Being away from family can be immensely hard. There are so many little things we don’t realize will affect us. A sense of freedom drives us and distracts us for a while. But there comes a time when we adjust and before we know it we are feeling a sense of sadness maybe we weren’t sure would ever come around to haunt us.
Family is forever right? So how is it fair we feel like they aren’t there at all anymore? Yes, they aren’t right in front of us, but they’re not gone so why is the separation so debilitating? Didn’t we ask for some freedom?
Of course we wanted some freedom but family has a bond that goes beyond physical presence, so who knew it would be so hard?
Visiting helps, but it also makes things hurt that much more when we leave again.
So what can we do? Well, I won’t lie, the biggest obstacle is going to be learning to get used to it. There will be a lot of ups and downs and time is going to be a majorly influential factor. Nonetheless, there are still options for trying to lighten the emotional load.
FaceTime, Skype, WhatsApp, regular, old phone calls, and anything else you can think of are all at our disposal to have the most possible connection with loved ones that are being kept from us through something as simple as distance.
Setting a regular time to call with individual family members, and another time to group call can make all the difference. Calling individually can help you maintain your individual relationships with family and friends and group calling can bring back an old dynamic you might be missing. If you spend enough time with people, you all learn how to function around each other without even thinking. I’ve found that’s something that I miss the most. Having such a bond with a group of people, spending so much time together that you don’t need to think before acting anymore, is something I think most people take for granted and once they realize it is gone, things get rough. Recreating a group dynamic through a call isn’t the same as being there, but it helps ease the pain and shows the care for everyone in the group. It also might bring you more peace of mind just to reach out when you need to rather than on a schedule. That part all depends on you.
Make the letter something of your own. Doodle on the paper, write your thoughts, do whatever you want. Any tiny thing.
I remember for my birthday one year, a friend wrote me a letter and covered the envelope in little jokes we had made together. I still have that letter and find comfort in it all these years later. Taking the time to put something as important as a friendship onto paper can be beneficial for the writer and the reader. Write a letter to your mom, your dad, siblings. Write one to your hometown. Write one to your dog, if that makes you feel better. You don’t even have to send them. You could pull a Lara Jean and just keep them for yourself. Keep them and remember all the good things about home, family, and friends. Or send them, and share the love. Also a Lara Jean move, if that helps.
There is something to be said for more old-fashioned methods of keeping in touch. Maybe writing a letter isn’t your style right now, but who knows? Give it a whorl and maybe you’ll find more comfort in that than a bunch of emoji hearts.
My next suggestion might seem a little strange but trust me when I say, it has its perks.
Write up a Google document and share it with friends. Now, what you do with this doc is totally up to you but, of course, I have a few ideas to share.
But there is one condition to this: do NOT delete anything. This document shouldn’t be like Snapchat, where you write a message and then it’s gone before you know it. This document should be more like a testament to the dynamic of your friend group.
Say anything you want. Put photos in, start a conversation. Write a letter in the document. If there’s drama, you need to share, then write it all out on the document. Your friends can respond and discuss and give advice.
I know this sounds like atypical texting, just in a different format. But this is something I used to do with friends. We would make docs, use them and forget about them. Then, before we knew it, we would be looking back and remembering where we were when we last wrote on them, whether it was while sitting next to each other in class or flying away from one another on a plane.
When the time came for a successful reunion, we went through all our strange conversations and reminisced about the past.
You don’t have to share the document right away either. If you want to write messages to your friends (or family, if they’re tech savvy enough,) and then wait to send them that’s good too. I’ve known that to be a kind of therapy for a lot of my friends in the past, and hey, it might work for you too!
Maybe you’ve got it all under control and this article seems like a compilation of some strange, maybe even dumb ideas for keeping in touch. Nonetheless, my point stands: homesickness sucks so take the time to address it and give these little things a try. You might even like it. But don’t worry, you don’t have to admit it.