No matter how old you are, we have all been there. We have had what feels like a life-changing moment. We've all wept and cried of things others may think are stupid. Most importantly, at my age anyways, we have all been hurt. Some are heartbroken and others are just knocked down by a situation and trying to find a way to get back up.

The feeling in the pit of your stomach that you are aching to get rid of, to me, is the worst feeling in the world. The feeling of emptiness and the feeling of always being alone. You might not actually be alone physically; someone might be sitting right next to you, but, no matter where you're sitting in this room, you are all alone. Have you ever had this feeling before? Personally, my greatest fear is to be alone. Being alone gives the mind time to think and to wonder. When the mind wonders it is not always a good thing, you're not always thinking about all the good things in life. Being alone gives you time to truly think about the bad things, allows time for emotions to reach the surface.

Have you ever just looked up the words loneliness and emptiness on Google? The definitions you get when you search them are as given:

Loneliness:

1. "sadness because one has no friends or company."

2. "(of a place) the quality of being unfrequented and remote; isolation."

Emptiness:

1. "the state of containing nothing."

2. "the quality of lacking meaning or sincerity; meaninglessness."

People always talk about how they like to be alone and "want some space", but when you look up the definition, do you see anything positive that goes with these words? I don't want to be alone. It's scary and it is empty.

Have you ever lost something you thought you'd have forever? Maybe not forever but at least for a long time? At the young age of 12, I lost everything I thought I would have forever. The movie The Vow has a quote that I hold dear to my heart, "Life is about moments of impact, and how they change our lives forever." In my life, the moment of impacted that changed my life forever was January 29th, 2010.

The morning of January 29th was like every other morning. I got up, got dressed, got on the school bus, and went to school. Being that it was the day before my birthday, I was excited, yet I knew birthdays weren't anything special in my household. It was around 2 p.m. and I was sitting in class when I got called down to the office. I will never forget the moment I walked into that door. That moment changed my life forever.

Standing in front of me was a taller man with short brown hair. He wore khakis and a nice polo shirt. I had never seen this man in my life. He called me into a conference room where we sat. I was scared. Things at home weren't the greatest. My dad had gotten angry, and my mom had cried for several nights. My brother was in pain, physically and mentally. I had bruises on my body and nightmares of pain. I knew what this moment was before he even said anything. "I need you to tell me what is going on at home," he said with a serious tone, looking at me where I had fear written all over my face.

That day I lost everything I ever knew. I lost my family, I lost myself. Throughout my life, I have faced obstacles I would never have even dreamed of. I have put people before myself more times than I can count. I have lost who I am. I have built my own life from scratch. I have done all this and yet I have never felt so alone.

The word loneliness scares me on its own. I am afraid of the dark and I am 20 years old. I am not afraid of darkness itself, I am more afraid of what the darkness has in it that I can't see. I am afraid of the emptiness that it holds. I am afraid of the loneliness you can hear. All because of one moment in my life I am afraid of those two simple words.

Moments of impact, they leave with a future that only you can decide.