Entering my final year here at St Andrews, I find myself reflecting on what I’ve learnt each individual year. University has become not just a place we go to with the aim of getting a degree; it has become a routine, a social world, and a way of living. So when we suddenly leave it, even temporarily, it can feel like our brains have to adjust to a completely different set of rules.
These continuous changes of leaving and returning appear in many different directions: going home for the summer, returning back to university, graduating and entering the big girl world, and grappling between moving away from or staying home after the finality of graduation. It feels almost like a reverse culture shock, where what once felt like home, familiar, and normal can all of a sudden feel strange and different.
This weird transition was something that I really struggled with this summer. It felt like the small, seemingly insignificant, and mundane things, like cooking whatever and whenever you wanted to, all of a sudden felt like I was breaking some unspoken house rules. It was like the independence I had grown so used to over the last few months had disappeared overnight now that I was back home.
At university, I often will stroll into the kitchen and make myself a bite to eat whenever my stomach even begins to rumble. Although I wouldn’t exactly class my mum as an almond mum at all, being home and entering the kitchen past 9pm somehow always became a discussion of “what are you eating now?” or “isn’t it a bit late to be eating?” So despite home feeling like such a familiar and comforting place (something I feel so fortunate to be able to say), after spending months living independently at university, I can’t help but feel that sometimes coming home feels like stepping back in time to my teenage self.
I suppose that’s what I mean when I say university teaches you more than just your degree. It’s an experience that isn’t just about lectures, assignments and grades, but also a lesson in gaining your independence and what that can mean.
Which is why, after months of waking up when your timetable allows, grabbing coffee spontaneously with friends, cooking at whatever time you want, making last-minute plans to go out, and being surrounded by your friends all the time, can make moving back home feel a little like you’re living under a microscope where you find yourself constantly justifying or explaining things. Things that are so common at university, once home become questions such as:
“Where are you going?”
“What time will you be back?”
“Dinner is at seven. Are you going to be joining us?”
Or the dreaded…“Are you really going to stare at your phone all day?”
While I know this entourage of questions is really a blessing in disguise, and it’s lovely to know that someone cares so much about me, they can definitely still feel a little much after months without them, and a little like being forced back into your teenage years.
Being a neurodivergent person, I also began to realise how much this experience is impacted by autism and how valuable my own definitions of routine are for managing my disabilities. For many neurospicy people, routines are not just preferences of how we choose to live our lives, but anchors that keep us stable.
So while university can be full of constant change, stimulation, and overwhelming things, interestingly, it can sometimes feel easier in some ways than home. At university, you’re almost forced to build a routine yourself, something you can control. It is a place that, in many ways, compels you to implement systems that aid your executive functioning. Therefore, when you go home, and those systems don’t necessarily exist or aren’t even needed, it can feel a little like losing your independence and some of the progress you’ve worked so hard to make.
But there is also the social side, which can feel dramatically different. At university, your friends become a key part of your everyday environment. Simple tasks like making dinner or popping to the shops can become a game and a chance to hang out with your friends. So when that changes, a sudden loneliness arises. Especially when, for many of us, going home means returning to a place that lots of our childhood friends have left.
Despite the fact that I love my family to death and take a huge amount of joy in hanging out with my parents, there seem to be many conflicting feelings that accompany being home: You can love being home with your family and still miss university life. You can be grateful to have some calm and have your parents do the majority of the cooking and washing, but still feel unsettled and lost. These things aren’t contradictory. I think it’s just something I’ve learnt that is part of growing up.
That being said, returning to university can be hard too. People often assume that going back to university is exciting, but while you can absolutely feel excited, it’s also okay to be nervous or anxious. After all, this change is yet another thing your brain has to adjust to, and that’s not always easy.
Life is full of transitions, whether it’s going back and forth between university and home, starting internships, graduating, starting a job, or living alone. The loss of familiar routines and the forced need to constantly construct new ones can be hard.
But it’s a reminder, albeit a cringey one, that home isn’t always a physical place. Really, it’s the place where your heart is, a place that changes and grows with you. Feel free to pause and vomit at how cheesy that sentence was.
So while university can become home, our childhood house can become home again. Your first flat, your new city or even your new work friends can also start to feel like home too.
One of the key things I have learnt so far in my adventure into early adulthood is that home isn’t always somewhere that you return to. Instead, it’s sometimes a place that you have to rebuild.
And perhaps that’s why transitions feel so strange, because we are not just moving through life; we are simultaneously rebuilding as we go. Whether that means rebuilding our routines, relationships, or even ourselves, it’s okay to be nervous and feel overwhelmed. We just have to remember, especially as we enter this new academic year and perhaps feel overwhelmed and disoriented, that we are not really lost.
We are really just between homes.