Sixty Too Many

Imagine this – on top of the stress that college brings among balancing exams, friendships, partying and loneliness, you live in a house with sixty girls. Better yet, your sleeping quarters are a ten by fifteen-foot room consisted of two bunk beds, so close together that not only can you not walk shoulder width between them, but you can hold hands with the girl bunking next to you.

Some people might say, well isn’t that great? You never have to be alone! Sure, it’s a lot of fun. But exactly that, you never get to be alone. It is nice, I’ll admit, when you’re having a bad day and need a shoulder to lean on or just a distraction. But what happens during those times when you just feel like being by yourself?

Living in a sorority house requires endurance, it’s a long-term persistent stressor. The accumulation of many repetitive acute stressors creates a stressful, unpreferred environment to live in. You want to go out with your friends, but you have so much work. It’s always those nights that you have an exam tomorrow that your friends are doing something actually worthwhile and you can’t participate. It is literally FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) every single night.

While people know everyone has work to do, there’s a constant pressure to be fun and exciting. People like to be around someone who makes them laugh, someone who has a positive aura about them. But can I just tell you how difficult that is? To be faced with stress from classes and living arrangements, and on top of that to be happy so other people enjoy being around you? There are obviously behavioral and emotional outcomes to this physiological stress. In addition to that, your directed attention is fatigued because of these constant distractions, both real and perceived. With this increased need for directed attention, it is difficult to manage yourself and be yourself: you act less altruistically, less happy, less inviting.

And not only that, it’s so easy to not only feel excluded and isolated, but to exclude and isolate others. I mean think about it, how many people can you invite to go to the library with you? But with that said, it’s so hard for someone to not feel like she isn’t wanted there since you didn’t think to invite her.

On top of stressors in the mind, It’s overcrowded. Crowds are assessed usually by the number of people, the density or number of people per area, the gestalt principle in terms of groups, and time spent in this aforementioned crowd. The thing about this is all of these are at an all-time high. There’s 60 girls in the house, you share a four bathroom stalls and three showers with thirty of them, let alone a tiny bedroom with three others. And it doesn’t end. For a whole year.

It’s a general feeling of being overwhelmed, but at the same time it’s your home. While most people’s homes are a safe space that they can retreat to – a territory of refuge. There is no control of information, no privacy. Privacy constitutes the extreme restriction of information, where you can restrict the presence of others, prevents being overwhelmed with new information and a very low rate of change. This is virtually impossible in a sorority house, which results in a chronic stress that requires endurance.

However, I’ve learned to look at the positive sides. I’m lucky enough that I live in a sorority that houses girls who don’t judge what I wear, how I look when I wake up, or how many times a day I nap. They are all incredible girls who accept me for who I am. Not only does this reduce some stress to feel like you belong somewhere, but you always feel supported and a part of something. And I think that makes these (mildly abusive) living arrangements all worth the pressure and stress.