Feeling homesick at university
by Ellen Ramsay, BSc (Hons) Occupational Therapy, Teesside University
University has been the best three years of my life so far but, at first, it didn’t feel like that way.
I was really excited about my new adventure – I was moving 200 miles north to begin my university course in occupational therapy. But the homesickness set in during Freshers’ Week. I found my new life very difficult – I had arrived with freshers’ flu (yes, it does exist!) and I cried all the time. I can remember saying to my family that, if I wasn’t feeling better within four weeks, I was coming home. But I stuck with it and it got better and, three years down the line, I graduated.
Feeling homesick is a normal part of starting university, especially when you’ve travelled a long way from home. Suddenly everything around you is different – a new place, people, accents, culture, language, course, combined with the pressure to get out there.
But if, like me,...