Saying goodbye is never easy... Goodbyes are not something I am good at. I have a tendency to hold onto anything and everything that ever meant something to me. But most specifically, people.
This past weekend, I said goodbye to someone that I will probably never see again, but I worked with nearly everyday for 2 years. It's a part of life. It was a good move on their part. And I was lucky I was allowed to go in and be a part of the departure. But I still bawled my eyes out when I said goodbye. Me and a coworker after we said bye, went to our office and cried some more. And there really are no real words of comfort that you can say because as much as you're prepared for goodbye, it still hurts. It doesn't stop hurting when the person is gone. It doesn't necessarily get easier like they say, you just kind of adjust. That hole doesn't really ever go away.
My college suitemate was my best friend throughout college. I mean, we did everything together. And then, one day, she was gone. We stopped talking. We stopped hanging out. It was slow, and you could feel it coming, but that didn't stop the pain of goodbye, even though those words were never said. And if she came back into my life and was like 'hey, let's be friends again,' I would probably do it without a second thought because I still miss her and I think about her a lot.
And I still talk to my Nana as if she's here a lot. I tell her about my day, and when things have been hard. I tell her that I miss her, and ask her to send me signs sometimes. The thing is though, we we're never super close when she was alive. We didn't really talk much. I saw her a couple times a year, and there weren't really phone calls in between or anything. I was never that great of a granddaughter to her. But now that she's dead, I talk to her all the time. It's easier to talk to her than to acknowledge the fact that we will never have that great relationship.
I know, I'm not the only one out there in the world that struggles with goodbyes. However, goodbyes often feel lonely and isolating. I often can't help that think that I didn't do enough, that I wasn't good enough, that I was the reason it happened in the first place. But reality is, it doesn't work like that. Goodbyes happen all the time, and you can't hate people for moving on with their lives. And I can say, for me, I don't hate the people who have moved on with their lives. I don't blame them. I think I blame myself a lot more, even though I know, and am well aware that sometimes growth happens at different times and differently to everyone. Sometimes we just outgrow people or they outgrow us, and it's that simple. We can't stop death. We can't be perfect, despite our wishes for it. We can't make people stay when they don't want to. We can't always stay, even if we want to. It's just not a realistic of expectation of life. And it sucks.
Goodbyes are just one of the many things that just happen in life, and are completely guaranteed to happen at some point. And all we can do is just grieve what we've lost, and feel the feelings that we don't really want to. So, if you're struggling with a goodbye right now, know that I feel you and I am with you. The hole may not fill, but that hole will always be theirs. <3
Till next time <3 C