And for the first time, I felt completely alone.

I moved away to school at the beginning of September, and was more nervous than ever before. I considered backing out and staying home more times than I can tell you, but I kept my worries to myself because I was supposed to be ready for this. This was the next step in my life, I needed to grow a pair and just do it.

So that’s what I did.

I moved in and started school without shedding a tear. I got choked up when my parents left but I was determined not to cry. Adults don’t cry.

With week one over, people began to miss home. I watched as friends cried to me in the middle of the night and listened as they cried to their parents on the phone. I was surprised that I wasn’t crying along side them. But I knew it would happen.

Weeks, then months passed and I still hadn’t gotten homesick. I was starting to think that maybe I was actually an adult and that I really was ready for this.

I made it through most of my midterms and assignments without any break downs and I was quite proud of myself. I was learning to take care of myself, and I wasn’t doing a terrible job.

Then I experienced it. Homesickness.

This week was no different than other weeks, my stress level was manageable, I had been taking my medication, and everything was great.

But it wasn’t great. I saw nothing great about it. I was alone. 

The friends that I would ask over when I was feeling lonely were all busy and for the first time since I moved out I was all alone.

I use the term “homesick” because I don’t know what else to call it, but honestly I wasn’t missing home, I was having my first “depression attack” since I moved away.

When I would get these feelings at home, I always knew that there were people who loved and cared for me just down the hall. I didn’t have that reassurance here.

I was sad and alone and I felt defeated.

I’m using the passed tense right now in hopes that it is in the past, but if I’m being honest, I still have those feelings.

Experiencing panic attacks by yourself is scary, even as an “adult”.

Going through this week from hell has taught me that homesickness isn’t missing a specific place, it’s missing the people. It’s missing the family dinners spent watching a funny movie. It’s missing the unconditional love that can be found one door over in the arms of your mom at any time of the night.

I saw my mom today, which helped, and she knew something was wrong so she offered to bring me home for the weekend. I wanted to say yes but if I go home right now I’ll never want to come back.

I need to work through this on my own because, as an “adult”, I’m not always going to have people around, and I need to know how to be alone every now and then.

It sucks. My head hurts and my chest is heavy. But I can sit here and tell you that even after a week of feeling so so alone and desperate, I’m okay. I’m not great, but I’m okay and I can keep going.

I don’t think I was wrong when I said I was ready for this step, this is just a little bump in the road, but the road keeps going and so will I.

So, if you take anything from this post, take away this. You’ll be okay.

*Side note: I know this is a mediocre post but I’m lacking inspiration right now! If someone has a good blog post to get me out of this slump I’d love to read it! xoxo