In my 23 years of living and 10 years of having cell phones, I've broken a ridiculous amount of them. I wish I could come up with a number, but honestly I have no idea. One time I drunkenly thought my phone being waterproof meant I could drop it at the bottom of a hot tub for 20 minutes with no repercussions. Another time, I was afraid someone was going to drop a cupcake into my beer, so I used my phone as a shield, but instead dropped my phone in the beer.

This time was the least stupid of the dozen or so drunken phone mistakes I made, mostly because I was sober, trying to push my friends car out of the snow, and it was only 11:30 a.m. So here I am, phoneless for the next week. Turns out, phones are pretty expensive and my dad, who is no stranger to my serial phone destruction, is sick of having to buy me new phones, so I find myself on my own.

While at first this didn't seem as bad as I imagined, I quickly realized I was wrong. Most of my generation is constantly on their phone, which requires you to not have access to your phone to realize. Numerous times in the last week, while watching TV with my roommates, I have looked around the room only to see everyone on their phones, barely paying attention to what was on television.

Our phones have become our communication with the outside world. They're how we make plans, order food, tell time, access the Internet, and they're our notepad. We now have an app for every necessity imaginable. This past week has been difficult and frustrating, and it's given me an unwanted insight into what life was like before the mobile age.

I quickly realized I needed to find a new way to contact people. Just like Yo Gotti, I had to get down in the DM. I messaged most of my friends using Twitter direct messaging, which is a difficult way to talk to anyone that you aren’t trying to make a side chick. People reluctantly responded and laughed at me for losing my phone, but now I have to check my computer like it's an answering machine.

I haven’t spoken to my mom this entire week. Instead, we spoke via email. This has actually made me more homesick than I have been in my last two years of college, which was an unexpected repercussion. I also talked to people using Facebook messages, which brought me back to younger days, and even more hatred for myself, reading old Facebook messages from high school. You quickly realize how lacking these other platforms of communication really are, and you start to dislike them and yourself for carelessly losing your phone.

After rediscovering ways to communicate with people, I realized how important my phone is. Countless ideas were written in my notes, my Social Security number (which, like everyone my age, I'm unable to memorize), countless pictures, and most importantly the app "Pocket Morty’s," which I was extremely close to beating.

During the Super Bowl, I had some fire Tweets about Beyonce and Cam Newton that I wanted to send off but had no way to do so. I felt like a tree falling in the forest when no one was around. Everything I had used to keep myself endlessly entertained was gone, and I was on my own to create my own amusement.

I quickly learned you need to trust everyone with whom you're making plans. One of the major conveniences a phone brings is the ability to check in with someone every step of the way. “Hey, on my way to the bar, where are you?” “Hey! Outside your door, let me in.” Without a phone, though, you have no way of knowing if you are going to be the first one to the bar or if your friend had to bail.

Things weren’t all that bad, though. After a couple days I barely noticed my lack of phone; other than when I would check my pocket for it every time I would leave my house. I realized that when I did things, I was much more focused on them, not on my Twitter feed.

I spoke and interacted with people a lot more instead of mindlessly spacing out on my phone. I read more this past week than I have since I started college, because I wasn’t reading pointless articles on my phone.

While it may not have been ideal to lose my phone, it wasn’t all bad, and certainly made for an interesting week.