Back home, your parents have bragged to everyone they know that their child is a college student. “The first in the family!,” they say. Now, you’re sitting at your desk in a dorm room miles away from home. You’re staring down at the pile of work ahead of you, and you start to wonder, “Can I really do this?” Being the first in your family to go to college is an exciting, stressful and oftentimes confusing experience. On the one hand, your family is proud of you and excited that you’re pursuing a higher education. On the other hand, they worry, realizing that you are the first to delve into new territory. Here are nine struggles first-generation college students experience that their peers probably don’t.

1. Identity Crisis.

Now that you have spent some time away from your family, you realize that your perceptions of the world have begun to change. You don’t hold all the same political and social beliefs your parents do, which could become a problem when you mention this on visits back home. At the same time, you also have a different perspective of life than some of your peers on campus. You have grown up differently than your friends who were raised by college grads. You begin to take on a double life, one in which you don’t fully belong in either place.

2. Lack of Options

Your parents aren’t alumni to a college, so you’re not expected to apply anywhere in particular. You weren’t taken on many college trips growing up. In reality, your hometown is all you’ve ever known. On the bright side, the college you eventually choose to attend is a result of your own individual research and preference.

3. Why You’re Going to College

College may not have always been a given path for you growing up. You may have decided to go to college so that you can get a job that will help your family financially. You might have seen your parents work physically laborious jobs and wanted something different for yourself. You may be trying to set a good example for the younger members of your family, or maybe you just wanted more education than was provided to the generations before you. Whatever the reason, this was not automatically the next phase to your life, but a decision that had to be made.

4. Lack of Support

Sure, everyone back home is rooting for you, but you don’t exactly have too many people to ask for advice. You after all, are the first! Other students have the experience of their parents and others to guide them through their college years. You, on the other hand, are learning as you go.

5. You feel like a role model

Being the first can be tough. Every decision you make further reflects the college experience to your older family members, who have never gone, and your younger family members, who could possibly follow in your footsteps. Your younger siblings are looking up to you. You now have an example to set for everyone back home.

6. Guilt

Many first-generation students come from low-income families. You know how hard your parents work to earn a living, and when financial aid and scholarships aren’t enough, that tuition price can leave you feeling pretty awful. While you’re enjoying your newfound freedom and college experience, guilt always lingers in the back of your mind. This can be seen as just one more thing to keep you motivated to do your best.

7. Working

While many of your friends spent their summer studying abroad or in an internship, you were working to pay off a part of your loans.

8. You feel the need to choose an occupation that will pay a lot of money

College is expensive, and saying you’re going to college for self-exploration is not an acceptable reason for your parents. You feel the need to major in something that will make all the loans and long hours of studying worth it, so you go for a job that can help your family financially in the long run. Some students find that they enjoy their major, while others quickly realize they’re not where they want to be. Telling your parents you want to major in something that will give you a lower paying salary is hard, but necessary when determining what is best for you.

9. Recognizing that you’re a first-generation can help or hurt you

Not knowing what to expect can be scary, especially when it seems that everyone around you knows what they’re doing and you don’t. However, being able to say you’re a “first-generation” can be your sense of motivation. Working through obstacles that others haven’t had to surpass on their own is what has made you work this hard. Now that you have gotten this far. Consider this the label that will keep you driven to finish your degree!