We all know the relief/pure joy of walking out of that last final and jumping for joy... HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS! But with going home comes all of the struggles of actually being home. We forget about all of those until we make it out of our college towns. Here are eight of the most common struggles that all college kids face...
1. You've had to adjust to living under your parents' roof (and rules) again.
After spending several months living on our own at college, winter break forces us back to our high school days of doing chores and having to ask our parents if we can hang out with friends, buy things, use the car, etc. At the same time, we are adjusting to living with family again and having patience with them. It's a constant struggle of knowing we've survived on our own for months, but also having to follow the rules of our parents all break long.
2. You've gained weight over break because you're actually eating real food.
Gaining the "freshman 15" in college has nothing on the weight we gain while we are home with Mom's cooking again. Getting away from dining hall food and snacks in the dorm room seemed like a blessing at first, but after stepping on the scale after break is over we might regret all of Mom's free snacks and good cooking.
3. You've finished multiple series on Netflix.
With more than a month away from school, who wouldn't take the opportunity to watch the series we've had on our list for months? We get hooked. We binge watch. We later may question the hours we spent laying in our beds watching them, but we're not really that sorry.
4. Your sleep schedule is completely off.
Because we're binge-watching and we actually have time to do things that would normally be "a waste of time", we end up staying up super late and then we sleep until noon. We say that we will go to bed early the next night, but then it's 3:30 a.m. and we're back where you started.
5. You miss having "things to do".
Even though we have things like Netflix to take up our time on break, we start to miss having "things to do". By the time break starts to wrap up, we find ourselves looking forward to getting lunch, studying at coffee shops, going to chapter, working out, and even going to class once we go back to school.
6. You've seen more doctors than friends.
The first things we were told when we walked through the door when we got home for break were what we needed to accomplish over break and, of course, when our doctors' appointments were. You better believe we'll have gotten our physical and seen our eye doctor, dermatologist, and dentist before the first few days of winter break are over.
7. After hanging out with high school friends again, you cannot help but feel that something is different.
We catch up. We retell and relive stories. We even hang out at the same places and do the things as we did in high school. But it's different somehow… All of a sudden, we realize that we're not the same people as we were even a couple months ago. It's incredibly bittersweet because we are all learning and growing, but at the same time, we start to miss the kids that sat at Dairy Queen forever talking. It's sad because we're still there, but just grown up a bit.
8. You want to go back to college more than anything.
We start missing getting up and going to classes that are moving us towards our future. We notice we are missing late-night conversations and cookie bakes with our roommates. We miss the freedom of living on our own. We realize we miss the sense of community in the dorms. Most of all, we miss our college friends- our new "family." If you're like me, you realize "home" may not be where you grew up or may not even be a place, but "home" becomes the people who you love most and who you can be yourself with.
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