if you were on this digital nomad visa. Whatever you make anywhere in the world, you owe taxes on it to Italy, since you’re living there and taking advantage of all of the public services that the country offers. You’re not taking advantage of the health care, though. So that’s a big chunk of it. Like a big chunk of taxes go to health care.
Katy
Yeah, that was what I was going to ask. Yeah. What else? Because I would think that most of it goes to health care.
Tiffany
Oh, here we go. This article is perfect. I’ve just got my question answered immediately. Applicants must be tax compliant in Italy before applying for the visa. Okay, again, what does that really mean? Most frequently, the Italian Taxation Office will need to speak to their equivalent in the country the applicant hails from.
Katy
Oh, good. So it’s one person in an office talking to another person in an office about you and your tax bracket and such. Yeah, that could take a while.
Tiffany
It would take long at all.
Katy
No.
Tiffany
Speak to an Italian tax expert before you apply so that you understand what tax you’ll need to pay and the associated paperwork. If tax violations occur, the office will immediately direct the contravention to the authority that originally issued the visa. The bottom line, based on the information that’s been made public so far, you’re going to have to meet a long list of requirements. No kidding.
Katy
So what does that mean? My brain just fell asleep while you were reading that.
Tiffany
Well, it’s not really clear. It says you have to be tax compliant, but what exactly does that mean, tax compliant?
Katy
What if this is just, like, a good news story that really is actually impossible to fulfill? They’re like, yeah, we’re granting the new Digital Nomads, but nobody will actually get in.
Tiffany
I think you might be right. They launched this on April 4th, so they started accepting applications on April 4th. So if I were an investigative journalist, I would be following this, and I would be interviewing people who had applied and following them to see if they actually get it. But I’m not an investigative journalist, so I’ll just have to Google it.
Katy
Maybe someday I’ll go for it. I can’t do it while the cats are still alive. I guess I could bring them.
Tiffany
Why not? You can totally bring them.
Katy
Yeah, you can totally bring them.
Tiffany
I have. I mean, look at our guest. She brought her cats. Come on.
Katy
That’s true. She’s talking about our guest Bree, who came to Rome with her two cats named Mark and Chainsaw. Well, that’s all very, very interesting. And I think over on the Patreon this week, perhaps we will talk about if a person should move to Italy, if they’ve never actually been there before. If they’re like, yeah, Digital Nomad, I’ve been over in Portugal, I’ve been in Spain. I’m going to just pop over to Italy and start living there now, assuming they can navigate this paperwork.
Tiffany
Or even people who maybe have been to Italy as a tourist and have been like, I fell in love with a place. Or maybe they lived in Italy as a student, you know, 20 years ago, and they just had a blissful experience and they’re like, I gotta move back there. I gotta. I gotta go back there.
Katy
Should you. Should you? Is the question.
Tiffany
Should you? And what should you think about before you go?
Katy
Right. So if you want to hear that discussion, become a supporting member of this show. I don’t know. What do you think of the term that I introduced last week, the Bittersweet lifer, as a name for our supporters? Does it sound too much like being in prison? I don’t know. Does it? Yeah. I don’t know. I tried it. I was like, bittersweet lifers. I kind of like it.
Tiffany
I got a better one. I got a better one.
Katy
Oh, you got a better one. Okay.
Tiffany
A bitter sweetie.
Katy
A bitter sweetie. That’s cute. Although it could be a bitter sweetie. It’s a good piece of candy, sort of.
Tiffany
What about a Bittersweetheart?
Katy
A bittersweetheart I don’t know. I’d like to hear some votes.
Tiffany
These can be different levels. The Bittersweetheart can be like the highest level.
Katy
That’s true. Bittersweetheart are the people who pay 50 dollars a month and get all the good perks.
Tiffany
Well, all the perks are good, Katy. They just, they just have the best ones. But there are the majority of the bonus content and things that we offer. The vast majority we offer to the lowest level, which is the five dollar a month level. Yes. What are some of the things that we offer?
Katy
Well, at least two bonus episodes every month. And of course there’s the whole back catalog of bonus episodes you’ve never heard before that you can ch. I am going to write you a handwritten thank you note and stick some fabulous little prizes in there because I really do feel like you don’t just take money from people, you thank them for it. Because that’s for me personally, Tiffany. How grateful I am that people will actually dig into their own pockets and help keep this show alive. What else is on there?
Tiffany
We’re going to bring back our live meetups, which is something that we’ve done in the past, but we haven’t been doing probably in the past year, but we want to start doing that more regularly now, at least once a quarter. Have a live zoom call with all of our Patreon supporters and talk to you face to face. So to speak, screen to screen, answer your questions, hear your comments and just have a good old chat.
Katy
Yeah. Maybe even do a live episode together.
Tiffany
That could be always.
Katy
That’s always fun. Yeah. And much, much more. Visit patreon.com/thebittersweetlifepodcast to support this show. We are aiming for a go of trying to get over that ever elusive $1,000 a month mark which would really help stabilize the footing that this show is on. And if we get there, we are going to let you hear the super secret EX-Files Podcast pilot, the Ex-Files, which we cannot air on the main show but is so worth listening to.
Tiffany
To just for people who maybe have joined us recently. What is the Ex-Files Podcast?
Katy
So the EX-Files Podcast—Ex, as in your ex—is a show that I produced based on a contest that I won. I basically went live on stage in front of an audience and a panel of judges and pitched this idea in this very nerve wracking Shark Tank type experience and won the contest and the support to create this episode. And it is basically two people who were once in a relationship together and aren’t anymore, discuss what they think went right and wrong from their own points of view. And then you edit their accounts together so that you can see where their memories line up and where they do not. And the pilot episode, the couple that agreed to do the pilot episode, they are so raw and so honest. And it is fascinating, Tiffany, to hear some really basic things that they do not remember, the same things that you would think would be fundamental to their understanding of the relationship. So absolutely worth listening to.
Tiffany
It’s such a great concept.
Katy
Yeah. And maybe one day it will be made. And that’s the reason why it can’t be aired on the main show, because someday it might be owned by somebody else. But for now, those of you over on the Patreon, if we can cross that $1,000 threshold and actually hold there steady for a couple months, we’re gonna release that show to everybody who is over there. So it’s worth listening to. And maybe I’ll end this episode by playing you the trailer that I played live in front of that audience so you get a taste of the couple that you would meet. If you join us over on Patreon. So patreon.com/thebittersweetlifepodcast. There is a link in the show notes, Patreon is spelled P A T R E O N. And if any of you have trouble finding it and you really want to become a donor, just send us an email and we will walk you through it. Bittersweetlifepodcastmail.com and I guess we’ll leave it there. Don’t forget to join us for the discussion about can you move to Italy and should you, if you’ve only visited as a tourist over on the Patreon. And we will talk to you there. And we’ll talk to you next week. And until next time, this is The Bittersweet Life. I’m Katy Sewall.
Tiffany
I’m Tiffany Parks.
Katy
And as promised, here’s the preview of the EX-Files podcast. Yvette and Warren were once married and they had two sons. Here’s the trailer that helped me win the contest. Beginning with Yvette
Yvette
You don’t have a child out of wedlock. You have a child when you’re married. Like, that’s what married people do. That’s what marriage is for, right? And I was like, yes, that’s what marriage is for. You have babies. And I always wanted to be a mom.
Warren
I thought it was a good match. She wanted to be married more than I did because that was the vibe I was getting and I was having Second thoughts.
Yvette
He was always up for it. He was always like, yes, yes, yes. He always showed up, he was always on time. He always followed through. And I was like, okay, that’s baby making material.
Warren
No, no, no. Having kids was not a motivation. It was. It was. I think it was after we got married that I thought about it.
Yvette
He was the right height. He was handsome. He’s Chinese. And I was like, oh, my God, our kids are gonna be freaking amazing looking. Like, what are they gonna look like? So we ended up having curly hair, half Chinese, quarter white, quarter black kids. Like, that was the goal. I was like, let’s mix it up. Let’s go. So I got pregnant right away.
Warren
Our first kid, Karada was born nine months after our honeymoon.
Yvette
He was 2 pounds when he was born, and he was only 11 inches long. Can you imagine? He was shorter than a ruler.
Warren
He was so tiny. It was an emergency C section. I was with her, and then the oxygen levels came down and her heartbeat went up. The doctors ran into the room and said, sir, you gotta leave. I was scared. A big chance that both Yvette and Karada were going to not make it.
Yvette
And literally, like, they were delivering him via cesarean section. And there was something weird and biological that occurred where I was like, I need another baby while they’re pulling the baby out. And he looked at me and was like, can we talk about this a little later? And I was like, no. That was like, not at all rational. It was just like, nope, I need another baby. Like, let’s do it. And I wanted to get pregnant right away. And he was like, no. So I had to wait for four years.
Warren
Well, with Corrado, he was such a good baby, easy. I said, oh, we gotta have another one. I wanted a second child with Yvette more than she did with Corrado being born early. She was afraid.
Yvette
I think I really wanted another child. I can’t have just one. Like, I needed one more. And he was like, no, it’s not going to happen. So I snuck the second one in.
Warren
We weren’t planning on having a second child, but. But we did. I was really, really happy. Yvette, I think thinking back, she wasn’t as enthusiastic as I was that she was pregnant again.
Yvette
I stopped taking birth control and I didn’t tell him. I mean, that’s an awful thing, but yeah. And when I considered leaving him, I was like, you don’t get divorced. You see it through. You have kids, you don’t do that. The worst thing you can do to children is get divorced. You stay in it. So I did. I stayed in it until there was a knock at the door. And I opened the door and there was this gentleman who was like, are you Yvette Moy? And I was like, yes, I am. And he’s like, throw some papers at me. He’s like, you’ve been served.
Katy
Want to hear the whole episode? Become a sustaining supporter of The Bittersweet Life at patreon.com/bittersweetlifepodcast. You will find a link in the show notes. Thank you so much. Join us again. Bye.