Well I’m sorry it has taken so long to get around to writing this up, as you can imagine I have been extremely busy for the past week and I’m quite drained, both physically and especially mentally. First of all there was the extremely difficult process of moving all my stuff out and the anticipation of what my new home and room mates would be like. Will they like me? What if they make fun of me? Will I be able to manage without my mum?
Saying goodbye was very hard, my mum ended up crying like I expected. I didn’t want her to hang around too long because I know she was going to be upset. Some people’s parents seemed to stay for almost the entire day. After I’d unpacked my stuff, I decided to venture out into the kitchen/common area to meet my other room mates (I’d said hello to a couple of them while unloading the car). It took me a while to psych myself up enough to go in there but I made it. There were loads of people in there, more than the amount who would be in our apartment so I was a bit confused at first since I wasn’t sure who was staying and who wasn’t. I managed to introduce myself and talk a little bit to some of them. I later found out that most people already had friends here, that they had either worked with, known from college or were already friends with. This made me feel a bit sad because I had tried to console myself with the fact that we’d all be in the same boat, i.e. everyone would be on their own and not already have a social group, but this wasn’t the case. Already I was a loner and everyone had got a group of friends.
We all went out together on the first night. It was the first time I’d ever done anything like this, we went to a couple of pubs first which I didn’t mind too much and I managed to chat to them for a little while. Later on when we went to the club though, I just couldn’t stand it. There were too many drunk people and it was so packed, I felt trapped. I stayed for about an hour but when they all went to dance, I couldn’t handle it any more and I had to leave early. I felt so bad for running out on them like that but there was no way I could handle it any more and I didn’t fancy standing about on my own at the side all night long. I ended up leaving them a note explaining that I get panicked in situations like that and why I can’t drink etc. Maybe it was a bad idea, but I didn’t know what else to do.
The next day, no-one was mean to me about it so I guess they understood or at least didn’t hold it against me. They asked me to come to dinner with them which I did and had a good time, felt much better after that. I didn’t go to town with them afterwards though, I think they realise that I am not into clubs and stuff now.
All in all, I think I have been very lucky to be put with this group, they all seem to be nice and even though they are all very confident and outgoing, I have managed to talk to them a little bit and I think we get on alright. I find it much easier to speak to people individually rather than in a group, it’s so intimidating being with a bunch of such loud people.
I think that overall I am coping ok so far. The course starts properly on Monday which I’m looking forward too, the introductory lectures I’ve had so far have been interesting and the course sounds really good. The lecturers are very enthusiastic and involved which is a refreshing change from college where they didn’t bother to turn up a lot of the time.
I wanted to let people know how I’m getting on so far. I’m actually at home for the weekend at the moment so I am a bit more relaxed and should hopefully be able to write a bit more later on. Thanks everyone for all the encouragement and support 
