When I entered college as a freshman in 2018 I was in a relationship with someone who was older than me and attending a different university.

I spent most of my free time with him, and while my peers at LSU were going to first-year events and making friends, I was busy hanging out with my then-boyfriend and his friends…all of whom had already done those things and were no longer interested. 

Two years later, when our relationship finally ended and the dust began to settle, I looked around only to realize I hadn’t made the kinds of social and professional connections my peers had. By prioritizing my relationship over everything else, I’d missed out on — well — everything else.  

After opening up about my experience recently on social media, I was overwhelmed to find that many people I knew had gone through something similar. 

We shared our regrets about spending too much time with our romantic partners and too little time meeting new people and building new relationships. Of course this won’t ring true for everyone in a romantic relationship, but the fact remains — building a diverse social circle of friends and colleagues often plays a huge role in a college student’s success, and being in a serious romantic relationship can take away from that. 

When you’re in a serious relationship in college, you might turn down invitations to social events on campus to spend time with your partner or even avoid making certain connections through fear of making your partner jealous. There’s an even greater chance of this when your partner attends a different university or is not a student at all.

“When viewed through a social lens, the relationships that students build and maintain during their college experiences also influence retention rates,” says Lindsay Wayt, whose 2012 study with the University of Nebraska found a positive correlation between students’ social interactions and their academic performance.

In short, your romantic relationship could actually be affecting your GPA. 

But it’s not all about grades. What about the impact on your mental health? The University of Texas at Austin conducted a study on the stresses of romantic relationships and students. Ultimately, research showed that stress caused by a romantic relationship can have more of an impact on a person’s wellbeing than that of any other kind of relationship.

“Problems in relationships are one of the leading reasons for why college students seek counseling at university mental health centers,” said Briana Linda Liu, M.A. 

Indeed, the majority of incoming college students are in the process of transitioning from adolescence to early adulthood. This is a huge transition and needs to be taken more seriously with regard to understanding and treating students’ mental health concerns. 

Many are living away from home for the first time, single handedly managing their personal finances and being held to a higher academic standard than ever before, all while having to make important decisions about the future. The responsibility of a serious romantic relationship only adds to that strain. 

Even if you think you can handle the stress of being in a serious romantic relationship on top of everything else that comes with being a college student, it’s simply not worth it. Being single during your early college years opens the door to more social opportunities which will further your success as a student. 

College is a time for young people to branch out and have new experiences. It marks the beginning of an era of newfound freedom and responsibility. Your earliest college years are a period of self-discovery, one that shouldn’t be influenced by the distractions of being in a relationship.

Olivia James is a 20-year-old Political Science junior from Baton Rouge, Louisiana.