The Bubble From the Outside In
By: Chiara Bruzzi
Hi observers, some of you may be wondering where I’ve been this past year. Some of you may think that this was just another meaningless high school project. Some of you may have forgotten about this blog altogether. You may all be thinking different things, but in this comeback post I’ll tell you what I’ve been thinking and feeling.
In August of last year, I started college.
Looking back at my freshman year, there was so much going that I don’t even know where to begin. The best way to describe my year is as one long emotional rollercoaster.
I’ll start by explaining the environment of my situation. College is like a bubble. Once you enter it, there is this invisible separation between the inside and the outside. Everything happening within this bubble, such as parties, long study nights, hard exams, new friends, characterize your entire perspective of life. As if there isn’t a whole world outside of it. I didn’t understand this at first, and soon I became trapped in the bubble. Unaware that everything going on inside (positive and negative) was simply a moment in time rather than a completely new life.
I started off the academic year very poorly. I basically failed my first chemistry midterm, and while I passed the other exams, my grades didn’t significantly get better. No matter how hard I studied, I just couldn’t do well enough. Call it test anxiety or exhaustion from balancing sailing, engineering, and a social life; but, at the end of the day, I was struggling. It was a cycle of negativity and stress. One that made me act different, as if I wasn’t myself anymore.
That’s the thing about being a freshman in college. Everything is new. There are so many opportunities, you can be whoever you want. You are no longer tied to high school labels, stereotypes, or activities you were involved in. You can introduce yourself to people as a completely different person than the one you were before, and no one would notice.
I found myself obsessing over things that I usually don’t even care about. My behavior was normalized because I was surrounded by so many people that were going through the same thing. I started thinking it was normal to have panic attacks in the library or sleep 4 hours a night. I realize now that, in college, people often feed into each other’s suffering. Everyone perpetuates the high intensity and unbalanced lifestyle. Parties become more important than sleep, full days at the library become more important than lunch breaks, and, for athletes, going hard at lift becomes more important than a knee injury.
As students, we’re constantly pushing our limits, but when does that end?
The answer for many people is never, and they fall into this lifestyle where they’re not really living at all. I understood that I was unwell from this lifestyle when I went home for winter break. I had to completely separate myself from the college world to understand that I had been prioritizing the wrong things for the last few months.
Instead of prioritizing my mental and physical health, I kept trying harder. This was in turn making me more tired and feeding into the negative mental state I was already in. I wasn’t doing well in classes because I was studying too much in the wrong way. It’s as if I was trying to climb a mountain while being chained to the floor: it’s just not going to happen. I took the 2 weeks of winter break to recover, mentally and physically. I returned to college feeling light again and ready to do things differently. Prior to leaving Miami on that January night, I said to myself, “This time you own college, not the other way around.” And that is exactly what I did. For the first couple of months, I was excelling in school, hanging out with people who made me feel safe, and prioritizing sleep and wellness. Yay me!
Until it all became too much all over again.
After all that work to change things around, I finished the semester feeling as if I had failed. A feeling I had never experienced before. I kept thinking that my grades were good but not good enough for the effort I was putting in, and for the amount of sacrifices I was making for sailing, I was just not at the level I wanted to be. To other people, I was doing great, but I couldn’t see that for myself. No matter how I looked at my situation, I was unhappy with the outcome.
I went home after the year was over, once again unwell. My parents could see it in my face, and I could feel it in my body. I spent the first week at home doing absolutely nothing, because doing anything just required too much energy. I was burnt out.
When people ask me how college is, my immediate response is good but overwhelming. That was definitely true of my freshman year. After this article it may seem like I was depressed for a year, but that’s not the truth. I was really happy sometimes, and really stressed other times. I wasn’t necessarily sad, I was just overwhelmed, in a constant state of alarm. It was not a bad year, but rather an unstable year. I wouldn’t change a thing about it because everything in life teaches you something. I just experienced what every freshman, regardless of the college they attend, experiences. I am glad I experienced this surrounded by people that I love and cherish, and in a city that I’ve grown to adore and appreciate. But, it is no lie that it was a difficult year. This is not a sad story, it’s just a real story. I am choosing to not highlight the many laughs and amazing experiences I had because I think that this is the best way to explain why I couldn’t write for a year. However, it does not mean that those moments didn’t exist. They did and I will cherish them forever. College really is a special place and I can’t wait for what is ahead of me. I am starting this year off excited and ready to take on new experiences. It’s all a matter of creation and evolution.
Good luck Kiki 🍀❤️