It's Okay To Mourn The Person They Used to Be

Ten days ago, I wrote “I Ended A 17-Year Friendship With A Text.” It was about one of my oldest and best friends, “Cindy.”

The Best Friend Who Always Had My Back

Cindy and I met in high school. She was amazing, and I loved her just so much.

Through the years I had Cindy’s back, and she had mine. We thought the world of each other. I tried to be there when bad things happened, and she reciprocated. It was the kind of friendship that was based on unconditional love.

And that was how it went for almost nine years.

But, as I said in the article, time passes. People change. They respond to the events of life differently, revealing new facets of themselves, new sides that you never knew were there. People are kaleidoscopes.

The Friendship Starts to Crack

The cracks started the first time she turned on me. It was after my first suicide scare (I didn’t try anything. A very well-timed routine checkup at the doctor’s took place, and when she heard how I was doing she pulled a Code Blue). Cindy came over that night, and she cried sitting next to me. She begged me, “don’t do this,” and I didn’t.

Two weeks later, we were out walking around town with another friend. We sat down at an ice cream place and she turned to me. I will never forget this moment. I know what seat she was in, what boots she was wearing. Because she looked me in the eye and told me that she was mad at me for being suicidal. “Because I’ve lost so many people who didn’t want to go.”

I was terrified and suicidal (at the time, all I knew was that my mind had snapped. Seven years later, we figured out that it was the sudden development of delayed-onset C-PTSD). I was in no way out of the woods.

And saying that was one of the cruelest things anyone has ever done to me.

The Cracks Keep Growing, And The Friendship Ends

I won’t turn this into a catalog of her faults. I’m sure I’ve had mine. But from that moment, our friendship was different. The ironic thing is that I had had contingency plans in place if I got that call from her for years. I guess we never thought that I would be one making the call.

Life continued. The wheel turned. And I watched, slowly, as the core of the person I loved shrank. And as long as I could see a spark of the person she had been left in her, I stayed. Smiling, making excuses. But as I said in my first piece, our friendship eventually became chains in my mind.

Over the summer I sent a text. The friendship ended. And I was free.

Taking Time To Mourn

It’s 1:30am right now, and I’m writing this in a hotel room (can’t sleep, stupid headache). And I’m passing the time by having imaginary conversations in my head with a mutual friend of ours (you know, as one does).

In this conversation, I’m telling her how much I wish she could have met the old Cindy. The badass, slightly punk nerd who geeked out on Shakespeare, with an incredible core of kindness in her. I’m telling our mutual friend how much she would have loved her.

And as I continue this imaginary conversation, I find that I’m crying. But you know what? That’s okay.

Cindy isn’t dead, but the person that I loved is gone. She’s been gone for years, and she’s not coming back.

I can take some time, in the wee hours of the morning, to remember her. To remember her brilliance, and remember how much I loved her.

And I can take some time to mourn.