What it means to have a best friend who is 2500 miles away from you.

What is it like when you have a long-distance friend? Not one you that you met online and plan to meet up with one day. Your best friend who you once were inseparable with prior to picking up and leaving for what feels like another world.

I decided to call mine up with a brilliant idea for an article, a 'no holds barred' type of article, that we would write together, and below is the result. We didn't write at the same time, and I had no idea what she could possibly write. I highly encourage best friends in this type of situation to do something like this because a lot more comes out than you think will, even if it doesn't actually make it into the final copy because it's too personal.

Debi and I, once we officially met, hit it off instantly, which is something I can only say about a very small handful of other people. As soon as we hung out that first time we had each others numbers, Facebook, everything possible to get in touch with each other because we wanted to hang out again. I won't lie, I was a bit skeptical because there is a bit of an age difference, and what 20-something-year-old doesn't have immature qualities about them? Needless to say, I was trying to seem more mature until she called me out on it and could tell I wasn't being me. We both were able to be ourselves with each other and everything just worked; until I said I was leaving. There was this constant feeling around us of "we aren't going to be with each other anymore, what is going to happen, and why?" that unfortunately didn't go away no matter what we did. It's hard being this far away from each other and I hope that the rest of this article can help you to understand that.

1. Texts come in at strange times.

H: Whether it’s 9pm here and 12am there or getting that 2am good morning text when it's 5am there; time zones have no shame in proving how much they suck.

D: Always forgetting she is 3 hours behind my time, my 7am and her 4am would just so happen to be those times I needed to talk to her most.

2. Snap-streaks save your lives.

H: Snapchat has become an essential tool. I don't know about you, but I get excited when I get the ghost notification and it's from her. It just brightens up my day even if it's just a 10 second clip of a song that makes us think about the other person (queue See You Again and Shut Up And Dance).

D: I never know what I'm going to see/hear when it comes to a Snapchat notification from her. Lots of times they are just what I need to put that smile on my face, even in the worst of moods.

3. Video chats become what used to be normal hang outs.

H: Not that anything is normal when it comes to talking to your best friend through a computer screen instead of when you would sit in the bedroom all night instead of sleeping. We really were just as bad if not worse than teenage girls when it came to that. But as much as you try and make it seem okay, it's really not.

D: Although video chat doesn't happen nearly as often as either of us would like, they still aren't the same as having her right there beside me. I don't think anything could ever equal that feeling. After all I can't slap her when she says something so stupid that just makes me crack up laughing….and choking on my cappuccino. That definitely deserves the smack.

4. Phone calls seem to last longer.

H: These seem to be one of those ‘few and far between' type things that make you realize how much you miss the person's voice.

D: Yeah, the phone calls last longer but knowing they aren't going to end in “meet me in the kitchen” or “see you in 20 minutes” that makes them so much harder to have to begin with. Sometimes being busy and missing her call somehow felt better than hearing her voice and missing her more than I already had.

5. Not talking makes you think your friendship is now over

H: I am definitely the culprit of this one. However, it was the first time we hadn't talked for a while and it was a few months all at one time. I later learned and realized that it was one of those times where we both needed each other to be there in person and because we weren't that's what affected everything.

D: You end up wondering if she's forgotten about you. Especially in your extreme “I need my bestie” moments. I catch myself thinking she's found a new friend or started a new “sistaship” if you will. But if I listen to my heart and the screaming that goes on in my head, I know she could never replace me nor I her.

6. You take it more serious than a long distance relationship.

H: We call it a "sistaship," as in a sista relationship. We take our time very serious when it comes to the other person and we are the other person's missing half.

Without a doubt it is like we are living life with a huge chunk of ourselves missing because we are separated. And to tie in the last point, during that break of not talking I messaged her and told her it felt like we broke up even though we weren't dating. #realtruth.

D: Feeling like you're out of the loop and you have no idea what is going on in each other's lives does really feel like it's the end of everything we had. Like we are now exes and are no longer on speaking terms all because you missed a whole month of even just one text.

7. You wish you had the other person's weather forecast.

H: I grew up on the East Coast where we would have 4 seasons rather than the two seasons we have here in Las Vegas. Currently back home, there is snow on the ground, something I have only seen from a distance in the past year and a half. So when we talk she says she wants my 80° weather and I tell her she can only have it if I get her snow.

D: She can totally have the snow, the freezing cold winds. Give me those 12am nights in a swimming pool. I'll take em.

8. Your shoulder to cry on becomes a computer screen.

H: Everyone (okay maybe not everyone, but no judgement here if you have) has cried because of something you watched on TV or YouTube. But when it's through a screen to your best friend it's a whole different experience. It makes you miss those times where you would cry and your best friend would be there hugging you and saying something ridiculous just to get you to laugh.

D: I end up talking to an action figure we had both found while on a random New Jersey trip. Bob Booey is his name. He's a good listener, but he's definitely not her.

9. The kids seem to grow up so much faster.

H: I don't have any kids, but she does and it feels like every time I see them they have grown up so much making my heart break. Those are the times you wish you had a remote like in Click to pause time so they stop growing up.

D: The kids never stop asking when she is coming home. They miss her just as much as I do. She will always be part of our family, she will always be their Aunt.

10. Life is totally different without each other... one of the truest meanings of incomplete

H: The year and a half we have been separated has been by far one of the worst times I personally have ever faced. I can't speak for her but I know it is very hard being apart. Before I moved, we did everything together, went everywhere together and experienced everything alongside each other. I lived with her for the last few months of being in Pennsylvania and we became even closer than we thought we could. Right before I moved, I had the unfortunate situation of losing my great-grandmother. I was completely shattered by this even though we knew it was coming. I did not know how to function and my family wasn't living near me. I had my best friend and her family to get me through it. I left shortly after all the services still not being myself but knowing I needed to be with my family. Little did both of us know that in that moment was the start of life completely changing. Since I have moved we have in total dealt with more losses than we can count on one hand, more personal struggles that we wanted nothing more to have the other person there, and more heartbreak than the two and a half years we were inseparable prior to this.

D: Life with her outweighs life without her, there is no doubt about that. Nothing has been the same since the day she got on that plane. It won't be the same until the day I see her face to face again. I don't know how long that will be, but I do know that no matter when it is I'll be waiting for her. Ready to dump my purse, pull out the nail polish and fill the table with makeup. It will be as though she never left.

(This was taken at the airport before I moved)

Final Thoughts:

H: Aside from the bad, life isn't the same when it comes to experiencing the fun aspects of life. The late night trips to WAWA for cappuccinos (it broke my heart to write that considering I don't have the option of that anymore), the trips to meet her boyfriend and spend a weekend in a new place, the seeing new things together. All of it is different now. Especially for me being in a completely new place, there is so much I want to say I got to see with her, and all I can do right now is send pictures or videos with the generic “wish you were here”.

You never realize how different life can be without someone in it until you are face to face with it. I strongly suggest you never ever take a friend for granted, you never hope and wait until you get to live your life without them, and you never forget about the moments you have shared with them. One day will come when you are standing outside looking at the sunset while talking to your best friend through video chatting saying “I wish you were here because I don't want to do this without you.” and it's those moments that make you realize that this specific friendship is the one that will last forever and this is the one person you will want by your side on your wedding day.

D: Growing up I’ve always hung out with the “guys”; I was never too fond of having female friends because drama always seemed to follow them. The very few female friends I did have didn’t really know me, they knew only what I let them see.

By the time I hit my 30’s I had been through more friends than shoes, none of them were trustworthy enough for me to consider them a best friend, most of them were merely friends by association. I had finally accepted the fact that I would never have that kind of friendship. I kept my true self to myself, no one would ever know the kind of person I really was.

In 2013 I had been at my boyfriend’s house, as I was walking through the living room I glanced over at this, younger than me, chic that was lounging on the couch giving me this dirty look. I gave a dirtier look while rolling my eyes and continued on my way. I never thought that girl would have such an impact on my life. Not much time passed before we would become connected at the hip. There wasn’t a day that had gone by that we didn’t talk to each other. We were closer than I ever thought I could be with a female friend. It was easy to get past the dirty looks that were exchanged because as it turned out she was just blind without her glasses on and couldn’t see me.

That friendship that I had always wanted and knew I needed, I found in her. She was there for me more than anyone had ever been. I was thrilled when she came to live with me. But that didn’t last long because she was moving across the country where she had family and as much as wanted to, I wouldn’t dare beg her to stay. Although, I knew if I had begged long enough she would’ve stayed and not just for me, but for my kids that she ended up becoming an Aunt to.

A few days before the expected leave date the ticket confirmation for the plane was in her email just waiting to be printed. I was more upset than I let on, but kept the majority of how I was feeling to myself. I made the most I could out of the time we had left and refuse to let it be anyone other than me that took her to the airport. The car ride to the airport was anything but silent and the goodbyes at the airport were quick. I couldn’t bring myself to watch her get on that plane. So I sat in the car and watched her walk through the airport until I couldn’t see her anymore. At that moment it hit me, she was gone, she really left.

It’s been almost 600 days since she has been gone. I couldn’t tell you how many days I sat alone and cried because I would catch myself turning to say something to her and she wasn’t there. The only one friend I could turn to and tell anything to no matter what it was. The days I needed to be there for her I beat myself up inside because I couldn’t. I never thought that I would be this close to a female friend that the things that happen in her life would affect me.

Never in my life would I have thought that this girl, who by the way, is 10 years younger than me, would be the one I would deem my “best friend”.