I've heard it my whole life, and I'm sure that you have, too: college is so much better than high school.

In many ways, it's true. In college, you have all of the freedom in the world. You are not confined to one small building with people you don't necessarily have anything in common with. You aren't required to be at class by 7:30 in the morning and you aren't forced to stay there for 8 hours straight. But, at the same time, college didn't live up to the hype that everyone had made it out to be for so long. And I'll say it: I liked high school a lot more than I like college.

I know that I speak for myself and many others when I say that college has been glorified since the beginning of high school. Looking back, this may have just been an attempt by the counselors and teachers to get us to actually go to college in the first place, but it set up many unrealistic expectations of what college would hold.

When I first moved into college I expected to find my life long friends who shared many interests with me. I had heard that I would meet so many friends on my floor and we would all share our secrets with each other as we binge watched Netflix together all night. I thought that by after the first home football game I would physically begin to bleed my school colors and become obsessed with the team. I was under the impression that I would even enjoy going to class because I would be studying material that I find interesting. I had heard these things from adults for so long that I believed that they would be true, until they weren't.

Aside from my roommate, I didn't make any friends on my floor until the very end of my first year and I learned that making friends in general is quite possibly the most difficult thing in the world. I discovered that I absolutely hate going to sporting events and have accepted that I will never know the names of any of the players on any of the school's teams. And even though the classes are generally more enjoyable than they were in high school and middle school, it's still class and there is still homework so, let's be honest, that still sucks.

Don't tell me that it will "get better with time once I adjust"; I have completed three full semesters of college and refuse to believe that anything will change since it hasn't already. At this point, it is what it is. Maybe I've had an unusually bad college experience or maybe I had an exceptional time in high school, but I simply enjoyed high school more than college, and I don't see anything wrong with that. I am sick of being shamed by my peers who so passionately love college. I am happy for them, truly, but just like high school wasn't for them, college isn't for me. And that is okay.