Opinion: I’m studying in the U.S., my family is in Italy. Every day is filled with mutual, gut-wrenching worry

WASHINGTON — I was supposed to be home in Italy for my spring break. Instead, as my parents are self-quarantining in our house near Milan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in Italy, I am stranded in Washington, D.C., self-isolating in college housing more than 4,000 miles away from them.

I want to go home, but I’m afraid to do so.

As a perpetual international student, I am no stranger to homesickness. I moved to the U.S. last June for a master’s in journalism