Dealing with "Reverse Culture Shock" Following Studying Abroad
After spending almost two months in Europe, I found myself feeling really down towards the end of my study abroad experience. I spent my summer in Florence, Italy completing a global seminar and in the time I spent abroad, I was able to visit 4 countries. This summer was honestly an adventure and it was my first time traveling without family. I really loved how different each place I visited was from the States and I sometimes caught myself contemplating whether I really wanted to return home. While being abroad in a foreign country did have its downsides and unique challenges, I found it really thrilling to learn something new and I enjoyed the challenge of having to adjust to the different locations I was in. Although I did end up coming home, I had a hard time adjusting to being back. After spending everyday this summer visiting somewhere new and seeing amazing sites as soon as I'd leave my apartment, returning home to my ordinary life made me feel really down and it took some time to adjust. For myself, personally, it was really challenging to adjust to all the changes that my friends and family had gone through in the time I was gone. While I had grown as a person from my abroad experience, the friends and family I didn't physically see during the time I was gone had also grown and changed in their own ways and that was one adjustment that took some time for me to adjust to. While you might be thinking, "But you're away from some of your friends and family while you're in school," there was something about being such a long distance away from them for a period of time that made me feel like I was out of touch with them when I came back. Returning back to the states made me feel very out of touch with what was going on here and with my loved ones I hadn't seen all summer.
I feel I commonly hear people talk about how challenging it is to adjust to the country they're going to be studying in but I don't really hear many people talk about how challenging it is to adjust to your life back home when you return. Some things I found really helpful were taking some time to reflect on my time abroad and to spend time catching up with my friends and family. I feel like it's really important to take time to adjust to being home and to be patient with yourself during that process. Regardless as to how you felt about your abroad experience, you dealt with a lot of changes and grew as a person. It's also important to give yourself time to adjust to being home. You might feel extremely jet lagged and tired when you return home so be patient with yourself. Give yourself time to also reflect on your trip. You may have spent a lot of time around the same people for a period of weeks to months so reflect on that and how that may have impacted you at all. Spend some time catching up with your family and friends that you haven't seen and try to listen to how their summers went and what changes they may have experienced while you were gone. I know it might be difficult to hold back a little and avoid talking about your trip every second you're catching up with family and friends but also give them a chance to tell you about their summers. Another thing that really helped me was creating a new routine now that I've returned. Since I graduated while abroad, preparing myself for a new school year wasn't exactly an option so figuring out what I was going to do after returning was especially important.
I feel I commonly hear people talk about how challenging it is to adjust to the country they're going to be studying in but I don't really hear many people talk about how challenging it is to adjust to your life back home when you return. Some things I found really helpful were taking some time to reflect on my time abroad and to spend time catching up with my friends and family. I feel like it's really important to take time to adjust to being home and to be patient with yourself during that process. Regardless as to how you felt about your abroad experience, you dealt with a lot of changes and grew as a person. It's also important to give yourself time to adjust to being home. You might feel extremely jet lagged and tired when you return home so be patient with yourself. Give yourself time to also reflect on your trip. You may have spent a lot of time around the same people for a period of weeks to months so reflect on that and how that may have impacted you at all. Spend some time catching up with your family and friends that you haven't seen and try to listen to how their summers went and what changes they may have experienced while you were gone. I know it might be difficult to hold back a little and avoid talking about your trip every second you're catching up with family and friends but also give them a chance to tell you about their summers. Another thing that really helped me was creating a new routine now that I've returned. Since I graduated while abroad, preparing myself for a new school year wasn't exactly an option so figuring out what I was going to do after returning was especially important.
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