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• Cook Counseling Center

Visiting home for the holidays especially if it's your parents' first time for you to be away for an extended period can be stressful and enlightening. Parents often expect that your visit home will be to spend a lot of time with them and your other family members while your plans may be different. Sometimes, parents will make all your favorite foods, make plans for you, or even load you up with chores. Many times all of these efforts have the same aim which is to insure that you do spend time with them. Some conflicts can be avoided by letting your parents in on your plans before you walk in the door and making sure to include them.  Let them know your intentions so they won't have to be so concerned about getting a chance to spend time with you.

One area of conflict may be your expectation that you can follow the same rules at home that you follow away at school, versus your parents expectation that you will continue to follow the guidelines you followed in high school. Problems such as this can be avoided by discussing ahead of time the differing expectations you and your folks have.

You may notice many other changes as well. If you come from a single parent home you may discover that your parent has made some personal changes while you're away - new friends, new interests or new habits may emerge. If your parents are divorced coming home from college can spark new battles over who spends time with whom and for how long.

There are many issues and changes that are an inevitable part of growing that you and your family will experience during your college years. For most these changes are stressful but normal milestones that they simply grow through. For others these transitions can be so stressful that they interfere with successful functioning. Help and counseling is available at Cook Counseling Center. Call 231-6557 for more information.