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Great question! My breaking point came in my 3rd year when my boyfriend (now husband) had gone out of state to grad school and I was spending every Tuesday night in lengthy chapter discussions over what should the party favor be... t-shirts? Sweatshirts? Jackets? Should they be green? Red? Green for the actives and red for the pledges? Should they have our letters or spell out our name? Should actives have the letters on a red t-shirt and the pledges spell out our name on green t-shirts? This seemed to go on for hours with some girls getting very worked up about the issue.
I was privately grieving the loss of my boyfriend, the stresses of my classes and conflicts within my family. Sorority life started to seem petty and ridiculous. I began withdrawing... leaving meetings as soon as they were over... skipping parties with fraternities, etc... I decided that I didn't want to have to pay dues to a group that was making me bonkers. A few months later I left school all together and got married a few months after that.
I don't regret leaving school or getting married, but I wish I had approached my sorority concerns differently. There was much more to my group than party favor debates. I should have let my friends know what I was going through. I thought they were too busy with their own lives to be concerned about mine... but that was not fair to them. They had been there for me before and I there for them... but this time I withdrew.
I should have used my time apart from my boyfriend to get more involved in my sorority, not less. It could have been a good distraction and brought me closer to my sisters. It sure would have beat sitting at home writing long, boring letters to him. (This was in the days before the Internet!)
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