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Welp… tomorrow will be my first full week as a freshman in college. But before I get to that, let me give some background on me. I am an 18 year old girl and I live in upstate New York. I am now a freshman in college and had to say goodbye to my wonderful group of friends, my great family, and the best dogs. I am living on campus and its only 25 minutes from my house so it shouldn't have been THAT big of a change right? Wrong. This last week, and what I can only assume will continue for the next month or so, has been the most life changing week of my life. When you are in high school, you picture college as a place where you meet a ton of people and find your life long "bffs", where you make memories 24/7, and are going out to parties, maybe trying alcohol or drugs or whatever other things teenagers do. You expect it to be the time of your life right away as soon as you get here. For some people that is the reality of it. And that's great if that's how it happens to work out for you. But in my case, that's the complete opposite of how it went. For the last 5 months or so, I was dreaming about moving into college. I was so excited and thought I was completely ready to get out of my house and be best friends with my roommates, and meet a ton of people and go out every night making memories. Nope. Not how it went. At all. Day 1: Move in day/Orientation- First day here was good. I loved my room and my roommates seemed super nice. We did lots of orientation activities and I had a pretty good time. I talked to some people throughout the day but no one really clicked with me. But oh well, its just the first day right? Tomorrow will be better. Day 2: Orientation- Now the second day it started to get a little worse. My roommates had other friends that they were much closer with on campus and they were already going out to do things with them. This left me kind of alone. I still hadn't met a ton of people but again it was only the second day so I assumed the next day would be better and I would meet more people. Day 3: Orientation Cont.- Now it was Monday and things still hadn't started to get better. By the afternoon I was in the counseling office. (Now some more background: I have always struggled with anxiety, more specifically social anxiety, and for me to be in such a social setting like college, was horrible for me to deal with. And let me say that I did not deal with it well.) So in the counseling office, I ended up hysterically crying and having a panic attack. So it was safe to say that I wasn't in a good place the rest of the day. I was miserable. Day 4: Orientation/ Classes Start- We had a big ceremony to welcome the freshman as official college students and I couldn't find a single person I knew so I signed my name on the plaque and snuck out of there and was the only freshman not at the event. I went back to my dorm and cried. Classes started that afternoon but mine got cancelled. I was a mess at this point. My anxiety was so bad that I felt like I couldn't breathe and that my heart was racing when it wasn't. All I wanted to do was cry and I couldn't do that with all of the people around. So I ended up calling my parents and went home. The moment I walked in the door, I burst into tears saying I didn't want to go back to school and that I wanted to stay home. My parents were doing everything they could to comfort me and tell me that it will be ok. I had another anxiety attack and stayed at home until about 9pm when I had to back to school. Now by the 5th day, classes had started and from here it got better. I started to meet people and it gave me lots of school work to focus on instead of the huge social aspect and it made me realize something. That is, that Im here to get an education. Yes the social part is important, but Im paying for my future and that will always come first. So basically, I wanted to write this for several reasons. One, to just get my feelings out and write about them. Two, because someone else out there might be feeling the same social anxiety that I have been about college and I want to let them know that they are not alone. and Three, to say that it will get better. I know it's only been a week, and Im still struggling socially a little bit, but it's already gotten better in the last three days since classes have started. So everyone, wish me luck and I wish you luck too if youre starting college or high school or whatever youre going through. Alright bye!
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Goodluck friend! I was there too. Keep sharp, score on each paper, work hard, play hard!
ReplyCollege is easy if you make it easy.
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