Friendships between women, as any woman will tell you, are built of a thousand small kindnesses... swapped back and forth and over again.
Making a genuine connection with another person does help to counteract all this loneliness. And I'm not talking about making Instagram or Facebook "friends" here, but rather one-on-one, face-to-face, IRL relationships. These are what open us to the actual lives of others, not just the filtered and curated existences we're likely to encounter online. In a true friendship, you remove your filters.
Finding and maintaining healthy friendships may not always be the easiest undertaking, especially now that a pandemic has made casual interactions more fraught, but the benefits have been well-established. If you have strong social ties, research shows that you are likely to live longer and with less stress. Scientists have linked having a robust social support system to lower rates of depression, anxiety, and heart disease. Even small social interactions--the kind you have while buying a cup of coffee or out walking a dog--have been shown to boost mental health and create stronger ties inside a community.
The fact is, with every friendship you make, and every bond of trust you establish, you are shaping the image of America projected to the rest of the world. That is so important. So when you study abroad, you're actually helping to make America stronger.