I recently made a huge life change. I moved out of my two-bedroom apartment into a dorm on my sorority floor. This was sudden, out of the blue, but necessary for my mental well being.

As my roommates and I fell into fall semester (terrible pun, I'm so sorry), I noticed that I was slowly becoming a different person. I felt myself longing to be home with my family and friends in a comfortable environment. My usual cheery attitude was replaced by someone who only thought about what could go wrong in a situation and what the worst possible outcome could be. I was negative, I was homesick, and I was unhappy. And I think a lot of it stemmed from the environment that I was in.

My apartment was far away from my sorority friends and, in my mind, the rest of civilization. This fact added to the separation I felt—along with the fact that I didn't fit in with my roommates, and this was something that made me feel more homesick. I felt like there was something wrong with me because I wasn't like the people I lived with, and that's not to say that there was anything wrong with me or them. But everyone has a different living style, and mine didn't fit in with all of my roommates. I became the odd man out.

It can take a toll on you mentally when you don't feel at home in your living space—and this can lead to you being really homesick. Like me.

Last week, I was having such a rough time that I was battling the idea of transferring to a school near my house back home and commuting. It seemed like the only possible solution to get me out of the funk that I was in.

Then I began toying with the idea of not transferring completely out of Happy Valley, but simply removing myself from a setting that wasn't making me happy instead. I went home for the weekend to regroup and spoke with Emergency Advocacy Services who helped move me back on campus. Within a few hours, I had a new place to call home. My sorority was able to find me a dorm to live in right near all of them, and they have been a constant help throughout this entire process. Addressing how I felt with my roommates was also very therapeutic for me, as they had noticed the change in me as well and wanted nothing more than for me to be happy.

So yes. I moved back into a small dorm room on campus, which seems to be contradicting what everyone else my age seems to be doing. It was shocking to me how much this improved my overall happiness and that's how I knew that this was the right thing to do for me.