The FOMO of studying abroad

After more than a yearlong countdown, I packed my bags, said goodbye to my friends, family and, of course, my dog, and headed off to the airport. It was a surreal feeling – in just a few hours I would be living in a completely foreign place. I would be meeting new people, eating new foods, speaking another language, experiencing a new party scene, everything was about to be totally different from America. My final destination was Salamanca, Spain, about 2.5 hours northwest of Madrid, and besides the small fight on the plane between two meat-head passengers, the trip was pretty seamless.

Every time I had Wi-Fi, I took out my phone and looked for the unique Snapchat filters none of my friends would be able to have and posted them on my story. I checked for new filters in both airports, on the bus from Madrid, while I was driving through Salamanca, and then checked to see if I got any cool filters on my new bed at my host family’s apartment (which I do have one cool filter from my bed, so that’s a plus). I was about to officially embark on the trip of a lifetime, I wanted to make sure that all my followers knew what was going on.

Salamanca Snapchat filter featuring: Megan Grimes, Kaitlin Crews, and Danielle Harris

Naturally, I posted a couple of long Snapchat stories, pinned my location on Facebook and tweeted the many worthwhile thoughts I had throughout the first few hours I was in Spain, but I promised myself I would cut back on my social media usage throughout my trip. Living in the moment was, and currently still is, one of the main themes of my trip and I know how hard it is to do that when you’re stuck behind your phone.

That being said, you learn pretty quickly that life goes on at JMU. Whether you’re there or not, they are still going to celebrate syllabus week, they are going to visit NewRec for the first time together, they are going to suffer through the worst GenEd together. They’re going to put their hearts out on the court during the biggest intramural game of the season and go out every snow day they have while JMU and the city of Harrisonburg figure out that they can actually prepare for the snow and clean it up once it comes down. And this is all while you’re on the other side of the Atlantic viewing it all second-hand through social media.

What is this called you ask? FOMO. Fear of missing out: the phenomenon every single college student faces when wanting to be in multiple places at once.

Symptoms of FOMO include periods of regret, envy, and sadness and it is extremely easy to contract. FOMO attacks only at the worst times. It could be possessed on the Friday night you stay in to study only to find out there’s a rager going on upstairs or you could get it the weekend you decide to surprise your parents, but your friends decide, out of nowhere, to go see your favorite band play in Richmond. The FOMO is real…everywhere.

Now that you’re thinking about all the times you’ve experienced FOMO, a study abroad student’s view of FOMO completely transforms while being abroad. Mimi Morris, a junior at JMU studying abroad in Ireland for the semester described her FOMO as, “[The] worst FOMO of my life, I can’t handle it.”

Stephen Vulcano, a sophomore studying abroad with me in Salamanca put his FOMO in just three simple words, “Man, fuck this.”

Plaza Mayor Salamanca, Spain

I knew that while I was studying abroad I was going to be missing out on all the amazing things that a spring semester at JMU would offer, but now that I’m here, I selfishly say, that I wish there was an “off button” you could press while you’re experiencing something totally different, and in the long run, better, than your friends.

So yeah, FOMO sucks, it’s not fun, no one likes it, but it’s another incredible reason to study abroad. I’ve only been abroad for about three weeks and I’ve already made some of the best memories of my life. And the only reason these memories have been made is because I took a chance and jumped out of my comfort zone to leave the happiest place on earth for 16 whole weeks. I’ve met some great people, improved my Spanish language skills immensely, figured out I actually enjoy coffee, learned how much oil my host mom loves to put in all of our food and learned to ignore FOMO while being abroad.

It is still going to take some time to get used to the whole living in another country thing, but I can’t wait to experience everything this amazing program has to offer. I thoroughly recommend taking the same chance I took and apply to a study abroad program. Whether it’s with the remarkable JMU Office of International Programs or with a third-party organization, studying abroad is a once-in-a-lifetime experience and you too deserve to feel what real FOMO feels like.

Toledo, Spain January 30, 2016