It’s the beginning of September, and you’re excited to see what college has in store for you. Everyone tells you that it’s some of the best years of your life, so who wouldn’t be excited? You unload the car with your parents, lug all your necessities up to your hot, sticky dorm room, and take it all in. “This is it”, you think to yourself. You say goodbye to your parents, shed a few tears, but the excitement floods through you as you think of the experiences to come. You meet your roommates, floor mates, and hall mates.
With classes beginning and orientation activities, you have no time to think. When the weekend comes around you’re so excited to go out with your new friends and make your first college memories. With the weekend comes down time, and you’re left with taking some time to think. You’ve been away from home for about a week now. The familiar smell of your mom making coffee on the weekend mornings has quickly been replaced with the various smells of sweat, air fresheners, and ramen noodles. You start to miss your home friends, home-cooked meals, and your dog. You’re already getting tired of the dining hall food and you feel lonely living in a building full of strangers.
I’m here to tell you that it’s okay to be homesick. It’s okay to want your home bed, to wake up in the morning and be able to walk down stairs and fix yourself breakfast, to want to drive to your favorite coffee shop and be with the friends who you’ve grown up with. Going home on the weekends is okay to do every once in a while. The first month of college was the hardest month of my life; I was lost. I had never been away from home before, and I was thrown into a place with 3,000 complete strangers. I constantly missed my friends from home and my mom. I had no idea why people liked college so much, I was miserable. I was surrounded by great people and living at a great school, but I couldn’t help but feel sad all the time. My roommates watched me cry as I called my mom and went home the first weekend. I considered for a split second transferring, but everyone says the first month is the hardest.
I’m here to tell you that it gets better. I joined clubs, branched out, and started making connections. September was the longest month of my life, but October came around and I began to enjoy school more. November sped by and in the blink of an eye it was time for winter break. I went home, enjoyed the time spent with my friends, and found myself itching to return to school. I could not imagine myself anywhere else, I consider school my home and I don’t even want to think about leaving for summer vacation in a few short weeks. I have met some of the most wonderful people at this school, had some of the greatest opportunities, and have had experiences that made a tremendous impact on my life.
So to the homesick freshman, it gets better. You begin to feel a sense of belonging and familiarity. Your school becomes your home, and it is a place you will never want to leave, hang in there.
