By 
Like nearly every other 17-year-old on earth, I had grand plans of reinventing myself when I went off to college. Though I enjoyed high school, I wanted more out of college. I wanted to be one of the cool girls, to be admired and looked up to by the people who were, well, like me in high school.
I wasn't necessarily popular growing up, but I wasn't unpopular, either. I was perfectly average, well-liked enough to be elected to student government but not quite well-liked enough to be invited to parties. I was happy, but I still hoped college would propel me up the social ladder.
When I began considering my college options, I quickly decided on Ohio University, which had the best journalism school in the state. It was also the biggest party school. Year after year, OU was named to national lists of the country's top party schools, and those rankings weren't lost on me: I wanted to get a good education, but I also wanted to let loose a little.
I was assigned to live with a random roommate – an art major who was nice, friendly, and a former high school prom queen – jackpot! We hit it off immediately, and before long, we were inseparable. Soon, our duo became a small pack when we befriended another pair of BFFs and expanded our social circle.
The four of us led a wild and crazy (for me!) social life filled with house parties, secret dorm parties and frat parties at the nearby fraternity where one girl's boyfriend belonged. In short, it was a lot of partying – and at first, it was a lot of fun.
After awhile, though, I found it increasingly alienating. Partying seemed to drive the other girls closer together. I'd always had a good time drinking with them, but I couldn't seem to maintain a sober connection with anyone except for my roommate – who was becoming much closer to her other friends than to me.
One afternoon, I asked if anyone wanted to see a movie. Someone asked, "Can we get drunk before it?" In that moment, I wondered: When we weren't partying, did I even like my friends?
After a night of drinking, the other girls woke up the next day laughing, happy, and ready to do it all over again. I woke up wanting to cry under my covers. It seemed like my only friends were kegs and six-packs – and they were friends I didn't even really want.
I craved real, meaningful friendships with people who understood me – and as I started to struggle with depression in my sophomore year, my friends either didn't know how to deal with me or didn't want to. Like most college students, they were having a blast and making lifelong memories. Meanwhile, I felt more alone than ever, and I'd started to feel debilitatingly anxious in large groups of people..
By junior year, we'd all joined a sorority and were required to live in our sorority house together. It was a good fit for the the others, who loved having their best friends down the hall at all times. For me, though, it was a nightmare. As an only child, I craved peace and quiet, which rarely happened in the dorms but was even rarer in a house full of 50 excitable sisters. There was no sense of privacy, no sense of personal space, and no sense of boundaries.
Even worse, it became clear I had no real friends at school. I continued to try to connect with my sisters, but in such close quarters, it became painfully obvious that I was an outsider. I couldn't take it anymore: I transferred schools to a large university near my hometown.
When I first transferred, I lived with my mom at first, which meant I couldn't party much. Initially, I wondered how I'd ever make any friends – because, at the time, bonding over beers was the only way I knew how.
But something miraculous happened: I made friends anyway.
As a requirement of my major, I joined the staff of the student newspaper, and it didn't take long for me to find my people. Hunched over computers, rushing to meet deadlines, and joking nonstop to keep ourselves from cracking under the pressure, I found plenty of friends – without booze.
When we hung out, it was alongside people I knew and loved; even better, my new friends could hang out sober. Because we bonded over common interests in the classroom, those friendships were more authentic, and less forced. They existed with or without a beer pong table in front of us.
In high school, all I wanted was to be cool. But in college? I learned that a life filled with deep friendships is a whole lot more satisfying than a life of empty partying.
