“I hate it here. I want to come home.” These nine words, uttered by a brand new college freshman, will break a parent’s heart. We watched our kids work hard, we supported them in their journey to college, we dropped off an excited teen only weeks ago and…now this. They are homesick.

Many of our kids have left everyone and everything they have ever known. Parents, siblings, pets and almost every friend in their young lives are miles away. They now live in a small, often cramped, room with complete strangers and are facing constraints due to Covid that make a difficult transition even more stressful.

Every support system they knew and everything normal in their lives is gone. They quite literally don’t know what to expect. Feeling homesick seems an entirely rational response, and surveys have shown that 66% of students report feeling lonely or homesick at times.

Maybe you don’t remember being homesick. Those who study memory tell us that the end of an experience colors our memory of it. The collage of our senior year is clearer in our minds than what we remember of those first weeks of freshman year.

Maybe we toughed it out better because calling our parents was so expensive. But maybe we were utterly miserable, homesick, and lonely and have just blotted out that unpleasant time. Either way, like so much about parenting, our kids need our empathy and our ear, and they need to figure it out themselves.

Lisa Damour, renowned psychologist and author, explains that in calling their parents, many freshmen are handing over their emotional trash and by doing so, are moving forward. In a 2015 New York Times article, Damour explained that when our kids were little, they literally handed us their trash, along with used gum and food they had chewed but chosen not to ingest. When they are older they offer up their emotional trash. They tell us all of their worst feelings and, in the telling, unburden themselves. Damour states, “I cannot say this often enough. Upsetting the parent is the actual solution. One of the things I do in caring for girls is when they come to me upset, I tell them to come back the next day and we will talk tomorrow. I have yet to have a student at the same level of crisis the following day.” While complaining or crying to us may turn us inside out, in so many cases just by lending our ear and our murmured support, we are helping our teens begin to solve the problem themselves, Damour advises.

Hopefully most college age students have been away for home for some length of time before they leave for college. One thing parents can do is remind them how they got through that experience. When college kids are making that freaked out call they can see no past and no future. One of the greatest things that a parent can offer is perspective. It is a way of being both empathetic and forward-looking at the same time.

For most freshmen, feeling homesick is a short stage and soon forgotten. At the time it is excruciating, and it can last weeks or even months before it lifts. But parents have a role to play here. Phyllis Goldberg, a psychologist and author of Whose Couch Is It Anyway?, suggests to parents that they listen to what your kids have to say about how they’re feeling before jumping in with solutions. Be available and supportive, letting them know it’s normal and helping them feel confident that they can work it through. Offer suggestions, one at a time, starting with what might be the easiest – text your best friend who understands.

Here are a few suggestions to make to an unhappy teen (if they are up for listening to advice):

Ideas for Homesick Freshmen

Get involved

Nothing makes us feel more alone than staring at four walls. There is no easier time to join activities, clubs, religious groups, and other organizations than the first few weeks of freshman year. Join anything remotely interesting. This is not high school; it is a chance to reinvent and explore. Missouri S&T has over 250 recognized student organizations!

Get familiar with your unfamiliar surroundings.

Leave the dorms. Wander the campus, go to any events that might be available, scope out the library. The fastest way to make a place feel like home is to get to know it well.

Don’t look at your high school friends’ social media posts and believe, for one minute, that you are getting the full story.

Most teens have moments or days of homesickness, yet few post it for the world to see. This is important for our kids to understand. Who would post a picture of themselves crying in their dorm room? Look at social media with the largest grains of salt.

Talk to people, even if it makes you uncomfortable.

There is a window of opportunity freshman year when it is not awkward to just strike up a conversation with a perfect stranger. Jump through that window, it never opens this wide again.

Find your happy place.

Suggest they do that thing that gives them comfort and makes them feel like they are back in their own skin again. For some it is running, others it might be listening to music or watching a movie. Find that place where it all seems right and urge them to visit there as needed.

Call home when you need to.

As parents, we are there for our teens. We will not solve their problems, but we will provide a sympathetic ear.  If, as a parent, you can remember feeling the same way during your freshman year, this is the moment to share that painful memory.

Reach out to others.

They can call or text their closest high school friends, supportive aunts or uncles, siblings (particularly if they are older and have been through homesickness), their RA, or even a high school teacher who can offer reassurance.

Our teens can brush us off but the more people who offer up the message of encouragement, the more likely they are to hear it.

Remind them that there was a time when their high school besties were also strangers.

There is no way they could feel as close to people they have known for days or weeks as they do with those they have known for 4 years, or even 13 or 18 years. But remind them that at some point, the people they are meeting right now may become their closest friends or even their spouse. Try to help them turn dread into excitement.

Sharon Greenthal, in verywellfamily, urges parents to stay put when they get the call. She explains, “Parents will feel the anguish their young adults are experiencing just by hearing their voice or seeing their face via Skype or FaceTime. It’s tempting to send a plane ticket home or jump in the car to visit, but that’s not the best choice. Allowing your child to adapt to her new environment without the interruption of a visit from you is the way to go, even though it may cause both you and your child a few tears.”

Finally, there is homesickness and there is HOMESICKNESS, and if you feel that your teen is incapacitated by their sadness, or if you perceive over time that the feelings of sadness are not lifting, or that those feelings are keeping them from normal functioning (e.g. not leaving their dorm room or going to class) encourage your student to seek help with Missouri S&T Student Well-Being for consultation or counseling. For some freshman, just a heart-to-heart talk with their resident advisor can provide reassurance and a place to talk. For others it might be a class dean, peer counselor or academic advisor.

Source

Authors: Mary Dell Harrington and Lisa Endlich Heffernan. Article adapted from grownandflown.com.  Please Note: Missouri S&T does not endorse or have a relationship with SOURCE and articles are provided for information purposes only.  Missouri S&T and SOURCE do not assume responsibility for error or omission in materials.  

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