Christmas

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It is Christmas Eve and the holidays are among us.  You have finished your first semester and your family is excited to have you home and hear all about it. Don’t be surprised when the family plays 20 questions with you at the dinner table.  The family will be excited to hear about your classes, what you are learning, and of course who you are dating.  Save the frustration and the embarrassing line of questions.  Prepare for potential questions and have responses ready for the family.  They do not mean to pry they are excited to see how you and how you have grown in the last 4 months.

Going home can also create a certain level of expectations. Be sure to communicate your expectations with family. If you plan to divide your time between family, work and friends be sure to communicate that information, as they may have plans for you.  Friends will want to interact with you, family will want their time with you, your partner will want to spend time together, and then there are the things that YOU want to do.

Be sure to communicate your plans to avoid disappointment.  Let your family know your plans; when you plan to come home, if you plan to sleep at home each night, nights you plan on going out with friends, how much you need to rest or catch up on reading. Whatever your plans are be sure to communicate them and be flexible if there are last minute changes.

Going home is a great time, but can also cause stress and frustration.  The key to a happy and stress-free Winter Break is communication.  Everyone will want to see you and know about your first year, oblige them and share the details of your experience.  Make time for everyone and do not allow anyone (or thing, avoid overusing your phone, tablet, or laptop) to monopolize your time.  Utilize this time to catch up, but also enjoy the break and do things that will help you enjoy your break.

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At this point, you’ve probably been home for Winter Break for at least a little while. Take a deep breath and pat yourself on the back-you made it halfway! Now you just have to weather moving into the new year, returning to school, and all those pesky questions about what you’re doing with your life, what you want to do, and the most dreaded question of all- “So, are you seeing anyone?”

If you’re like most college students, you find these questions at best irritating and at worst invasive. That’s completely normal. It’s also completely normal to tell your well-meaning friends and relatives that you simply don’t know what you’re going to do with your life right now. Freshmen year is the time to BEGIN thinking about what you want to do with your life, not to make concrete decisions and never change your mind ever again. Your relatives and friends understand that. They are most likely asking these questions as a touch-stone for hearing about your life and aren’t sure what else to ask you. If you find yourself in these conversations over and over again this holiday season, try to steer the conversation toward other interests of yours, such as a class you found interesting or a new friend you met in the dining hall. You are not required to talk about every little detail, but finding common ground keeps you from having the same conversation over and over again. Make sure to keep your family talking about themselves as well! Take the time to ask questions about events you may have missed while you were away at school.

Another thing to keep in mind while you’re home for winter break is to catch up with those high school classmates you might not have seen since you went your separate ways after graduation. Plan these meetings early; don’t wait until the last day before you have to go back to college to catch up with everyone. It may be a good idea to meet up with a few friends one-on-one instead of attempting to gather everyone together at one time, but do whatever works for you! This is your chance to catch up with old friends and find out what everyone has been doing. While it may seem like you’re up-to-date with everyone via Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook, you may find you’ve missed out on a lot! We tend to only post the really good or really bad things on social media, but it’s those mundane in-between events that keep friendships alive!

One important thing to keep in mind this winter break as you’re catching up with all your old friends and family is that despite the seemingly short amount of time you’ve been away, people change, and that is a good thing! You certainly aren’t the same person you were when you began your freshmen year, and it’s likely that your friends and family aren’t either. Embrace these changes and take the time to get to know these new aspects of the people you love, and let them get to know the new you as well. Make the most of the time you have before you head back to a fantastic spring semester!

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It the most wonderful time of the year….or is it?  Thanksgiving and Christmas are great times to go home, take time away from school, and to refocus. Going home is a great time to reconnect with friends from high school and enjoy new friends you have met over the semester. Home is also a time to check in with the family and provide them with an update on your progress this semester.  Prepare share yourself.  Friends will want to interact with you, family will want their time with you, your partner will want to spend time together, and then there are the things that YOU want to do.

Be sure to communicate your plans to avoid disappointment.  Let your family know your plans; when you plan to come home, if you plan to sleep at home each night, nights you plan on going out with friends, how much you need to rest or catch up on reading. Whatever your plans are be sure to communicate them and be flexible if there are last minute changes.

If you have embraced a new sense of self, explored your new freedoms, or have a new outlook on life, that it may not be readily received from the family.  For almost two decades, your family and friends from home have known you a certain way, so coming home a newer person may be a surprise and may take some adjusting on their end. Be prepared for questions on your major, what you plan to do with your degree, how your dating life is progressing, what organizations are you a part of, etc.  Have answers prepared and sound enthusiastic to share.

Have you lost contact with old friends? You can use this time to reconnect and pick-up where you left. Find out what is new with them and share your experiences away from home.  Spend time with your partner and let them know how much they mean to you.  Long distance relationships are tough to navigate through and holiday breaks are a good time to reconfirm your feelings and commitment to each other.

Going home is a great time, but it does bring a certain level of stress.  You could be pulled in different directions and be expected to share yourself with everyone.  Utilize this time to catch up, but also enjoy the break and do things that will help you enjoy your break.

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It is almost Thanksgiving time; which means you have survived more than half of the first semester, midterms, and homecoming. By now, you and your roommate should have a good understanding for each other’s preferred lifestyle. For some your relationship is one that is great, while for others you may be at your breaking point.  It is at this time you have to realistically look at the situation and determine can you tolerate the situation and make adjustments or do you need to explore the options you have at the time. Thanksgiving serves as a time where roommates can go home take a break, regroup, and come back to school refreshed to finish out the semester.

If you are experiencing roommate conflicts, you may want to use the Thanksgiving break to relax, focus your energy on something else for a few days, and determine a way for you resolve any issues you may have.  You will need to be realistic and ask yourself, is my roommate violating my rights or are they just not meeting my standard.  It is one thing to have a roommate who violates your rights as a resident, puts you in harm’s way, infringes upon your privacy, etc. There is also a distinct difference in the two of you having varying definitions of what it means to be clean, quiet, or how to entertain guests.  Decide for yourself what is acceptable for your living environment and what is not acceptable for your living environment.  After reflecting on your experiences and detailing examples, confirm how you feel about the issues.  A room (suite or apartment) meeting should be scheduled with your roommate(s) to talk with your roommate(s) and create house rules or complete a roommate agreement.  If you feel like you and your roommate are past amicably resolving the issues you will want to enlist the help of your RA.  Your RA is trained to help residents talk through issues and resolve any tension they may be experiencing.

Before you decide that things are just not working out and want to move, consider if you have done everything that you could do in the situation.  If rights are not being violated, it is probably a rather simple situation where you will need to compromise and meet in the middle.  Relationships are about compromise and realizing that someone does things differently than you may do things can be difficult to adjust to. Evaluate if your requests are reasonable. It is reasonable to ask your roommate(s) to discuss overnight guest prior to them staying, but it may not be reasonable to ask your roommate(s) to never have guests in the room.  It is reasonable to request that your roommate(s) not disturb you while are studying, but it may be unreasonable if you do not reciprocate.  You will need to compromise and meet in the middle and find a solution that will work for both of you.

If you feel your rights are violated or you have exhausted all possibilities, you may want to consider changing rooms.  It is not reasonable to say “they’re the one with the problem so they should have to move”.  For the sake of happiness you may have to be the person to move.  If the staff interjects they will ask who wants to move and if no one volunteers then depending on the issues all roommates may be forced to move.  It is okay to move on after you have done all you can in the situation. Right before (or during if possible) Christmas break is a great time to change rooms. It will serve as a fresh start when the new semester starts. You want to make the moving out process and smooth as possible. You never want to burn bridges, it is a small world and you never know when you may come across that person or someone that knows that person in the future.

Not all roommate assignments will work out.  It is important to remember to give differences a chance and not to be judgmental and closed-minded.  It may be awkward and require more attention at first, but as long as you develop and display a mutual respect for each other, you should be able to make it work for the short time you will be living together.  When your relationship hits a little turbulence, do not run away, stick it out and do everything on your end to make it work.