Addressing serious problems: talk

There are many aspects of college I can fill a column with. I could talk about clubs, or share roommate horror stories. I could describe the accumulating stress of finals week or my plans for my first three-month summer.
But there is a topic that I feel is too important to neglect. One that needs to dragged from under the covers and addressed. It revolves around the idea that no one can escape life without hardship. This is not a new thought, nor is it unfamiliar to me. What strikes me, however, is how much personal strife college students, who are typically 18- to 22-years-old, have encountered in their brief lives.
After nearly one full year of college, rich in late-night talks, I began to understand why so many people party, regardless of the day of the week. My peers’ proclivity towards alcohol or drugs became clearer to me, and I also found students much like myself, who busy their minds with a packed schedule or visual entertainment so as to avoid thinking.
I have met people who once struggled with depression, and some who face it currently. I have met others who have inflicted self-harm in the past, and those who struggle with suicidal thoughts. Pills and therapy, I learned, are nearly as common as iPhones.
Only a few weeks ago one of my own friends had overdosed and needed to be taken to the hospital. A peer down the hall recently announced himself to be cancer free. My friend at another college personally knows a handful of girls who have been sexually assaulted, but were too afraid to say anything for fear of standing out and being humiliated.

But these are things that must be acknowledged, because the only alternative is to avoid them — to shove them under the rug and remember to watch your step. Harsh breakups, friendship conflicts, family friction, unhealthy relationships, and death is around us all. There is a reason that posters of blood alcohol content charts, definitions of abusive relationships, and phone numbers for the campus police or counseling center are taped to bathroom doors of universities all over the country.
This is the dark side of college that is often masked by young-adult frivolity. The driving force behind the decision to just have one more drink, to ignore the clock and play one more mission of a favorite video game. There a many ways to escape, and we all do it. But what we should be doing, is talking. Talking to friends, family and professors helps us realize that we are not alone.

Kohn, an Atlantic Beach resident, is completing her freshman year at SUNY New Paltz.