For me and my best friends in high school, we all had one thing in common. We all spent 5 days a week on the same field complaining about the fitness we had to do while waiting to stuff our faces with pasta after practice. We were soccer players and sure as hell proud of it. However, after 4 season together, a million pasta dinners, and over 4,500 minutes of playing under the lights, we all went our separate ways. No matter how sad it was, it was something we had been preparing for for months. Some of us would be in different states while some of us would just be two hours away, but something we had never prepared for was what life was like not being a competitive athlete any longer. There are at least five ways that coming to college made you realize how much of an impact high school sports had on you:

1. Everything is a competition

From racing the guy on the elliptical next to you or seeing who can finish their exam first in a 500 person lecture hall, everyday activities have turned into a competition. Not being able to compete every week athletically has forced you to find competition somewhere else.

2. The pain of welcome week

No, this isn’t what you’d expect to be thinking about during welcome week, however, there was no conditioning or game in high school that hurt my calves as much as that first week walking around campus. Is it wrong to take an ice bath from just walking around all day?

3. Lack of appetite

My best party trick was being able to eat as much food as the linebacker on the football team. Now I can barely stomach through an adult sized meal. A talent that was surely the worst one to lose. Partly due to the consistency of caf food, and partly due to the fact that my metabolism is equal to 45 year old man’s.

4. Intense FOMO

Whether I was playing that game or not, I was still there on the sidelines with my team. Now I see all the Snapchat stories, tweets, and Instagram posts from the girls younger than me stating how they “can’t wait to start the season with my favorite people”, only now I am not pictured. I’ve been replaced by some 14-year-old freshman.

5. Lack of girl friends

Unless you’ve joined a sorority in college, the amount of friends that you have that are girls has greatly depleted to maybe 3 girls. Boys are just easier to be friends with, plus you’d rather play a pick up volleyball game than go and get your nails done anyway.

But all good things must come to an end. Even though that chapter in your life has ended, there’s so much time for a greater one. High school sports are now simply a piece of home that lives on in your heart and keeps you connected to what use to be. As for me, I'll never forget the amazing years that I was gifted to play with the most amazing girls inside and out... and how much more in shape I was.