The prospect of moving out finally at eighteen excited me and I was more than ready for it. Even though I did not know what to expect, I knew I would be living in the heart of Birmingham with four other girls. I was excited to start a new adventure of new experiences, doing something I am passionate about at university and meeting new people. Everyone tells you that uni is the best years of your life and you will never forget them. If I had to sum up the first year, it would be eventful that’s for sure. In the beginning it was amazing, the girls were full of life and up for anything which I loved. If there is a time where I will say yes to anyone, it is when I’m drunk and we went out a lot. It was thrilling yet exciting and no matter how many of us got into the taxi, it was always £2 each. I managed to get into a situation where I walked with strangers in the middle of the night in Birmingham to a club. It was not worth saving the £2, after sobering up and freezing my tits off, not to mention how dangerous it was.
However living with four other girls isn’t always easy. When you move out, you discover that people live very differently to you and some are used to others clearing up for them. Which means it is not always fun and games when you wake up every morning to a disgusting mess, you quickly become fed up of tidying up after everyone else. Therefore the mess, smell, dirt, smoke, dishes will be there for days. Not only that but when you are tight for money it becomes very frustrating when people constantly steal your food and rely on you to buy the needed supplies.
It got to the point where our nights out were so wild, the sofa had been ripped up, the fridge was drawn all over, stalls broken, curtains pulled down, the constant stench of smoke and things missing from our kitchen meant our deposit was well and truly gone. Not only that but you’d walk into the kitchen to grab a drink and there would be strange men in our kitchen getting up to no good.
The chaos began when girls created drama by speaking behind one another’s backs, twisting words and dividing up the flat up. The stress of university and deadlines, a shit hole of a flat, 8 bin bags piled up in the corner, maggots in our kitchen, did start to get too me. However when you live with these girls and see them every day you hardly want to fall out and create a toxic environment. Although unfortunately that did happen. Very awkward and horrible fights began with unkind words thrown about, quickly became distressing. Not to mention walking into a kitchen filled with people who you are unsure if they are your friends, trying to cook dinner at 7pm hoping someone hasn’t stolen your pasta sauce whilst people are snorting coke off the kitchen side meant I developed a crippling severe type of anxiety. When I turned down a night out, I would be kept up with screaming drunks until 12am (when we left for a night out) to then them storming in down the hallway banging on my door at 4am, turning on the drum and base and the overwhelming stench of weed started to become less and less fun. The all nighters and pressure to keep up with the deadlines along with being constantly tired from my ME/CFS was a struggle.
It is fair to say I felt as if I didn’t want to be there at all. You may think I have exaggerated or inflated my experience, believe me I wish I had, however this is everything I went through. The point of me sharing this story is for you to understand, you probably didn’t have it that bad and hey if you had it worse, you made it through.
Love Tishhlah x
