lonely campus podcast

Just a quick message for our listeners. The following podcast discusses issues of substance abuse. Please use discretion when listening. Following the podcast, we will provide some campus resources available to students.

Hi. I'm Mary Grace Almandrez, the vice president for diversity and inclusion. Welcome to the lonely campus podcast as presented by the office of diversity and inclusion. This show is hosted by our administrative fellow, Amy Messersmith, and features students just like you who share stories about the challenges and triumphs that come with trying to find your place on Syracuse University's campus.

Hi, everybody. This is Amy Messersmith. I'm an associate director for Trio Student Support Services here at Syracuse University. And I am also one of the administrative fellows for the office of diversity and inclusion. And my proposed project is a pop up podcasting studio focused on a podcast called Lonely Campus.

And the thought behind Lonely Campus was to create a podcast where we collected students' stories that we could share with incoming students who might be feeling some degree of loneliness so they can, number 1, know that they're not the only ones who felt like that here on campus. And number 2, learn about the steps that students took to find community on campus. And so I'm super excited to be here with student veteran, Andrew Hooper. Welcome.

Thank you for having me.

Andrew, do you mind just sharing a little bit about who you are, your background, anything you're comfortable, letting us know about your story?

So my name is Andrew Hooper. I graduated high school in 2014. I did one semester of college at a community college back home in New Hampshire. I decided I wasn't quite ready for college, and I withdrew from classes my 2nd semester, and I ended up joining the United States Army. And I went active duty for, I think it was about 6 years 9 months total time in service before I was, medically retired.

I got out as a sergeant and that kind of flipped my world upside down being that my time in the service was over before I wanted it to be over, so it was hard for me and I felt kind of alone and needed a new niche in my life and went to a couple of different colleges, didn't really find what I was looking for, or they didn't offer a 4 year degree. And I'm now here at SU getting a degree in communications, And I'm on this podcast to hopefully shed some light and help out whoever needs to hear anything and need help, and hopefully I can help.

It's interesting thinking about how student veterans come to campus with a different kind of backstory than your traditional undergraduate student. I wanted to ask, is there anything that you would like traditional students to know about the student veteran experience?

It's it's definitely a little weird. I've met some absolutely brilliant undergrad students who can hold a extremely high level conversation, and and I've also met undergrad students who are very politically incorrect and kinda hard to talk to, and they're very judgmental more or less. So the experiences that I've received have varied exponentially to the point where it's kinda hard to say one way or the other. It's kind of a mixed bag of people not enjoying the fact that I'm a veteran or saying I don't belong somewhere, and then people that really just wanna have a conversation about me seeing that I am a student veteran, and I'm not a freshman in college coming straight from high school. I did almost 7 years in the service.

I'm turning 28 this year. So for me, it's kind of a mixed bag of good and bad.

Interesting. So thinking about and you went into this a little bit, but can you go into a little bit more detail in terms of your story about how you ended up at SU?

So when I initially got out of the service in 2022, I wanted to go to SU because it's the number one college in the country for veterans returning to college. And my mentality was in the whole time of the service was if I'm gonna set myself up for success, I need to set myself up for the highest level of success. And with Syracuse being the number one college in the country for veterans returning to school, my mentality was why not go there to set myself up for the highest level of success and the most resources that I will be able to use while in school. And it ended up with a long conversation with my girlfriend at the time, now fiance, with her going into her doctorate program when she graduated her undergrad program. She got accepted to a handful of colleges, and she ended up deciding to go to Syracuse University for a doctorate program.

And I, unfortunately, did not get accepted, my first application to SU because of my previous grades from the community college back in New Hampshire. So I ended up doing 2 semesters at OCC. I loved it there. The veterans office was awesome. The people there were great.

The certifying official, Steve White over at OCC. I had so many conversations with him about my mental health and just anything school related and personal related, and he was a phenomenal person to talk to and have an ear for you to talk to. And then I ended up transferring to ESF where I didn't get the warmest of welcomes, kinda got pushed out of there. I was told I didn't belong there by faculty and students, which it was unfortunate because I, at the time, I wanted to get a degree in wildlife sciences because I love the outdoors. I love the wildlife.

I love to hunt. I love to fish. But after my experience there, I decided against it for how I was being treated, and I already knew for a fact I wanted to come to SU from the day I got out of the service. And this is my 1st full semester here at Syracuse University.

Do you mind sharing a little bit about what you imagined SU to be like before you came?

So when me and my fiance came out here and drove around while she was touring her doctorate program, We drove around Syracuse University a little bit and I was kind of amazed of how big it was not knowing that majority of the classes were right here around the dome around the what is the quad called right there?

It is named after somebody. Hold on.

I didn't know that all the classes were just basically surrounding the quad. I thought I would be having a walk all the way across campus, like, a 20 minute walk to to a class, and then 20 minutes back the other direction for another class. So I'm kind of relieved that I'm not doing 20 minute walks to get to each individual class where it's just a walk across the quad and I'm at my next class.

It is Syracuse University's Kenneth A Shaw Quadrangle. K. The official term.

But I've been happy living here in Syracuse. I mean, the best fishing of my life has been in upstate when I was at the 10th mountain division, so I'm happy to keep fishing in the spots that I did when I was still in the service. I'm still close to my brothers that are still up at Fort Drum, and I will hang out with them on occasion when they're not in a training cycle or when they're not on deployment, but I'm definitely ready to be out of New York.

Your first few days on campus as a student, do you mind describing what that experience was, especially coming in from a non traditional perspective?

I kinda tackle anything new the same way. Especially being in school, I I try to set myself at the front of the class because I know how I am as a student, and if I'm tempted by goofing off or playing on my phone sitting in the back of the class, I'm gonna do that. Unfortunately, I know myself pretty well. So I purposefully set myself in the front of the classroom or the front row of the lecture hall, so my temptations to not pay attention are as limited as possible. And then more often than not, I'll sit quietly, and I'll more or less observe the people around me, how they're acting.

I'll look for people that may or may not be a veteran as well as myself, and kinda go from there with the dynamics that I'm seeing among the people, the clicks. Like, in a couple of my classes, I have, like, part of the football team, basketball players. So I've slowly but surely started seeing all of the clicks in all of my classes.

It's interesting to hear how the the role of observation has come into play as a student coming into a new environment Mhmm. And how, you know, this idea of reading the room and kind of getting the feel for the different dynamics. I think that's what a lot of students do, but I would imagine coming with your background, it means something a little different.

I agree. And I mean, my job in the army was a forward observer. So I've gotten pretty decent at just observing and just trying to see the clicks. Who are friends? Who's not friends?

Who's kinda just sitting by themself? And usually, it's me sitting by myself because I'm, like, more or less the old man in class. I only have one class, and it's actually Ebony's class, freshman year seminar or 1st year seminar 101. And there's actually 2 veterans from Fort Drum up at 10th mountain that are in the class with me, and it's nice to have a a veteran or 2 in the classes with me to build a friendship sitting next to I mean, we're all definitely old enough to drink, so get a beer on the weekend. But that's the only one that I know of that I have fellow veterans within the class with me, and me and them have had multiple conversations about Fort Drum, about deployment, about our GI Bill benefits, about our classes, our degree paths.

So it's it's been refreshing to have at least one class with veterans whereas more often than not I am the only veteran in the class and I am the oldest student within the class next to probably the professor being older than me more often than not. But the TAs, I'm older than the TAs, so the dynamic's a little weird, But and at the end of the day, I'm here to learn. I'm here to get a degree. Your age doesn't bother me as long as you are teaching me what I need to be taught within the class.

That kind of segues pretty smoothly into the next question because the name of this podcast is called Lonely Campus. At what point did you realize that you were experiencing feelings of loneliness, or at what point were you aware that you were missing a sense of belonging here?

So ever since I got out of the service back in February 2022, the sense of loneliness has kinda always been there. Because being in the service for that long and being around the same people so often and going on training exercises and just being in really crappy situations with your teammates who eventually turn to brothers because of you're all in the same situation together out in the field, whether it's rain, snow, hurricane, tornado, you're in it with them, and you build these friendships, these bonds that just, like, kind of more or less last forever. And then the army or the military in general has a funny way of dismantling those friendships with, oh, this person's getting PCS to a different duty station. This person's getting out of the army. Me, it was, I'm getting medically retired.

And I know I'm not the only veteran that feels this, but a lot of veterans and soldiers when they're in, they didn't really have a good family life before they joined. I was fortunate enough to have a good family life growing up as a kid with my folks and my older sister, but the family that I made while I was in is it's family that's not blood. It's family that you made over hardships, over trauma, over training exercises, over nights at the bar, fights. You you name it. It didn't matter what walk of life you were from, skin color.

It it didn't matter. You it's a family that you made. And when you leave the service, you lose that family because you're no longer around them all day, every day. You're you're alone. And that's still something that I do struggle with from time to time, but having my fiance there with me it it helps a lot.

But I still kind of feel that that gap within me that hole that when I got out it is now void. And I I truly don't know if that void will ever be filled again. I mean, I just I try to just keep myself busy with school, with work, with planning a wedding, so that emptiness is kind of quiet at the moment because of just how busy life is at the moment. But I know when life quiets down, it's another story. But I have a good support system with my family.

I have a good support system with my fiance, Steve White at OCC, which is my first veterans counselor returning to school. I've had so many conversations with him about this topic with getting out of the service and just not having a purpose and trying to find a new niche in life. So talking about it helps.

The understanding that I'm not the only one that is dealing with this and trying to find people that have the same feeling as me and helping them is kinda what I wanna do.

What would you say a sense of belonging feels like to you? How might you describe that, and how do you know that you found it?

That's a really good question. That's that's a hard one to describe with a sense of belonging. Like, when me and my fiancee are home, we have both of our families together, we're hanging out, having a few drinks at my parents' pool, Life just kinda slows down, more or less. And I don't know, it makes you feel warm inside. And then I can also relate it to my time in the service with the saying, he who shed blood is he who becomes family.

So you build these families through trauma, through tragedy, through hardship, and then you're just kinda bonded for life. And I still have my brothers that are still in the service or have gotten out, and they live in Texas or Colorado or still in New York. I still talk to them probably about weekly, give or take. Sometimes more, sometimes less. But being in the service doing my job, I ever since I was a child, I I wanted to be in the service.

Like, that was my calling, that was my belonging, And I got I got pretty good at my job. I loved it till the day I got out, not by choice, but because my body just more or less failed to recuperate and heal and keep being able to push forward. So I lost that sense of belonging, and I haven't quite found that same level of belonging for day to day.

This next question answered to whatever degree you feel comfortable, but I'm curious if you don't mind talking a little bit about how you go about coping with feelings of loneliness or a lack of sense of belonging.

So if this was 5, 6 years ago, the answer would have been copious amounts of alcohol and just get so drunk to the point where you just forget everything for a little while, and you just don't feel anything. And that led me down a very bad path, turned into alcohol abuse on the daily for 6 months. Drug abuse, lots of cocaine for a while, and this was all while I was in the service. So I I got very lucky. I should be dead 10 times over from the way I was coping, getting in fights every weekend, copious amounts of drugs.

Not a great way to cope. Definitely did some damage, physically, mentally. I definitely caused some damage to my liver, to my mental state, damaged relationships with family members. So that type of coping is is bad. Yeah.

In the moment, it's it you're like, oh, it's just it's a quick release. You feel good for a while, and then the effects wear off, and you're right back where you started. So that level of coping is atrociously bad, which I don't drink often anymore. I I just I don't I don't do drugs, which I'm very happy about. I still love my alcohol.

I still drink every now and again, but more on a social standpoint versus grabbing a bottle and drinking the bottle to my my dome every night. And the way I cope now is I'll tell my fiance, like, hey. Like, let's go for a drive. Let's go for a walk, a bike ride. Like, I'm gonna go fishing.

Do you wanna come with me? You can read your books while I fish. My coping now is more a healthy outlet with exercise or hiking or I love to fish. So I'm happy that spring is finally here, and I can finally go fishing again because I'm not much of a nice fisherman. But my biggest coping for me is fishing.

And that's my one big thing where I can just go, I don't care if I catch anything, if I'm having a bad day I can just disappear for a little while, cast a line, and just kind of zen out more or less. So for me my biggest coping is fishing, and that's my healthiest form of an outlet for trying to cope with any kind of tragic event that's happened in my life to where I don't regress back to what I used to do for coping.

I'm really happy you found that or that you rediscovered it. So thinking about your life here now at SU, and I know you're just getting towards the end of your 1st full semester here, so it's a little fresh. Mhmm. But do you mind sharing any steps you might have taken to figure out the spaces and places on campus where you do have a sense of belonging here?

So if I'm being honest, I don't I do my classes and I go home. I don't prolong my stay on campus. I wanna get home. I wanna take care of my cat, get dinner ready. Me and my fiance have a cat who has seizures, so I don't wanna be away from the cat for super long periods of time.

I have a life outside of school, so I try to I mean, we have an apartment, so I wanna get home, make like, tidy up the apartment if it needs to be tidied up, clean the cap box. So it's not like I'm 18, 19 years old, 20 years old, living on campus in a dorm or a dorm apartment, if that's what it's called, on, Euclid Street with all those kind of apartment buildings for students, or an off campus housing. Our own landlord paying rent, utilities, the whole nine. So for me, I don't linger on campus unless I'm, like, in between classes. On Fridays, I have a 4 hour gap, and I go down to the vet center and I hang out.

I'll grab lunch, watch some TV on my laptop. But when my classes are done, my Mondays, Wednesdays, my classes are just back to back to back, so I can leave right after. Show up, go to my classes, done with class, go home. Because, like, that is more or less, like, my safe place with my soon to be wife, my our cat, the TV, my video games, Wi Fi, like, that is my more or less zen place. I do my homework sitting on the couch.

I'm with my laptop on the ottoman all hunched over like the hunchback of Notre Dame, and Kendra gets all upset with me telling me to sit at the table and I'm gonna hurt my back. I don't listen. I'm stubborn.

Do you mind talking a little bit about the vet building?

The veteran building is it's one, it's it's gorgeous. It is very aesthetically pleasing to look at, and I actually just found this out this past week that there is a turf field up in the top center of the building. What? I don't know how to explain this without, like, using my hands, but the walls kinda go around, and then it's hollow in the center with a turf field and they have cookouts, tailgates, and I've never been up there, but that was just brought to my attention a few days ago.

That sounds really cool.

And I think that's kinda cool. But the veteran center is really is really good. There's a lot of people within that building that are educated on your GI Bill benefits, on student veteran programs. There's there's a lot within that building. And if somebody can't give you an answer, there's somebody in that building that knows it and will help you achieve what it is that you're trying to achieve.

Do you mind sharing a little bit about what your postgraduate plans are?

Initially, I wanted to go into, fish and game, like a department like DEC, Department of Environmental Control.

That makes sense.

And

there's a TV show actually based off of my home state, fish and game. It's called, Northwoods Law. And with how much I love the outdoors, I love to hunt, I love to fish. I was like, oh, I'm gonna be a fish and game warden. Yeah.

No. My body, my body can't handle that because for I wanted to go federal, but there's only, I think, 300 giver. I think it's around 300, maybe it's 500. I'm not entirely sure on the number for federal fish and game wardens in the country. So the likelihood of me being able to secure that a slot, it's pretty slim.

And for a state fish and game warden, it's 25 years for a pension.

Oh, wow.

That's a long time, and that's manual work. I got medically retired from manual work, so I had to come to a swift realization that it's not possible for me to do that and be healthy through the whole thing, unfortunately. So I've talked to my father about this. He's a financial adviser, and he said if you wanna do it, you need a college degree first. He's like that's the only way they'll look at you for the hiring process, so that's why I'm here.

Get my college degree, so they'll look at me for the hiring process, and then hopefully at the end of the day get hired and become a financial advisor. So I can help people in a different aspect, set them up financially for the rest of their life, their retirement, they wanna buy a house, buy a car, how to save for that, how to save for their retirement. So they're not working when they're 70, 80 years old. It's helping people but in a different aspect than what I'm used to.

But still using your communication skills and Yeah. The things you're gonna build on while you're you're in CRS.

Agreed. Yeah. Because a lot of this job is selling yourself, making friends, having people trust you with their life savings. So it's a lot of it's a big jump in the trust aspect, and having your clients trust you enough and be close enough with you to they'll tell you about their medical history. And from what I've gathered, my father knows more about them than any singular person besides their family members.

So being able to be to be trusted by your clients, the people that you are trying to help, That that feels good to me knowing that I'm gonna hopefully go into this field if I get hired, and helping people set themselves up for life to make sure that they can succeed financially through their lives and have enough money at a certain age that they wanna retire. So for me, it's a different way of helping people. But at the end of the day, I just wanna help people succeed and achieve what they want or however you wanna help people. There's always a way to help somebody. Whether you know it or not, there's always a way.

A 100%. Finally, what words of encouragement or advice do you have for incoming students who might be experiencing similar feelings of loneliness and isolation? And if you don't mind, speak directly to them and give them your words of wisdom. And this can be directed towards any population that you wish. If you wanna focus on student veterans, you can.

If you wanna address any incoming student, you're welcome.

Okay. I would say for student veterans, find one thing that you can go do that makes you happy where it doesn't matter if what you're doing succeeds. Like, for me, it's fishing. Find one thing, just one thing where you can go do. You can be in a true zen state where you can be happy and all of your worries and all of the bullcrap just kinda disappears even if it's for a little bit, that one thing.

For incoming freshmen, sophomores that are 18, 19, 20 years old, don't be afraid to seek help, and the same goes for student veterans. Don't be afraid to seek help. It's not weakness. It's not bad. If you are struggling, reach out and let people know, Because the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make a drink.

I can't make you reach out for help. No. Nobody can. But if you can't help yourself, then the people around you that care about you can't help you. So reaching out for help, finding something that brings you joy and brings you happiness, and being safe, and finding healthy coping mechanisms is gonna be your greatest friend and advantage going through college.

Because college is going to get it's gonna get hard, it's gonna get fast, your classes are gonna become more and more intense the higher level of classes that you get, and if you decide to go doctorate it's only gonna get more intricate. So finding a healthy coping mechanism whether it's going to the gym, or going on a walk at the park, or going fishing or going hunting. It's finding something that brings you happiness and joy where you can disappear for a little while and just kind of be. And finding time for you time is the biggest thing, and that's something that I struggle with is finding time for myself, Andrew time. I struggle finding me time because of just how busy life can get.

And I know that now that spring's here, I'm definitely gonna do a better job of finding me time so I can go fishing. But over, like, the fall and the winter when when there's not a lot to do with fishing because of just the change in weather, and I don't have access to deeper water where usually the fish will be in cold weather. So there's not a lot of me time going along during the fall, winter, and the very early stages of spring, but spring, summer, early fall, I'm fishing. And I I have I have my happy place back. And I during the winter, I definitely have some true cabin fever.

Just watching fishing videos trying to get out. So my biggest words is find a healthy coping mechanism and reaching out for help when you need it and swallowing your pride to reach out for help.

I think that is so important. Andrew, thank you so much. This has been a pleasure. I really appreciate you sharing your story.

Of course. Thank you for having me.

Awesome. Alright. Bye, everybody. Before we end this podcast, we wanted to let you know that if you are a Syracuse University student who is or knows someone who is struggling with substance abuse, there are a variety of resources and services available at the Barnes Center, including counseling, substance free programming, and group therapies. For more information, please call 315-443-8000.

Be alright. You're gonna be alright. You're gonna be alright. You're gonna be alright.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the lonely campus podcast. I'm Armando Martinez, director of inclusion and belonging. If you found this podcast helpful, let us know and feel free to share other ways we can make campus more welcoming and inclusive to all. Thank you.

You're gonna be alright. you're gonna be alright. you're gonna be alright.