Its funny how people tend to take things for granted until they're gone. We are all guilty of this, and as I recently found out, I am too. Growing up I always had a set idea of what my family was--there were my parents who were happily married and then there was me. It was just a given to me but that all changed when I got home from my freshman year of college last summer. My parents split up while I was away at school.

In a lot of ways it feels like it just happened. While some people have to go through seeing their parents fight and live with them while they figure out how to handle the situation I was three hundred miles away at school. At first I had no idea what was going on, and then when I did find out I was only home for a few months before I was back in my own little bubble three hundred miles away again. I didn’t see either of my parents again until the holidays, even though months had passed and I talked to each of them almost every day it was still fresh.

Sitting at the Thanksgiving table in Rochester with my mom and all her family was one of the hardest days I have ever experienced. I have never not been home or a holiday and never not seen both of my parents. It was so difficult that when we went around the table talking about what we were thankful for I started to cry so much that my cousin’s boyfriend (hey Riley!) had to console me. Apparently it's hard to be thankful for things when you're trying to get through you first holiday season where your parents aren't together.

If possible Christmas was even harder. I have always loved Christmas, my family has always made such a big deal about the whole thing and my favorite part of it was spending time with my family, decorating, baking cookies, picking out gifts… this year, I got to celebrate twice but it still wasn't right. My mom went up to her family in Rochester on Christmas which meant that again I didn't get to see one of my parents on a major holiday and I once again found myself crying. This time in my ten year old cousin’s bedroom. So naturally she walked in and pretended not to notice that I was crying. Instead she tried to make me smile and went back down stairs.

Everything happens for a reason, at least that's what people say, but it doesn't mean that those things are easy to deal with.

This past semester and especially the holidays have been a huge struggle for me. There were days that my depression got the better of me and I couldn't get myself to enjoy what was going on around me. Its great to see both of my parents but sometimes only being in the same state as one of my parents at a time has been difficult especially at the holidays, but I'm surviving.