But then I remember all the worrisome, uneased conversations with my friends, family and fellow exchange students and remind myself there's a lot more to it.

1. Losing friends.

Or should I say "friends". You do get a lot of friends when you go on your exchange, but you are bound to lose ones, too. People I thought were my friends ended up forgetting me and moving on. Some people I decided to leave in the past. Almost all the people who I've studied with for the last 2-11 years are going to graduate before I come back to Finland, and I'm gonna have to study with people who I don't know the most stressful year, and all that with the highly possible post-exchange depression.

But hey, at least I found out who stick around.

2. Jealousy.

I have never been the one to get jealous. Never. I remember when I got jealous for the first time in here, and it was terrible because I didn't understand what I was feeling and why I was feeling, I felt annoyed and frustrated - jealous - everytime I readed another exchange student's blog, or saw a good picture of them having fun, or heard them speak Spanish better than me. Jealousy is a nasty thing and I hate it. It's all getting better now, though.

3. Flu.

Like I told you earlier, I've been sick most of my exchange year so far. It has been mentally and physically consuming, when I couldn't do anything. Everytime I had to stay inside for many days and with my host sister going to school and host dad working full hours I was alone a lot. I didn't ahve anyone to speak Spanish or even speak at all, and the more time I spent silent, the harder it became to start to speak again, especially in the beginning. It was also hard to get to know my class members when I was out of school a lot.

After changing host families I haven't gotten sick anymore, though. I hope it stays like it.

4. Missing out on things.

This one goes hand in hand with the previous things, somewhat. When I'm sick, I can't meet people, I can't do things. Obviously. But I'm missing out on a lot of stuff happening in Finland, too. I can't see my brothers grow. I can't graduate with my peers or even just attend their graduation. I miss a lot of events with them. My best friend had her prom less than a week ago, and I'm missed the one day she looked like a true princess. My mom turned 50 and I missed out her birthday. She graduated from her school after working for it so hard, and I missed that out, too. My grandparents are getting old and I am afraid I'm losing precious time with them. My relatives are all living their lives and I'm missing from them.

I'm missing out a lot of things.

5. Missing things. And people.

On top of not getting jealous, I rarely miss people. It doesn't mean I don't care about people - I just don't miss them. But even I started to miss home after a while. Of course I'd love to see my family around instead of skyping, but it's not until I feel like absolute shit when I can say I really miss them. It's always when I feel really bad when I miss home. I figured it's the place & people I feel safe; as if all my problems will vanish if I just got back home. But I know it's just because I want the struggle to end. I'm not seriously thinking about going back home before my year is over.

It's easier to miss food and clothes and small things than people. I can always talk or text to people, but unfortunately food doesn't talk. Still, missing stuff is more like "oh I wish I had a rye bread in front of me right now" or "the things I would do to have my speakers and thicker walls" or "where's the Finnish weather when you need it". I don't get teary-eyed after objects, unlike I do when it comes to the people I love.

However, I don't miss home that much and it's a good thing, I guess. After all I'm going to go back, and when I do, I'm gonna miss everything that I leave here. I should just focus on this moment and make every second count. Home isn't going anywhere.

6. Learning a new language.
I could easily devote an entire blog post to this subject and I probably will. To put this short, I've had some major problems with learning the language. I've always been bad at motivating myself, and I can easily lose my patience if something is difficult and I'm not comfortable. I didn't have the confidence to make mistakes. Summer vacation in the middle of my year also didn't help that much, because I wasn't exposed to the language as frequently as I should have.
I have my ups and downs. Sometimes I feel very accomplished, sometimes super frustrated when I'm lacking a simple word from my vocabulary. I just need to keep trying.

I love this quote so much....

7. Realizing how flawed human being I am.
I certainly didn't think I was perfect before I came here, but I didn't really know all my weaknesses as well as I do know. Exchange year is not just about learning a new language or new culture. It's a lot about finding new sides of yourself, too - even those sides you might not want to discover. Or maybe I've always been aware of my weaknesses and flaws, but I've only known really accepted them as part of me. It's the ugly truth, but nobody is perfect. In the end, our flaws, weaknesses and strengths make us unique, make us... well, us. Be comfortable in you own skin, embrace yourself and work on your weaknesses. You are loved, valued and respected, and you never know who you might be inspiring.

8. Fights.
There is almost bound to be fights in your host family or amongst friends. Maybe you are not involved in them, or maybe you are, either way it's always a bit complicated. And very uncomfortable. There's so many things I've done wrong, because things are handled differently here and I wasn't aware of my mistakes before making them. I just have to learn from them. I've certainly learned to apologize and admit my mistakes here.

9. Not having the option of getting mad at someone
Goes with the fights. I might get annoyed at times to someone, but I kind of feel like I better keep it quiet if it really isn't a problem that effects my well being. I can't get mad at my host family even if I get annoyed, because that would just cause more problems and since I'm the exchange student, I really don't want to break any relationships or make things more complicated than before. I feel really bad if I've made someone mad or sad, so there's that too. I just have to suck it up and live with things. Most of the times they are not worth getting mad for.

10. Money.
Exchange year costs money, a lot of it. On top of that, many of us don't have that much money to begin with. Rotary makes two trips here but of course they cost a fair amount of money, and I'm not sure if I'm able to go and make the North trip. I really, really want to, but I'm afraid I can't.

11. Sad days.
There is bound to be sad days. You might miss your family, friends, pet, country - hell, even food. You might feel frustrated about the language, or feel lonely, or maybe you don't even know why you are sad. Just know that it is okay to feel those things. No-one is saying exchange year is easy, it's not supposed to be. Cry, if you need to, but make sure you pick yourself up sooner or later and keep going. Make tough changes if you really feel unhappy. It's not easy, but it'll be worth it.

12. When I don't feel like trying.
There are days when I really want to stay at home and not do anything. Struggle is part of my everyday life, and sometimes I'd just rather not face the struggles, even though outside my comfort zone is where the magic happens.

13. Lazyness & procrastination.
Everyone reading or personally knowing me knows this is my biggest weakness, which I've been trying hard to get rid of. I don't want to look back and curse myself for being lazy and not getting awesome things done.

14. Gaining/losing weight and skin problems.
I've made extra effort not to weigh myself and to this day I've stayed away from the pharmacy scales. I've probably gained weight, but I really don't want to miserable because of some stupid numbers on a scale. That is not how happiness is supposed to be measured. The food is different in our host countries and we do things differently so weight gain or loss is almost evident. Exchange students go through a lot of stress, which results as lot of sleeping, food cravings and kortisol levels rising (which makes us gain weight). There's so much things that can cause changes in our body, but a year is just a year. Enjoy the food you like. You never know when will be the next time you get to eat those delicious alfajores after your exchange year. 

15. Self-confidence & self-doubt.
I've had periods when I feel so crappy about myself and how I look and even my freaking personality. I've doubted myself and scolded myself, pushing myself down when I should be encouraging myself to work harder. It's just one of the things I've had to work on consciously and tell myself what really matters and how things really are. We humans tend to be so hard on ourselves, when most of it is just in our heads. We are consumed by the ideas of perfection we get blind sometimes.

16. Having to break to get stronger.
There are days I feel like I've had enough of this struggle, or I've embarrassed myself enough, or I've done a mistake and feel so bad about it. There are days I feel like I'm a complete desastre, a failed exchange student, and what else. Or maybe I'm just going through a longer phase, not feeling that bad, but not that god either - just hanging in there. But I remind myself I will be stronger. I am already stronger. Whatever happens, in the end I will come out of it as a stronger person. 

17. Host families & changing them.
Change can be good or bad. To me it was good. I loved my first host family, but in the second one I got a fresh start and get to try again with all the lessons learned in the first host family. I think to me the change was easy, like I already explained at my previous post, so I got easy on this one. Still, it's not nice to leave a host family and a house that has become dear to you.

18. Having to be my own motivator, comfort blanket, support myself, do everything by myself. Nobody is making me do anything. I'm the only one responsible of me. I need to find the motivation in me and reason things to myself. I need to be the one holding myself together. It is hard, so hard, and lonely, but it is necessary to me. I need to be able to live my own life, on my own, without depending on other people.

19. Regret.
There is so many things I regret. Sometimes I question if exchange year is worth this all, but then I laugh at myself. Of course it is. It is so much more worth it than any tears and pain I might feel. Regret isn't a nice or comfortable feeling, but I think regret is a necessary feeling. You learn a lot from the things you regret. And in the end, I tend to regret things I didn't do more than my mistakes.

20. Having to go back.
This thought gets me both excited and scared every time. I want to see everyone back home, I want to go back and see how I handle life with all the things I've learned during my exchange year. I want to go and do so many things that have been on hold.
In the same time, I'm gonna leave so much behind. I have two homes, two families, and so many friends here. On top of that there is my exchange friends, especially Ian and Amandine. I'm so used to have those two around me that not having them near is a foreign thought, a scary thought. After my exchange year, nothing will be the same again. I will never get this exchange year back. Every exchange student scattered around the world, of course I can go and see them but it won't be the same. Same goes with my life in Finland - most of the people I've studied my whole life have graduated about a month before I return, and I still got one year left. I have my big finals, I will have to start thinking of my future. Everything I put on hold in Finland are becoming more relevant now.
But guess that's just life. It keeps going on no matter what.