First, I am going to have throw it all the way back to August, 1999. The reason I'm bringing up the past is because thats when I started kindergarten and that is when I met the best group of friends anyone could ever have: Gradie, Rachel, and Cassidy. We would always try to have the same classes and be together all the time but, sometimes Cassidy wasn't able to be at school all the time because she was sick. When Cassidy was younger, before we even met, she was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis which is basically a life-threatening condition that mainly effects the lungs (it can effect other parts of the body as well) but with this condition it made it extremely difficult for her to breath because she constantly had lung infections.

So all though elementary school, Cassidy had stays in the hospital multiple times. Sometimes for weeks and sometimes it was up to a month. But we would try to make the trip down to the children's hospital in Nashville to visit her and keep her up to date on all of the elementary school drama. But once middle school hit most of us went to different schools. Rachel and Cassidy went to East, Gradie went to Moss, and I went to BGCA.

Surprisingly we all did stay close and would still talk on the phone all the time and have sleepovers. Then high school came and I was finally back with Cassidy and Gradie, but Gradie went to a different high school so we didn't get to see her as much. We all had different friend groups but at the end of the day i knew I was still best friends with them. I only had one class with Rachel, Spanish 2 if anyone is curious, but I had one classes with Cassidy and lunch with her, too, so it was basically like hitting the jackpot. But as Cassidy got older her health started deteriorating, she would miss months of school from being in the hospital. She knew she wasn't getting any better but that never stopped her from doing anything. We all knew that she was sick but when we were younger, we didn't truly understand how bad it was.

The year 2014 is when some of us realized how much this disease really did effect her body. That January she got phenomena and was sent to a hospital in Louisville, shortly after that she found out that she needed a double lung and kidney transplant so they moved her up to Pittsburgh. As she waited for her transplant, her health kept getting worse. The days turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months of just waiting. On June 4, Cassidy turned 20 and on June 12, her body gave up and she went home. Her family lost a daughter, sister, granddaughter, niece, and I lost my best friend. The life expectancy for my Cassie in 1999 was only 18 years old. Today the life expectancy for some with cystic fibrosis is 37 years old.

It has been a little over two years now and I still have no idea how to move on from that. When you lose a best friend you lose so much more than that. You lose the person who will always keep your secrets and never judge you for it, you lose your sing along partner for 12 hour road trips to Florida, you lose the person who will stay up with you till 2 in the morning talking about everything under the sun. But the worst thing about losing your best friend is that I don't get to grow up with her anymore. She won't get to help me plan my wedding and stand up there with me and I won't ever be able to see her graduate college and do so many wonderful things with her life. All those plans Gradie, Rachel, Cassidy, and I made won't ever get to happen. When I lost my best friend I lost one of the closest things I ever had to having a sister. But I know she no longer has any health problems which makes me happy for her. I know she's healthy and reunited with her grandpa so I know she's okay. While I obviously know that my best friend is no longer I still know that she is still watching over me and all of other people that cared about her as well. When your best friend is gone you miss them all the time but you know that they are still keeping their eye on you and making sure you don't do too much stupid stuff. So thank you for being my fearless best friend for many years. You will always be the strongest person I know and I love you no matter what.