My dad and I talk one day. He asks me: "How do you feel about studying medicine? That was always your dream growing up"
He's not wrong. I had wanted to be a doctor growing up. But in the recent years I had set my mind on psychology, and was planning on taking the entrance exam the following Spring. But given how my life had been going lately, even that dream felt unlikely.
My dad suggested to me: "What about you go study medicine at RSU, like [family friend]?"
There was still a week left in the application period. And I decided, f--k it. I'll go! I'll get to start over, find new friends and be whoever I want.
I got my acceptance letter within the week. I packed up my things, moved out of my apartment and in a month, I moved to Riga.
Orientation week was really fun. I hadn't drank alcohol in years, but I decided to this week, because I was reinventing myself. I made friends, and met my now-boyfriend. I felt like a new person. I was regularly spending time with friends, something I hadn't done in years. I had had bad social anxiety for a long time, and somehow I had overcome that in one week.
Unfortunately, I got sick for a few weeks, so I couldn't really see those new friends for that time. When I came back to school, I saw that those friends had gotten closer with others, naturally. I fell back into my old habits and interpreted this as 'They don't like me enough. I'm just a B-tier friend'. Since they didn't always invite me to study with them, I stopped trying to meet with them.
And boom- I was back in the same situation I was in before my studies. I felt a dread any time I thought of reaching out to anyone. I spent all my time with my new boyfriend. I went to class in the morning, and straight back home. I didn't send people text's asking how they are. And I got increasingly anxious that if I did, they would just see through the facade and think I'm trying too hard.
Now, 1,5 years later, I realise I had pushed everyone away. I shouldn't have expected to become a new person just with a change of scenery. That's not a way to make a change, and definitely not the way to make lasting friendships. And let me tell you, being lonely in a foreign country is 10x worse than being lonely at home. There's no family to fall back on. No long-time friends who will want to meet up after two months of no communication.
Therefore, a month ago I decided to make a change. I started reading books about social interaction, to start feeling more confident in myself and my ability to talk to people. I've never been confident in my social skills. I've been shy all my life and had the same friends for 13 years. I realise now, that here, I need to make the first move. I read three books. I started practicing mindfulness to get over the anxiety I'm feeling. I've used a website that is actually built to be DBT (Dialectial Behavior Therapy), but it has great mindfulness exercises I've found useful for when I start feeling anxious.
Last week, I asked a friend to go study with me. Yes, really. I just texted them "Hey, would you like to go out to study this week?" And we did! It was fun, and definitely not as hard as I dreaded it to be. If you don't have social anxiety, that might seem super obvious and simple, but it really takes some work sometimes to not feel nervous. Anyways, if I can do it, anyone can.
I didn't become a different person when I moved to Riga to study medicine. I was still the same, shy and introverted girl. I was still looking for acceptance from others. I've become closer with a few people since starting to work on myself, and feel significantly less dread when planning social interactions. Moving abroad won't fix your problems. But you can work on yourself.
I hope that anyone who reads this post and can relate to it, will be motivated to start working on themselves.
If you want to read more about making friends in university, read this blog post.
Good luck in your studies, and in making new friends!
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