How do I convince my American wife to move to England?

Living somewhere though and going on vacation are two different things.

Everyone at my workplace tells me how they would love to live in Florida.    

Same with New York City.

She convinced me to come to America by saying we would go to England after two years. She was going to come to England before her boss said don't leave ask me to come here and I'll give him a job. Which never happened.

I kept my bargain I think she is obliged to move to England and be happy. We would do all the things we do here, eat the same stuff etc and she would also stay at home which is what she wants.

You've got to have this conversation with your wife.  Nobody here is going to be able to give you any concrete steps to take that will end up with her agreeing that you should move to the UK.

Oh no, my heart truly goes out to you.

There certainly is a lot to play up- good quality of life, all the vacation time,the NHS, the social services, the beautiful countryside, etc. Sending her here as well will help open her eyes- there is lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of good living to be had in the UK!!

But if she's got it in her mind to stay, she will... So...  open, honest communication for one thing... serious discussion about the kids, having your kids experience life in the UK, missing your previous life, etc...

It's so not as easy as they say though- "Well, just talk to her" -it's really, really, really hard.  So I guess I don't have much advice, but to just hopefully lend a good ear and hope you can indeed open up the communication channels...    

If you have difficulty talking to her, it may help you to write out all your feelings about moving back to the UK.  Though, I would leave out the "you owe me" bit. 

But, sit down, think about why you think it will be better, why you miss it so much, why it's important to you to give it a go.  Tell her all that.  It may not convince her to move, but it might open her up to it.  It might also open her up to tell you why she has her misgivings, and then they could be addressed.

When people are confronted with ultimatums, they're much less likely to do what you want them to.  But if you really express your feelings about it, you might have a better shot at getting what you want.

It also might help for you to do some research about where you might want to live, research about potential jobs, look up houses that you might be able to afford.  Having a more concrete idea of what it would be like could also help her.

But you also need to remain open to the idea that she just may not want to do it, and you need to think about what you'll do if that's the case.  In any event, you need to really get yourself geared up for a talk, somehow, and you also need to get your immigration status sorted! 

Most of what you mention has nothing to do with living in the US (the stolen purse, car crash etc).....I'm baffled as to why you didn't go for a green card and why she wouldn't encourage that.....so either you aren't working (and contributing to the household income) or you are working illegally.
I'm British, got married 3 years ago and we'd discussed the possibility of living in either country. We were both equally open to moving to the others country, in fact so much so that we often joked that whoever lost the discussion had to stay put!
We just weighed up all the pros and cons and decided it was best FOR US, and our circumstances that she move to the UK. I stress "for us" because that's what it was, not that we think every US/UK couple would be better off in the UK, but that it seemed the best move for us.
The plan was that once she can get citizenship we could then consider moving to the US if we wanted, it wasn't certain that we would, but I wasn't ruling it out and actually said I wouldn't mind doing that.
Now, 3 years on, she says shes settled and doesn't envisage moving back. Yes she misses certain things but overall thinks things are settled and it would be a big upheaval to move back. It's funny because I often overhear her saying this to friends and then she says "I may be doing him a disservice because maybe he really wants to move there!"
I'm just happy that there is no pressure for us to move......it's something for us to consider and maybe at some point we will.

Most of what you mention has nothing to do with living in the US (the stolen purse, car crash etc).....I'm baffled as to why you didn't go for a green card and why she wouldn't encourage that.....so either you aren't working (and contributing to the household income) or you are working illegally.
I'm British, got married 3 years ago and we'd discussed the possibility of living in either country. We were both equally open to moving to the others country, in fact so much so that we often joked that whoever lost the discussion had to stay put!
We just weighed up all the pros and cons and decided it was best FOR US, and our circumstances that she move to the UK. I stress "for us" because that's what it was, not that we think every US/UK couple would be better off in the UK, but that it seemed the best move for us.
The plan was that once she can get citizenship we could then consider moving to the US if we wanted, it wasn't certain that we would, but I wasn't ruling it out and actually said I wouldn't mind doing that.
Now, 3 years on, she says shes settled and doesn't envisage moving back. Yes she misses certain things but overall thinks things are settled and it would be a big upheaval to move back. It's funny because I often overhear her saying this to friends and then she says "I may be doing him a disservice because maybe he really wants to move there!"
I'm just happy that there is no pressure for us to move......it's something for us to consider and maybe at some point we will.

It baffles me why my wife isn't as concerned as me. Maybe she just wants to hide me and collect her few thousand tax return every March. Maybe she knows I can't leave the country without a green card (she likes to isolate me). Maybe she just doesn't want us to pay the green card costs. Yep she wouldn't mind me having a cash job but from my point of view, doing that would never get me a green card and if I said this cash job is going straight for the green card she would freak out and demand the money went towards bills.

The last couple of times I have brought up the green card she said my family should pay the costs and the last time (this year) she said we would get it in 3 years.

I'm sure if your wife somehow didn't get to live in England on a proper visa and get citizenship and had to go home and you said don't worry just get a job under the table for the rest of her life and not even be able to get back for a visit to US and she said no I'm going home, I'm sure you would follow her to the US.

I'm going to have a chat with my wife about the greencard tonight.

It baffles me why my wife isn't as concerned as me. Maybe she just wants to hide me and collect her few thousand tax return every March. Maybe she knows I can't leave the country without a green card (she likes to isolate me). Maybe she just doesn't want us to pay the green card costs. Yep she wouldn't mind me having a cash job but from my point of view, doing that would never get me a green card and if I said this cash job is going straight for the green card she would freak out and demand the money went towards bills.

The last couple of times I have brought up the green card she said my family should pay the costs and the last time (this year) she said we would get it in 3 years.

I'm sure if your wife somehow didn't get to live in England on a proper visa and get citizenship and had to go home, I'm sure you would follow her to the US.

Wow Joe ALL of what you just wrote has me seeing so many read flags! It sounds to me like your wife is head of the household? Why in the world would you not FIGHT for this green card? This is a MAJOR disservice to yourself and your children because now it sounds like you're stuck. If you left you can't come back for 10 years and that's a LONG time to not see your children (if that's how things played out) From what you have said it sounds like there a lot of problems at home that need to be sorted fas before it gets worse. You and your wife need a REAL sit down and I suggest you stand firmly on how you feel, but keep your children in mind. I personally would work a cash job, save the money (whether she agrees with that or not) and get your green card!!!

Wow Joe ALL of what you just wrote has me seeing so many read flags! It sounds to me like your wife is head of the household? Why in the world would you not FIGHT for this green card? This is a MAJOR disservice to yourself and your children because now it sounds like you're stuck. If you left you can't come back for 10 years and that's a LONG time to not see your children (if that's how things played out) From what you have said it sounds like there a lot of problems at home that need to be sorted fas before it gets worse. You and your wife need a REAL sit down and I suggest you stand firmly on how you feel, but keep your children in mind. I personally would work a cash job, save the money (whether she agrees with that or not) and get your green card!!!

My wife is definitely head of the household and if I have to audacity to complain I'm gonna get it. When I came here I noticed that my wife was a little odd, a friend said she most likely bipolar. I did some study and would say she is borderline (explains her sometimes violent mood swings) with some histrionic (drama queen) tendencies.

I'm going to talk to her tonight. She gets a few grand in tax return around March that would easily cover the green card costs and the bumper apple season as started here, lots of apples to pick and lots of apple boxes to make