Chapter One: An Unforgettable First Year

Hey guys!

I submitted my last final for my freshman year yesterday. To say I am relieved is an understatement. I can't believe that my first year of college is over. I am done with classes and homework and quizzes. I am DONE with Zoom!

Personally, my first year in college did not go the way I thought or wanted it to. I had many crazy and wild experiences happen that I will try to talk about! Let's just say that I really did not expect anything to happen this year. This just proved to me that as much as you try to plan out your life and have plans, life is uncertain. Sometimes there are things that are out of your control.

Just like there were bad days, I had great days where I made some great memories. I personally think that everything that happened in the past year has led to where I am today. I definitely have seen a lot of growth come from it!

In this blog post, I want to do a little recap of my first year in college and some of the lessons I learned. I think that it is super important to take time and reflect on what has happened in your life. I hope that maybe you will be able to learn something or see that sometimes not everything is perfect! Despite everything that happened, I would not change a single thing!

Transitioning to college is hard, moving away from home is even more difficult. Luckily, I was able to find a second home at my school. I was scared to move out to LA. I did not know what to expect. I did not know who to trust, I did not know who I could reach out to in case anything bad were to happen. I thought I would be alone. Luckily, I found out about a special interest community at my school that would help with that.

Special interest communities bring students with similar interests and/or cultural backgrounds together to share their experiences. Although many people get confused as to why we have them, I think that they are one of the best things that my school has to offer!

I was part of the Latinx Floor residential program called El Sol y La Luna! The goal of the Latinx floor is to create and promote a positive, supportive atmosphere that will help freshmen transition into the college life. The floor is open to all students interested in learning more about the Chicanx/Latinx culture. At our floor, we created a family.

Moving into the Latinx floor really softened the blow. Now, I did have my bad days still, but I was not alone. I had people that cared about me and understood some of my struggles. The first year is always hard but having a group of people you can count on makes it so much easier. I was blessed with an amazing roommate that I would not trade for the world. Without her or the Latinx floor, I think I would have lost my mind and more importantly myself.

It was not until around October when things got a little crazy. One night, as we were sleeping, I woke up to a loud alarm and bright lights flashing outside our room. I quickly called out to my roommate who immediately got up and checked. It turned out that the suite across from ours had a broken sprinkler in their living room that was flooding our floor.

It was quite early and we were all taken by surprise. All we wanted was to get out of the building as fast as we could into somewhere safe. The entire eleven floors in the building were evacuated for nearly four or five hours. We saw the sun rise! My suite and the suite where the sprinkler broke where the last to go back in. We were all stressed, tired, hungry, and scared.

After a LONG time, we got news that there was a lot of damage in our room and that we would have to move out for maybe one month or the rest of the fall semester. We were in the midst of exams. To say the least, we lost it. Some of us had to class immediately so we did not have time to process the news at all. I broke down in tears because of how overwhelming it was.

We had to move out within three days to some lounge in another residence as we had classes and midterms. Not many of us where happy. I certainly wasn't. Anyways, I won't be going into much detail but those that month was not my best month. My roommate and suitemates went through something that I would not wish upon anyone. But I did learn something from all of this. I learned that we should not stress over things that are out of our control.

Now, I know that is easier said than done. It is almost normal for us to freak out about everything that goes wrong in our lives but it is important to understand that sometimes, somethings happen that we have no control over of. We could not have prevented it, we can not fix it, there was not much or nothing that we could have done at the moment. However, we can control and decide how we react to these situations. Obviously any feelings that arise from these situations are valid. You have a right to be mad, sad, anything; but the way you deal with it will say a lot about who you are.

The more you stress out about things that are not in your realm of control, less progress will be made. You are holding yourself back and making your situation worst. The things that are actually in your control will disappear or go wrong due to the lack of attention.

Personally, the first days where the hardest. It was hard to adapt to a new living space. I was blessed and fortunate to have gotten a place to stay but it definitely was hard adjusting to it. However, I soon leaned that I had to focus on my exams. I could not stop studying or practicing because I was no longer living where I used to. I had to make the most out of my situation. It was then up to me if I did study or not. That was in my control. Was it difficult to find the motivation to study because I was physically and emotionally drained? Yes. Did I want to give up and just cry? Yes. Did I actually gave up? No.

It was not easy but I took all my midterms and passed. I kept going to classes. I tried to get all the meals that I needed to. I tried to keep living as I did before. I could not let anything else go bad in my life. I knew that the school was handling our situation and I could not due much about that. It was not worth stressing over. I had a good time with my roommate and new roommates that were in our lounge! I was able to celebrate my 18th birthday with them! It was honestly a nice bonding experience despite it all!

Luckily, we were able to move back into our old space around Halloween. Now, crazy story number two. In November, a few days after turning 28, I had my first visit to ER by myself.

When people tell you that you begin to find out more about who you really are in college, they weren't lying. It was not until then that I discovered that I am allergic to peanuts lol. It was my first time riding on an ambulance and hopefully my last. It is funny to me know because I honestly was clueless until I was having a anxiety attack.

By the time I was in the hospital, it was already dark. I had contacted my roommate and she contacted our RA. I did not want to call my parents because I did not want them to rush over to LA during the rain. I knew that I would be okay and told them to trust me. I mean I did panic for a while before calming down but once I was in the hospital I thought I could handle myself (lol).

Something that I learned about this ordeal was to not be afraid to ask for help. Obviously no one is going to take care or push you better than yourself but it never hurts to ask others for help. I knew that I was not feeling okay and I did what I thought was best for me. Clearly things got out of hand but I was fortunate enough to have someone that I could count on. I asked my roommate for help. If I had not asked and tried to handle the situation myself, I am not sure what could have happened give how bad I got.

Sometimes it is important to set our pride aside and be a little vulnerable. There are going to be moments that we won't be able to do everything for ourselves. We are going to need of someone. Make sure you start warming up to that idea.

Yes, I agree that being independent is great. Yes, I am not against being alone in college whether it be eating or studying. But sometime you will need someone for whatever reason. It may be for comfort, for assistance, etc. Don't be afraid to reach out to someone when you can no longer deal with whatever is happening by yourself.

As you probably can imagine, I was hoping that spring semester would be a bit better. Do not get me wrong, pre-quarantine, everything was fine. I really enjoyed the classes I was taking and I was having fun with the people that I had met! I got to be able to explore a lot of the city for some of my school projects! I was enjoying myself!

After being almost displaced for a month, I didn’t want to lose my room or my floor again. Little did I know I would. Going remote was something. I did my best and I finished in the middle of a pandemic. You can read more about my experience and initial thoughts here. It was not easy. It was overwhelming. There were good days, there were bad days. Some days I did not mind doing work, other days I lacked the motivation and will to open up my computer. But I managed it.

I found this quote the other day and I wanted to share it with you guys.

"When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal; you do not change your decision to get there."

- Zig Ziglar

This caught my attention because that really is what life is about. We all have goals and sometimes the road to reaching them is not always so smooth. Life will always throw something at you but that doesn't mean you should give up on your dreams and goals.

COVID-19 proved this. We had to leave our school and dorms for those that lived on campus. We had to learn to work from home. We had to take our class via a computer screen. We had to do things that were not easy or expected. Nevertheless, that did not stop of us from pursuing our dreams. Never do. If the the fight gets a little difficult, don't give up immediately. Find out new ways to still get where you want to.

Everything that happened in college, no matter how bad it got, was good for me. It helped contribute to the person and where I am today. I really would not change a thing. Although it was not ideal, but it was my experience, my year.

I learned a lot about myself. I learned about who I was and who I want to be. The in between is still a little bit fuzzy. I am still working on myself and it's not pretty. But that won't stop me from becoming the woman I want to be. I will take action on what is in my control, I will ask help if I need it, and I will not let anything throw me out of course.

Even though I shared mostly (all lol) negative experiences, I think it was important for me to do that. I made great positive memories but it is also important to acknowledge the bad and reflect on them. I don't want to obsess over them or act as if they never happened. I thought it would be fun and show that sometimes, college is not perfect.

The media was provided us with expectations and story line for college but no matter how much you plan, things might not always work in your favor.

I hope that you are able to learn something from this. I could talk about this all day but I tried to keep it as short as I could! I really wish the best for you all and hope that you guys are safe.

Until next time,

Diana