To My Best Friend Who Loves Me, Even When I Don't Love Myself

My best friend and I met because our daughters were in first grade together. They started playing together, and begged us to meet.

We actually ended up bumping into each other at the craft store. Our kids were ecstatic, and we made a play date for them to hang out ASAP.

When she dropped her daughter at my house, she walked in and never left. Not because she was worried about the kids, but because she and I didn’t stop talking.

And that’s how we are. We never want to leave each other when we are apart. Our kids have to drag us to the car.

It’s pretty awesome, and the thing is, it honestly happened “overnight.” That’s the thing about friendships that were meant to be. They just happen, and you don’t have to force them

The thing is, it just works. When my marriage fell apart, she was the first person I told. I remember, I called her and invited her to Olive Garden– no kids.

That’s how she knew it was serious.

She liked my ex-husband. They got along, and she didn’t totally understand why or what had happened, because even though she is my very best friend, I still kept my failing marriage from her.

She wasn’t upset about that, though. She understood. You see, she understood because her marriage was secretly falling apart, too. Three months later, she was in the middle of a divorce herself.

And that’s when we leaned on each other a lot.

Our kids spent enough time together that even all these years later, they call each other sisters. And, she and I cried, hated life, and eventually laughed again.

All this time, I was ramping up my career. I fell in love with someone, got married, and she accepted him immediately. I knew she would.

That’s just who she is.

Now we are both in happy, awesome relationships, our daughters are in high school and we don’t need to lean on each other as much.

Life can get in the way of friendships. And that’s rough. Sometimes friendships stutter, or end all together. But not ours.

And there are times when we have to throw our calendars out the window and just spend the day floating in the pool together. Or we sneak out on a Thursday evening just to get margaritas together.

And there are times when we can’t. There are times when our lives are so busy, when our families need so much of us, or just times when we want to catch up on sleep, so we miss each other.