Leaving has always been painful. Knowing that you will go without the people you used to be with will be a total melancholy. Believing in the saying that time will make you get used to the circumstances will seem meaningless. It is worst when you have to leave and live in your own.
I grew up in a family-oriented atmosphere. Needless to say, I have adapted that trait from my parents. I am too attached to my parents that even the slightest decisions for my own were from them. I got used to my mother being there for me in every difficulty at school. I got used to my dad being the ones to help me in my construction projects. And I was never oriented at being alone. I even had a little trantrum during my first day of high school because of the thought that the distance from our house to our school is a five minute ride away. I was accustomed to the thought of going home easily everytime I have problems at school when I was in elementary. I even told my mother that I won’t pursue my studies anymore. Let’s call that childish, but I grew up that way.
Just then, the end of my high school studies was fast approaching. Every college student wanna be have their planned courses to take up and schools to attend to by that time, but I don’t have any. “I don’t want to go farther away from my parents” was my first thought by that moment since the nearest college school was approximately 7 kilometers away. It was my brother that opened up to me the topic about what my course would be. He told me that I should study at the university where he is studying and that I should apply for a scholarship. And that university is a one hour travel at sea and 6 minute land travel from our home. I was not prepared by everything but still I applied for a scholarship at DOST. I told myself that if I happen to get the scholarship grant, I would rather take it and attend school at my brother’s university. I luckily got the grant and decided to study at Dumaguete City. The thing about my scholarship grant is that we have to attend school a month earlier from the regular college students (the program was called SOEP and I forgot the exact meaning of the acronym so yeah). Which means I have to leave home by the start of May.
When I left home, I know I wasn’t ready to be alone. I have to live to in a new house. Then there’s the fact that I can’t be with my brother since my boarding house were just for girls. The first night was as lonely as the darkness that crept the whole room. Let’s add the fact that I was the only one in that room during that time. I cannot get myself to sleep and sleep wasn’t pulling me either. I suddenly missed my mother. I can’t help but miss my father’s warm arms. I miss my siblings. I miss our house. I miss my well-groomed bed. I miss everything back at home. Instead of sleeping, I spent the night crying. I just can’t make my tears stop and all that enveloped me was the growing loneliness inside me.
I am aware that I easily get separation anxiety but that time, my anxiety lasted for months, even a year. Everytime my mother calls me, I stop myself from crying again because of the longing that I have for them. I was too afraid that if my mother tells me that she misses me I might come running home. I shed tears every after phone calls and those tears did not even helped in easing the desolation that I felt.
But God has always His ways of healing my wounds, my loneliness. Whenever I get too solitary I knew I can’t go anywhere but to Him. During my loneliest times He has been my very best friend. He taught me to get habituated of my situation. He even slowly revealed the meaning behind those loneliness.
Because of those times being away with my family, I learned to treasure them more. I learned to build a mutual family with my friends in our new home. I learned that leaving will remind me that I have people to come back to. I learned that leaving from my comfort zone will make me stronger than I ever thought I would be. And that leaving means chasing my dreams for my family who are waiting for my victory.
It is lonely and sad at times, but right now, knowing that I have a goal to succeed and people to offer it to, I am more determined to pursue what I started painfully. I might have learned things the hard way, but what is certain is that I am heading to a better version of me.
Leaving won’t always mean misery, it sometimes symbolizes hope. For a better person. For a better future. And it turned out to have worked well on me. My growth as an individual has been my greatest token to every teardrops that fell from my eyes during my darkest times.