Evryone feels a little anxious, down, or confused at one point or another while away at college. It’s a change of scenery, full of new people, and definitely more challenging in the homework department compared to high school.
Trying to keep up with homework, a decent social life, eating, and even sleeping, can feel like a humongous storm cloud looming over you, about to burst at any second if one more thing to remember or do touches it.
And sometimes it does burst. It doesn’t for everyone, but it may burst for you, letting all the little things you were trying to keep up with wash over you in a torrential downpour. That’s what it did to me.
Yet I tried to pretend that everything was fine, that I had everything under control. I told myself and others that if I could study for one more hour, or that if I could sleep for fifteen more minutes, that I would have all my ducks in a row and be fine.
But that wasn’t the case. Everything accumulated into that big rainstorm until one day it burst, and I couldn’t see two feet in front of me because of the heavy rain.
If you or anyone you know feels like this, or even if you’re still in denial about feeling this way like I was, please, please, listen to yourself and observe your own actions. Those random freakouts at your friends? You’re taking your stress out on them. Those ten-minute blank stares you get while doing homework? You are literally finding any way to procrastinate so you don’t have to focus on the one thing that’s going to make you lose it.
Listen to yourself. Take a break. Go talk to someone; whether that be a friend, a family member, tell a therapist, go talk to someone. You cannot always get through everything by yourself. And if there’s one thing I learned in college is that there will never be that “break” you keep telling yourself you’re going to get; homework, socialize, eat, sleep, repeat. Every week. So, do yourself a favor, and focus on keeping you happy and sane or else you’ll forever be stuck under that rainstorm, and let me tell you, it’s not very fun being here.
