Anyone who reads my articles or just knows me, for that matter, knows I am never afraid to tackle sensitive subjects and this week is no different. Writing is my coping mechanism, as I've said before, so this is me attempting to cope a year later.

A year ago my world and the worlds of many people around me were flipped completely upside down. I had yet to experience a major loss in my life (that I could actually remember) up until this point. This, I suppose, sounds fortunate, except that I was at the disadvantage of not knowing how to deal with my feelings. I shifted between trying to comfort those around me to trying to hold myself together and we all know that's never easy. I felt a lot of emotions a year ago; pain, anger, heartache. I questioned God, sometimes I still do, but mostly I felt alone.

I hated that I felt alone, because I wasn't, but in a certain sense, I was. One minute I was home with family and friends, who were more family than anything, and we were all experiencing the loss of the same person, but the next minute I was at college and I was alone in my pain. I thought I would be able to separate myself from what happened at home, but I couldn't. Most of us have experienced loss in our life and we know that while others have been there, it's different when they don't know the person who passed. People didn't quite understand why I was so devastated at the loss of my good friend's grandmother and that made me feel even more isolated.

Normally there isn't really a connection between you and your friend's grandmother, but for me there was. I would say that half of my life was spent in her house, it was as much of home to me, or to anyone really, as our own homes. A loss is always heartbreaking, but the loss of the person who connected so many people, is absolutely devastating. It takes a special person to give without ever asking for anything in return or to open up their home to friends and strangers alike. That's what my friends at college could never see or understand and that's why for a very long time I felt so alone, that it took a heavy toll on me.

You can relate to someone's loss all you want, but you still won't know about the parties or pictures or card games. You'll never hear the songs and the terrible singing or the stories that make you laugh so hard you cry. No one, but those who felt the same loss with me can know just how important one person can be to so many people.

It's been a year now and while I still get sad and occasionally a little angry, I no longer feel alone. I have learned just how different holidays can be and just how difficult staying in touch is when you lose your center. I've learned to give a little more and to keep pushing on, even when I'm tired or I feel like a failure. I learned that when my mom said missing people doesn't get any easier it is so painfully true, but I know I am not alone and I never truly was. Some nights, when I'm at home, where it's harder to push everything to the back of my mind, I cry, but I know that that is ok.

Time will never fill the silence, it will never erase the terrible singing or the awful picture or the countless hours of spending time with family that wasn't blood. Nothing can replace that feeling of home and togetherness, but all of us are doing our best to persevere. I don't know that we ever truly recover from a loss, I'm not entirely sure that we are supposed to. This year has been full of ups and downs, but it's been full of growth as well.

At the end of it all, when pain or difficult times or heartache come, I know that I have a pretty great guardian angel watching over me, and I think that's the most I could ask for.