The Version of Me That Only Exists in Danish

A few days after that exhausting shift, I was talking on the phone with my sister. We were speaking our native language, the language I grew up with, which still feels like home regardless of how long I’ve been away.

During our conversation, my sister laughed and said something that resonated with me: “You sound like yourself again.” I laughed too, but then I asked her what she meant.

She explained that when I speak Danish, my voice subtly changes; I’m slower, more careful, and slightly more formal. “It’s not bad,” she added, “just different.” It’s like I become a slightly altered version of myself. Those words lingered with me long after our conversation ended.

I Never Noticed I Had Two Voices

The strange thing is that I had never really thought about it.

I speak Danish every day. At work, with my children’s teachers, with neighbours, with almost everyone outside my home. I’ve spoken it for years. It feels like my language.

But my sister noticed something I hadn’t noticed. There is a version of me that speaks Danish, and another that speaks my mother tongue.

They are both me, but they aren’t the same.

In my mother tongue, I interrupt people when I’m excited. I don’t think about it. That’s normal where I’m from.

In Danish, I wait for my turn. Sometimes I wait a bit too long. I’ve learned that interrupting can seem rude, so I’ve developed the habit of holding back.

However, holding back also has drawbacks. It can mean missing opportunities to share my insights and engage more actively in the dialogue, leaving me feeling sidelined at times.

Balancing politeness with assertiveness is a skill I’m continually working on as I navigate these conversations.

The same thing happens with humour. In my mother tongue, my jokes come naturally. I know the timing. I know when to pause and when to keep going.

In Danish, I sometimes hesitate. Will this joke land the way I mean it to? Will they understand the humour? Will it sound funny, or just strange?

None of this means I’m pretending when I speak Danish. I’m not. What I say is real in both languages, but the way I say it changes. Once I noticed that, I started wondering what that difference means.

Maybe Fluency Isn’t Just About Words

After reflecting on feeling mentally drained at work and recalling a phone chat with my sister, a question suddenly emerged that I found surprisingly difficult to answer.

Do I think in Danish or in my native language? Honestly? It varies.

At work, I now think in Danish almost instinctively.

Medical terminology, patient interactions, quick decisions—all happen in Danish, with minimal translation.

But when I’m frustrated, tired, or scared, something changes. My mind shifts back to my native language almost instantly.

I later discovered that researchers have also explored how emotion can affect the languages bilingual people use.

It’s as if, when I lack the energy to carefully choose my words, I automatically revert to the language that’s always been there.

That made me think. Maybe fluency isn’t just about vocabulary and grammar.

Perhaps it’s also about familiarity, about where your mind naturally goes when you’re too exhausted to be precise.

For me, that place remains my native language.

Many years later, that hasn’t changed, and I don’t interpret this as my Danish being inadequate. It probably reflects something much simpler.

My native language existed before I even realised I was learning a language at all.

My Children Are Doing It Differently

Watching my children grow up between languages has made me think about this even more.

They switch between Danish and English so easily that I sometimes almost forget how unusual it is. I wonder why English. The story behind it is in the next piece, “How my children became my Danish teacher”.

They can be deep in a conversation with a friend in Danish, turn to me and finish the sentence in English without even pausing. They don’t pause to think which language to use. They just switch. Sometimes I feel a little envious of that.

But then I look at my children and realise they are building something I have too. Fluency in at least four languages.

They are growing up with multiple languages as part of who they are and may have their own questions about belonging one day.

Which language feels like home?

Which traditions feel like theirs?

Where do they belong when they are between cultures?

I don’t have neat answers to those questions.

I’m still figuring out some of them for myself.

I Used to Think I Had to Choose

For some time, I believed that becoming fluent in Danish meant becoming more Danish. I thought this was the essence of integration: learning the language, adapting, understanding cultural nuances, and mastering social norms.

I envisioned that eventually, there would be a single, unified version of myself without hesitation, with no accent, and free of second-guessing. Just myself.

However, I’ve come to realise that this isn’t the case. I was trying to solve the wrong problem, and I don’t need to erase one version of myself to make space for another.

The Danish-speaking version, who carefully presents patients, thinks before speaking, and consciously follows social rules, is just as authentic as the woman who laughs loudly on the phone with her sister and interrupts out of excitement.

 Neither is a performance; both versions are me. I’ve simply learned different ways of being in different languages.

What I’m Sitting with Now

I don’t have a clear answer to all of this yet, and that’s okay.

What I do realize is that noticing these differences has made me kinder to myself. When I take longer to speak Danish, I no longer see it as a weakness. Perhaps it’s simply because I learned the language later in life. That doesn’t make it any less mine; it just makes it a different part of me.

 Interestingly, since that phone call with my sister, I’ve started to value the Danish version of myself more. She’s cautious, thoughtful with her words, and attentive to how things are said.

I used to think these qualities were just necessities for functioning in another language. Now, I see that some of them have become part of me, useful parts I wouldn’t want to lose.

Maybe that’s what I’m discovering: that fluency isn’t about becoming the same person in every language. It’s about accepting that different parts of yourself may emerge in different languages, and none of them is less authentic.

If you speak more than one language, do you notice a change in yourself depending on which language you’re using?

Does one language feel more like home? Or, like me, have you slowly realised that you don’t have to choose?

I’d genuinely love to know.