Words are amazing. They can talk for you when you don’t know what to say. They can make you feel emotion. And they can represent a plethora of other things for a person. To me, words are how I cope with many things, including sadness. A year ago, I experienced a sadness I’ve never felt before. I experienced a loss.

Losing anyone in your life is traumatic. And it can make you feel dark inside. Loss can make you feel like something is physically gone. Along with losing someone, you feel like you lose a part of yourself. It can make you feel like you can’t breathe and something inside you is just weighing down your lungs. It can make a black hole appear and suck down every bit of happiness you once had. Loss can make you feel ways you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy and it sucks.

But the one good thing that comes from a loss is support. Support from family, support from friends and even support from strangers. This support shows you the good that is left in the world, when you can’t see anything but bad. It’s an incredible feeling to be supported, especially when you are at your lowest point.

When I lost my friend, I couldn’t sleep. I would lie in bed at night thinking of all the things I wish I had said and all the things I wish I could have done. I would think about her family and how they must be feeling. I would think about her best friends and all the people who were missing her as much as I was. But over time, I came to realize I couldn’t change anything, and that was probably the hardest thing to understand. No matter what I did, no matter what I said, I couldn’t bring her back. I was hopeless. But, I wasn’t alone.

My friend would always find ways to end up in my thoughts. Sometimes it was a song I heard on the radio and other times it was a picture that sparked a memory. She wasn’t with me physically, but she was with me. Knowing that made things get better. Knowing that she could still be a part of my life without physically being there was the greatest satisfaction I could ask for. A person’s soul doesn’t die with them. It lives in everything you do and everything you see.

My friend got a saying tattooed on her ribs before she passed that said, “Will you live or simply exist?” This friend lived and she lived well and she lived love. And that is how anyone who passes should be remembered -- for exactly who they were. They may be in a different place, but who they are isn’t different.

When you lose someone, it’s easy to lose yourself. You can lose yourself in doubt, in sadness, and in desperation. But I’ve learned that you can find yourself in that person again. You can find happiness. You can find ways to make yourself feel better. And you will. It’s not a matter of getting over the loss of someone but rather it is coming to terms with it. You never really get over someone, you just get used to them being gone.

So to all of those in the world who have lost a friend, know that it gets better. The pit in your stomach won’t always be there and the tears won’t always fall from your eyes. When you look back on memories and photographs you’ll learn to smile. And you’ll learn that it’s okay to smile. You’ll be okay. It will all be okay.