Is it impossible?

I am an American living in Stockholm, Sweden. My Swedish boyfriend and I are looking to move to the UK. I have Swedish citizenship which makes me an EU citizen so I don't need to file papers and such. What I wonder is how hard is it to move there? I once moved here from CA to Sweden and although it was hard it was NOT impossible. It seems that no matter who I ask here they all act like moving to the UK will be an imposible challenge. I never believed this before but I am starting to. Is it this hard?  I mean the languages and such are the pretty much the same. Here in Sweden I've learned the language and culture. I figured that I've already done the "work" in moving here almost 6 years ago.

Does anyone have some advice in moving from other European countries, or maybe another country in general?

Hi Sabeine,

I am also with a Swede. We moved from Germany to Sweden to Austria to England. I found the move here to be very easy in comparison to the other moves. My partner has had a bit of a harder time especially in the workplace. He finds that the way Swedish businesses are run is very different to the way they are run here. The socialistic Swedish society is reflected in the work place and here things are much more hierarchal.
Of all of the places we lived, I felt that Sweden had the highest quality of life, though very expensive. Life for us is good here, but I do still hope to move back to Sweden one day.

Highest quality of life? How so?

I should have written that my parents are from Sweden (från Skellefteå) Wow if you only knew how much they disliked Sweden! They spoke mostly English during my childhood so my Swedish was rusty at best when I moved here. Now I speak it fluently and teach at a school here. 

I believe that if one works hard one will be rewarded. I haven't seen this at all in Sweden other than some small box of chocolates at Christmas, and everyone gets this regardless of their performance. I think that Sweden is not the place for people who really want to work hard and succeed. If you want to be "average/lagom" then Sweden is the place for you, if you actually have some ambitions for something better than just getting by then another country is better. It's no wonder that the Swedish motto is "Lagom är bäst" which translates to English as "being average is the best" In most other countries this would be viewed as loser-like but not in Sweden, it's celebrated here. Let's all be AVERAGE .

It makes me so sad, because in the times of my Grandfather Bengt, Sweden used to be great.

No, I completely understand what you are talking about. This is why we are talking about retiring in Sweden and not trying to live and work there now. We have had a bit of upheaval in our short lives and we longed for lagom, but at the same time we don't want to live it 24/7 right now. When we are much older it will be lagom for us, though.
For us it was the highest quality of life compared to the other places we lived, but again, at the time the quiet average way was what we needed.

The real advantage to being an EU citizen is one of the main tenets of the EU is free movement of labor.  This means that you, as an EU citizen, do NOT have to file paperwork ahead of time, do NOT have to pay fees to file the paperwork and YOU, as compared to an American, can breeze through that EU citizens line at the airport (well, depending on when you arrive and how many other planes have arrived) and you can even tell the guy at the passport control that you're there looking for work and they can't put you on a plane back to where you came from.  (Well, maybe they could, but it would be for more serious reasons, like your name ends with bin Ladan).

Having lived previously in the UK and having lived in Sweden now since 2000, I can say that the quality of life in Sweden is superb, truly it is, BUT from my perspective at least, that is only if you're older and have some financial security.  You can't beat the nature here and personally, I don't think you can beat the medical care and support network and when I get really old, if I have to be put in a home, I hope I will come back here.  But this is also a country where a large percentage of Swedes, never mind immigrants, have had problems finding work if they become unemployed and are over the age of 45.  My Swedish husband, 6 points away from his doctorate, highly qualified, multi-lingual, has been unemployed for 5 years now, and it boils down to he's "too old".  We're not ready to move yet (for financial and canine reasons, among others), but he gets probably 5-6 serious inquiries per month from employers in the UK, wanting to hear from him when he gets over there.  Based on my C.V., I too have had London employers wanting me to get my butt over there.  So financially, the future looks better for us in the UK, at least until retirement.